No, Jamie Raskin didn’t say he wouldn’t certify the election if Donald Trump wins

U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., has drawn recent news coverage for his comments about certifying the 2024 presidential election. But one statement attributed to him in some social media posts isn’t authentic. 

“BREAKING,” A Nov. 5 Threads post said, “Jamie Raskin said, ‘Let folks cast their votes for Trump if that’s their choice. But mark my words, we won’t be certifying the election. He might win, but we’ll ensure he doesn’t step foot in the Oval Office.’”

The post adds: “Tell me again which party is seeking to destroy democracy and install an unelected candidate?” 

It was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and Threads.)

Raskin responded to an X post sharing the same statement attributed to him.

“This fictional ‘quote’ is 100% fabricated,” Raskin said in a Nov. 5 X post. “It’s one more lie in the stream of right-wing lies designed to undermine our election. Despite this actionable libel and all the disinformation, America is having a free and fair election and Congress will certify the winner.”

In October, Axios reported that Raskin, ranking member of the House Oversight Committee and a former member of the House Select Committee on the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, said that if Trump “won a free, fair and honest election, then we would obviously accept it.” 

“However,” Axios wrote, “Raskin said he ‘definitely’ doesn’t assume that Trump would use free, fair and honest means to secure a victory. … Trump ‘is doing whatever he can to try to interfere with the process whether we’re talking about manipulating electoral college counts in Nebraska or manipulating the vote count in Georgia or imposing other kinds of impediments,’” Raskin said. 

This came up again in a Nov. 4 Axios story about House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., “at each other’s throats over which party can truly be trusted to certify the 2024 election.” 

Johnson “reacted strongly” to Raskin saying that if Trump “won a free, fair and honest election, then we would obviously accept it,” Axios said.

“I would hope every member of Congress, including Jamie Raskin, would commit to following the Constitution and certifying the election,” Johnson said in the story. 

Axios quoted Raskin responding to Johnson’s comments in a statement, saying he is “of course committed to following the Constitution and certifying the actual results of the 2024 presidential election, and I’m thrilled to learn that Speaker Johnson says he is too.” 

But we rate claims that the quote attributed to Raskin about refusing to certify the election False.