{"id":50434,"date":"2020-11-15T01:49:30","date_gmt":"2020-11-15T08:49:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/for-montezuma-county-patriots-the-presidential-race-isnt-over\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:51:28","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:51:28","slug":"for-montezuma-county-patriots-the-presidential-race-isnt-over","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/for-montezuma-county-patriots-the-presidential-race-isnt-over\/","title":{"rendered":"For Montezuma County Patriots, the presidential race isn\u2019t over"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Montezuma
Montezuma County Patriots rally in the parking lot of the Ute Coffee Shop in Cortez early Saturday morning before their weekly Freedom Ride down Main Street. Participants gather for prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance, and depart with chants of \u201cfour more years\u201d for President Donald Trump.<\/span>Emily Hayes\/The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Patriots also say 2020 election results are not final. But as of Saturday, former Vice President Joe Biden led the race with more than 78,633,000 individual votes and 290 Electoral College votes compared with President Donald Trump\u2019s 72,910,000 individual votes and 232 electoral votes.<\/p>\n

Biden is the projected winner of the White House election, but Trump has refused to concede. The president had challenged the election results in court, but has not yet produced proof for his claims<\/a> of fraud and irregularities.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur election is not over \u2026 we will not lose this battle,\u201d Tiffany Ghere, co-organizer of the Freedom Rides, told those who rallied at the Ute Coffee Shop early Saturday morning.<\/p>\n

For the Patriots, the battle over the election, and political power in the country, is important because \u201cour way of life is in jeopardy,\u201d Ghere said.<\/p>\n

The Electoral College meets Dec. 14 to vote for president, and Biden has more than the 270 electoral votes needed to win the race, as well as insurmountable leads in states such as Michigan, Nevada, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Arizona.<\/p>\n

Most states use their statewide popular vote to cast its electors, but there is a long-shot legal theory that Republican-controlled legislatures in states such as Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania will ignore the popular vote and appoint their own electors.<\/p>\n

Federal law allows this<\/a> if states have \u201c\u2018failed\u2019 to make a choice\u201d by the day the Electoral College meets, The Atlantic magazine reported. But there is no evidence of systemic fraud or wrongdoing in any state, and Biden\u2019s lead has made it clear states have made a choice.<\/p>\n

\"For
For Montezuma County Patriots, presidential election results are not final until President Donald Trump&#x2019;s legal challenges to results are decided.<\/span>Emily Hayes\/The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Department of Homeland Security called<\/a> the 2020 presidential election \u201cthe most secure in American history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Loren Lewis, a participant in the Montezuma County Patriots\u2019 Freedom Rides, said he doesn\u2019t know whether Trump\u2019s legal challenges would succeed, but the election is \u201cnot over until it\u2019s over.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whatever happens, the message of the Freedom Rides remains the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t about the election, it\u2019s about patriotism,\u201d Lewis said.<\/p>\n

Raymond Goodall, who ran for Cortez City Council this year, said, \u201cWe\u2019ve got to have Trump in there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump has always stood with the people,\u201d while politicians such as Biden act only for themselves, Goodall said. He is concerned about tax increase under a Biden presidency to pay for an increase in government programs, he said.<\/p>\n

Biden\u2019s foreign policy does not put Americans first, Goodall said, it benefits other countries like China.<\/p>\n

In the bitter wind and light snowfall Saturday in downtown Cortez, Ghere said the Patriots are \u201cnot fair-weathered.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will not roll over, we will not bow down and give up this freedom,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

ehayes@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Montezuma County Patriots rally in the parking lot of the Ute Coffee Shop in Cortez early Saturday morning before their weekly Freedom Ride down Main Street. Participants gather for prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance, and depart with chants of \u201cfour more years\u201d for President Donald Trump.Emily Hayes\/The Journal The Patriots also say 2020 election […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50435,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[13,28,167,265],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-50434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-local-news-lead","tag-politics"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50434"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87747,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50434\/revisions\/87747"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50434"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=50434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}