Beaming conservative's false claims repeatedly smacked down on CNN: 'Just patently false!'

A conservative commentator met repeated pushback on "CNN News Central" for justifying President Donald Trump's attempts to take over this year's midterm elections.

The 79-year-old president signed his second election-related executive order in this term directing the Department of Homeland Security to create federal lists of citizens and ordering the U.S. Postal Service to transmit mail ballots to only those voters, and conservative activist Terry Schilling insisted Trump was addressing a real issue and not simply trying to tip the scales in Republicans' favor.

"Look, to say that we're terrified of losing in the midterms is ridiculous," said Schilling, president of the anti-trans American Principles Project. "It is the trend, is the vast majority of the midterm elections after every single Republican president or Democrat president wins, there's a huge pushback in the election. So to act like we're wetting the bed over this is just preposterous. But I will say that for the people that are concerned about all of the changes that President Trump is making to our election system, we should rewind a few years. I mean, in 2020 was the first election where not just millions of ballots, but tens of millions of ballots were cast through the mail. This has never been done in American history. Jimmy Carter, for example, wrote an entire brief and report on election integrity where he admonished nations that did mail-in balloting. It's super unsecure, so I think we need some –"

"Donald Trump just voted by mail in the special election," interrupted former Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh.

"No, no, listen," Schilling replied.

"But there's also not any evidence of widespread fraud and certainly not in the U.S., widespread fraud," added host Erica Hill.

Schilling shifted the terms of the debate.

"But the argument is not that there is not widespread fraud," Schilling argued. "The argument being made against this executive order is that he's making all of these changes to federal elections. I'm sorry, but in California, they allow illegal immigrants to register to vote. They're only allowed to vote in state elections, apparently. [Editor's note: California law allows noncitizens to vote in some local elections but not in state or federal elections.] But we know that these laws are fungible. You know, we're up against an entire party that really doesn't even believe in American citizenship."

Singh heard enough.

"I am sorry, I have to absolutely object to that," she said.

"Please do, I love that," Schilling interjected, beaming into her face.

"The party that is on the other side of that – I mean, that that is just patently false," Singh said. "We are not against citizenship, and what we want and what Democrats have been fighting for is just access to to voting and voting by mail is something that I do, something that the president does, that is inherently safe, that is secure, and something that can be done with ease."

"It is not secure," Schilling insisted. "We need rules."

"There's no evidence that it's not secure," Hill added, "that it has been widely insecure in the United States."

Schilling argued that the Department of Justice had seized absentee ballots in Georgia that showed signatures that didn't match ones on voter registrations, and legal expert Shan Wu challenged his assertion.

"Just because they got them, it means they're fraudulent?" Wu said.

"No, it means that their their signatures don't match," Schilling replied, and Wu chuckled. "Look, the reality is the American people need to have assurances that their elections are safe and secure."

"They do," Singh exclaimed. "They have in every single election that's happened."

Schilling shifted the terms of debate once again.

"Sabrina, Sabrina, let me just say," he said, beaming into her face again. "Let me say half of the country, half of the country disagrees."

"That's actually not true," Singh corrected.

"Yes, half of the country has very big concerns," Schilling insisted. "They're called Republicans, about how our elections are handled."

A recent poll found 57 percent of Republicans say voter fraud is the biggest threat to elections, and Singh told Schilling she's talked to many Republicans who don't have concerns about the issue Trump's order is purported to address.

"But you haven't talked to me or my friends," Schilling said.