The Last Stand: The 2020 Contest May Be Our Final Chance For Free And Fair Elections
Word came Sunday night that the Republican National Committee is suing the state of California for its plan to send mail-in ballots to every eligible citizen. Registering a “complaint for declaratory and injuctive relief,” the RNC claimed the move violated the Constitution and that governor Gavin Newsom had created “a recipe for disaster” that “invites fraud, coercion, theft, and otherwise illegitimate voting.”
The idea of mail-in ballots has caught on during a generational pandemic that makes a traditional election look increasingly more unlikely. By the time the nation votes, chances are we will be knee-deep in the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic, and gathering at local polls, standing in lines, and interacting with volunteers, most of them senior citizens who make up the most likely victim base for the virus, is an absurdity to even the most diehard citizen.
Something must give. For the election to be held, and it must be held, an alternative infrastructure needs to be built and prepared. The problem is that the Republican Party inherently opposes any action broadens turnout. Ballot by mail will be fought tooth and nail by the GOP until the end and will probably need to be weighed on by a conservative Supreme Court that has been manipulated and stocked in the party’s favor.
As previously discussed, the Republican Party, as it is currently comprised, poses a threat to the future of America. It is a minority party that controls large swathes of power because the institutions of the Senate and the Electoral College were designed to give outsized-power to slave states in order to pass the Constitution and created the United States as we know them. As a result, this is a power group that looks at the electorate, particularly shifting demographics, and understands that to hold free and fair elections would mean certain defeat. Minority groups holding power and watching that power threatened often embrace authoritarianism and war against democratic institutions in order to maintain their power. In America, this has taken the form of gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, and disinformation campaigns.
That the GOP has filed this lawsuit is no surprise. Their survival depends on infringing upon the people’s right to vote. Mail-in ballots mean more participation and more participation means political extinction. Even if the GOP has to make its own supporters, many of them older and in danger, march into the streets and face certain death, as they did in Wisconsin, they will do it happily.
As it always is with Donald Trump, the situation is both more complicated than it seems and way simpler. Trump understands that mail-in ballots or free and fair elections would mean an election loss, but he also holds a particular paranoid view of the world that inspires his anger.
Trump’s personal philosophy is delusional positive thinking, which he learned studying under self-help and prosperity gospel guru Norman Vincent Peale. Going back to the 2016 Election, Trump was faced with an overwhelming loss in the popular vote despite his victory in the Electoral College. As Trump was unable to accept the possibility that more people voted against him than for him, he invented an alternate reality wherein the difference in votes was explained away via fraud and criminal activity. His complaint that 3 million votes were cast illegally, and the resulting “investigation,” was part of his incessant need to protect himself from any reality wherein he is not perfect and beloved.
Again, the GOP and Trump find themselves symbiotically linked. Republicans need to resist measures to increase the electorate and Trump is steadfastly determined to believe there are conspiracies against him. It is these interlocking needs and beliefs that have brought the GOP and Trump together, and unfortunately it is these interlocking needs and beliefs that will more than likely interrupt free and fair elections as far as we have them.
If you want free and fair elections, in November or beyond, the time to fight for them is now. In fact, it is past. We have watched for decades and generations as the Republican Party has undermined them and engineered them for the purposes of power. Even without a pandemic, they would have attempted to undermine them in 2020, but now the opportunity is there and obvious. As with all things Trump, people need to realize institutions are only as strong as our ability and willingness to defend them. We cannot assume that laws and institutions will save themselves or survive his onslaught. Unfortunately, we’ve already seen too many instances where that is simply not the case.
Jared Yates Sexton is the author of American Rule: How A Nation Conquered The World But Failed Its People, available for pre-order from Dutton/Penguin-Random House. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, The Daily Beast, Politico, and elsewhere. Currently he serves as an associate professor of writing at Georgia Southern University and is the co-host of The Muckrake Podcast.
