NC Republican insists 'no one will ever convince me' Trump's election lies aren't true

A North Carolina state legislator vowed he'll never accept President Joe Biden legitimately won the 2020 election after insisting he's not crazy to believe the vote was stolen.

State Sen. Bob Steinburg again insisted on Facebook that he believes former president Donald Trump's unfounded conspiracy theories about the election -- whether they involve China, the CIA, the FBI or an alleged blackmail campaign against Chief Justice John Roberts -- rather than accept the assurance of numerous officials and courts that the vote was conducted lawfully, reported WRAL-TV.

"I, like many of you, probably 75 million or more of you, who do not believe that Joe Biden actually was elected," Steinburg said in a video posted Inauguration Day on his Facebook account.

The TV station asked all 27 other GOP state senators whether they agreed with Steinburg, who easily won re-election in November and represents much of the state's coastal area, but only Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger's office replied.

"Sen. Steinburg is an elected member of the North Carolina legislature and can and does speak his mind," said Berger spokesman Pay Ryan. "We are not in the business of policing the speech of other members, who are responsible only to the voters who elected them."

A reporter pressed the spokesman to say who the Senate president believes won the election, and Ryan conceded that no evidence could prove the election had been stolen from the former president.

"The Trump campaign exhausted all legal avenues to press its claims regarding the election," Ryan said. "The evidence produced in court did not meet the standard necessary for something as serious as changing the outcome of a presidential election. Joe Biden is president, and hopefully he does a good job."

Only one GOP senator, state Sen. Warren Daniel, took a follow-up call from the TV station, and he said "we need to move on" now that the election was over.

"As far as I know, everybody in America can still have their own opinion," Daniel said, "and Sen. Steinburg can have his."

That's basically what Steinburg -- who begged Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act and suspend civil liberties to remain in office -- said when he replied by email to a request for additional comment about Biden's election, which he said on Facebook had caused "Lady Liberty" to shed a tear.

"This election was stolen – no one – no one will ever convince me otherwise," Steinburg wrote.

"This is what I think," he added, "and if I'm not mistaken I believe free speech and having an opinion are still 'technically' legal in America. But for how much longer with the new regime is anyone's guess."