Retiring GOP lawmaker warns Trump will try to steal the next election

Gonzalez was one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump in the wake of the January 6 attack on the Capitol. In the face of relentless attacks and threats directed toward him and his family afterward, the Ohio Republican chose to retire from Congress at the end of his term and avoid facing off with a Trump-backed primary challenger next year.

With Trump appearing to prepare for another presidential run in 2024, Gonzalez told CNN he will try to stop Trump from running the same 2020 playbook to overturn another election, but he warned that Trump could have more help next time from those in charge of running -- and certifying -- elections.

"January 6 was an unconstitutional attempt led by the President of the United States to overturn an American election and reinstall himself in power illegitimately. That's fallen nation territory, that's third world country territory. My family left Cuba to avoid that fate. I will not let it happen here," Gonzalez said.

"I think it's all pushing towards one of two outcomes: He either wins legitimately, which he may do, or if he loses again, you just try to steal it," he added.

Gonzalez was one of numerous Republicans targeted by Trump in the year since the 2020 election after they stood up to his attempts to subvert his election loss to Joe Biden. Many of the GOP officials who took the brunt of Trump's wrath spoke to CNN for "Trumping Democracy: An American Coup," warning about the danger Trump still poses to American democracy as he keeps spreading the lie that the election was stolen from him.

"I'm afraid that the kind of political violence, the kind of abandonment of the rule of law, the kind of abandonment of the constitution that we watched, does threaten the foundations of democracy, the foundations of our system," said Rep. Liz Cheney, the Wyoming Republican who was kicked out of House GOP leadership over her criticism of Trump.

"And the fact that so many in my party are willing to be silent, are complicit, are enabling it, adds very much to the peril," added Cheney, one of two Republicans serving on the House select committee investigating January 6.

"I have real concerns about the future of this democracy," said Bill Gates, a Republican supervisor in Arizona's Maricopa County who pushed back on claims that there was fraud in the 2020 election result. "I didn't think we had this sort of pull towards authoritarianism in our in our democracy."

Gonzalez pointed to election officials like Gates as a key reason Trump was unsuccessful in his attempts to subvert the election result in 2020.

"The institutions don't hold themselves," he said. "In the moments of truth, you need the right people to pass the most difficult tests. We had just enough people on January 6 pass the test. We have to make sure we have equal number of people to continue to pass the test going forward."

But Gonzalez and other Republicans fear the officials who stopped Trump in 2020 may be replaced by those "more beholden to him than their oath," thanks to the former President's revenge campaign against those who opposed his election lies.

READ MORE: CNN