Sen. Rand Paul during Wednesday Senate hearing: 'The election in many ways was stolen'

Sen. Rand Paul said during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing on Wednesday that fraud occurred during the 2020 election, which he said "in many ways was stolen."

During the hearing, which was focused on irregularities related to the 2020 election, the Kentucky Republican suggested that there should be hearings in the future about the actions state legislatures will take to ensure that election law is honored and enforced.

"So I think there's a lotta work to be done. While we will not dictate it to the states, I think we should have hearings going into the next year hearing from state legislatures and what they're going to do to make sure election law is upheld, not changed by people who are not legislators," he said noting, "we do have an interest in that."

"I don't want it to be federalized," Paul said. He noted "we can't just say it didn't happen. We can't just say, 'Oh 4,000 people voted in Nevada that were non-citizens and we're just going to ignore it.' We're gonna sweep it under the rug and say, 'Oh, the courts have decided the facts.' The courts have not decided the facts. The courts never looked at the facts. The courts don't like elections," he said, remarking that the courts "stayed out of it by finding an excuse, standing or otherwise to stay out of it." 

"But the fraud happened. The election in many ways was stolen. And the only way it'll be fixed is by in the future reenforcing the laws," he said.