Karoline Leavitt’s One-Word Defense Of Trump Is Raising Alarms

As if President Donald Trump’s comments about nationalizing United States elections were not alarming enough, Karoline Leavitt has now sparked further concerns about what the Trump administration is capable of. Trump has recently made headlines over his calls to “nationalize” voting due to his belief that there’s “horrible corruption.” Over the past several years, Trump has made unsubstantiated claims about election fraud.

In attempting to explain what Trump was trying to say, Leavitt both downplayed his comments and justified them in a way that people find deeply concerning.

Leavitt asserted that the president believes in the Constitution but…

And that is exactly the problem people had with what the White House press secretary said. Because her response should’ve started and ended with, “The president believes in the United States Constitution,” but it didn’t. Instead, Leavitt continued to speak, using the word “however” right after she said Trump believes in the Constitution. Um, what? The general consensus on social media is that if someone truly believes in the Constitution, there shouldn’t be a “however.”

This is what she had to say: “The president believes in the United States Constitution. However, he believes there has obviously been a lot of fraud and irregularities that have taken place in American elections. Voter ID is a highly popular and common-sense policy that the president wants to pursue, and he wants to pass legislation to make that happen for all states across the country.”

Leavitt: "The president believes in the United States Constitution, however … " pic.twitter.com/AAGTX5zJ0c

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 3, 2026

Leavitt’s use of the word “however” sparked a ton of backlash online.

Many people who reacted to Leavitt’s response online pointed out that the word doesn’t belong in this sentence. “There’s no however,” one person wrote in response. “Not how it works.” And someone else argued, “You don’t add a ‘however’ to something you actually believe in.”

Some people suggested that Trump believes in the Constitution in that he believes it exists, but it doesn’t mean he’s actually familiar with it or committed to upholding it. After all, back in May 2025, Trump was asked, “Don’t you need to uphold the Constitution of the United States as president?” His response at the time? “I don’t know. I have to respond by saying, again, I have brilliant lawyers that work for me, and they are going to obviously follow what the Supreme Court said.”

Reacting to Leavitt’s controversial use of the word “however,” one critic joked that Trump “hasn’t actually read [the Constitution] yet” because it has “too many big words and no pictures of giraffes and elephants.” Someone on Reddit shared a similar theory, writing, “… he has never read it nor understands any part of it that is explained to him. But he believes it’s there… somewhere.”

Some people wonder if Leavitt was, in a way, telling the truth.

Because some saw it as Leavitt essentially admitting that Trump does not truly care about the Constitution. “Our president believes in the Constitution, however….” another critic wrote on X. “Did Karoline Leavitt accidentally tell the truth?”

But “however” wasn’t the only word that bothered people. Others took issue with the use of the words “believe in” when referring to the Constitution. “It’s not something to ‘believe in,’ it’s an official, legal document that exists,” someone else argued.