Donald Trump, Slipping in Polls, Warns of ‘Stolen Election’

Donald J. Trump has lashed out at fellow Republicans, calling them “disloyal” and “far more difficult” than Hillary Clinton.

He has griped openly about a “rigged” political system, saying Wednesday he has “no respect” for the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates and complaining about a “defective” microphone in the first debate.

And on Monday, at a rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., he worried the election could be “stolen” from him and singled out Philadelphia, a city with a large African-American population, warning, “We have to make sure we’re protected.”

Mr. Trump’s ominous claims of a “stolen election” — which he often links to black, urban neighborhoods — are not entirely new. But in recent days, he has been pressing the theme with a fresh intensity, citing everything from the potential for Election Day fraud to media bias favoring Mrs. Clinton to rigged debates.

The assertions — which coincide with Mr. Trump’s decline in the polls in the wake of a shaky first debate performance and accusations he forced himself on women — highlight concerns that he may not accept a Clinton victory, breaking from the traditional decorum of defeated presidential candidates and undermining the legitimacy of the election result.

At rallies in recent days, Mr. Trump has become a candidate seething with excuses, perhaps the clearest manifestation of his frustration with his current standing in the polls and the growing alarm within his campaign that a White House victory is slipping away.

On Monday, on a trip through Pennsylvania, Mr. Trump began the day urging the almost entirely white crowd outside Pittsburgh to show up to vote, warning about “other communities” that could hijack his victory.With less than a month until the election, Mr. Trump’s litany of grievances has come fast and furious as he has begun to slip again in the polls.

On Friday, Mr. Trump also asserted, without offering evidence, that the Obama administration was allowing illegal immigrants to enter the country to vote in November, another example of how he claimed the election was being rigged. “They’re letting people pour into the country so they can go and vote,” Mr. Trump said at a meeting he held in New York with the National Border Patrol Council, the union of border patrol agents.

There has been no evidence that the administration is delaying deportations of — or intentionally letting in — immigrants so they can vote. (Illegal immigrants are barred from voting in federal elections.)

Mr. Trump’s claims seem to be resonating among his supporters. At a campaign stop in Iowa on Tuesday, a woman stood up and, her voice quavering, said she feared “voter fraud” before offering a stark call to action to Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana, Mr. Trump’s running mate.

“If Hillary Clinton gets in, I myself, I’m ready for a revolution because we can’t have her in,” the woman said.

Mr. Pence has emerged as Mr. Trump’s most loyal defender. But the call to revolt was a step too far for him. “Yeah, don’t say that,” he said, shaking his right hand as if to try to brush away her comment.

He then tried for a more positive spin: “There’s a revolution coming on November the 8th,” he said. “I promise you.”