If the best argument you have is that Terry McAuliffe, someone not one Democrat in 10 has even heard of, occupying a role not one Democrat in 10 could coherently describe, claimed that the historically complicated and tendentious 2000 election was stolen, I feel I've made my case well.

Again: that case is that there is nothing new about claims that elections were stolen, but that there is clearly something new about a President literally attempting (in more than one way) to rig an election after losing.

As it happens, I agree with you (or at least, the professors who taught you this at Northwestern) about the 2000 election --- that is, that it was correctly decided. But not only did Terry McAuliffe believe 2000 was wrongly decided, so did almost half the Supreme Court. And despite all that, there was a peaceful transfer of power, and not a whisper from the Democratic party that any of the institutions of government be bent or subverted to "correct" the result.

You haven't provided any evidence to connect obstinate federal employees to Trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election, and so I don't think I need to address that point. I don't agree with you about those obstinate employees (obstinate employees brought Nixon down, after all), but that doesn't matter.

The idea that the Democrats are somehow responsible for Trump's effort to literally rig the 2020 election is a strange hill to die on. I don't think many reasonable people would be sympathetic to the argument.