Trump Attempts to Tear Down This Country

I’ve long been an opponent of the two-party system in this country. The U.S. population is roughly 330 million people, and every 4 years, we’re given two options on who we want to lead our nation. Sure, there are third party possibilities, such as an Independent candidate, a Libertarian, a Green Party nominee, and someone who goes by the name Deez Nutz, but if we’re being honest, there are only two plausible winners: the Republican and the Democrat. A presidential election in this country is actually an example of the false dilemma fallacy, for we’re presented with just two options, when in fact there are more. It’s almost like, every 4 years, we’re forced to choose between cover bands of the Beatles and Rolling Stones, when in fact there are millions of people who don’t even like the genre of rock music, let alone those two specific bands – yet they’re told to vote for one of them as a civic duty.

 

In addition to this, we often like to brand ourselves as a democracy. For the record, we’re a republic, but to this point at least, I suppose we could label the U.S. as a democratic republic – for while the voters don’t technically decide the eventual winner, the electors in each state have gone with the will of the people. It still amazes me that we seemingly obsess with spreading democracy to other nations while we are still trying to figure out our own. The least populated state in the nation is Wyoming with 582,658 people. It’s worth 3 electoral votes on election day. Apply this math to California, which is the highest populated state and worth 55 electoral votes, and it would be worth 197 electoral votes on election day. The electoral college is about as representative of our voters as Will Ferrell would be of basketball players if he played in the NBA.

 

Given this, I think it’s safe to say the U.S. electoral system is flawed. Yet for as flawed as it might be, every 4 years we’ve respected the process and peacefully transitioned from one administration to another, regardless of their party affiliations. Well, now the Trump Administration is threatening to end all of these traditions, and no, that’s not hyperbole.

 

Whatever you want to call the United States – whether it be a democracy, republic, or democratic republic, the Trump Administration is threatening to transform it into a dictatorship/an autocracy.

 

Voter-suppression tactics are nothing new in the world of politics – especially by the modern-day Republican Party. Whether it be through gerrymandering; passing stricter voter-identification laws; or partially overriding the public’s vote of allowing convicted felons to vote once they’ve served their time, the GOP has not shied away from decreasing voter turnout – especially among college students, women, and persons of color, who are all traditionally reliable Democratic-leaning voters. However, we haven’t seen this level of attempted voter suppression in decades, if ever. In the run up to the 2020 presidential election, here’s what Trump and the GOP either attempted to do or successfully did to decrease voter turnout and/or sow doubt in the election results:

 

- eliminate mail-sorting machines

- tweet false information about mail-in voting

- provide inaccurate information about the date of the election and the location at which to vote

- slow down the mail-in voting process

- tighten voter identification laws

- limit drop-off boxes

- pass laws to prohibit the early counting of mail-in votes

- condense the time allotted for early voting

- attempt to stop the counting of votes at midnight on November 4^th (the election was on November 3^rd)

- spread disinformation about widespread voter fraud

- call for recounts in only black-dominated counties

- file lawsuits against states in order to remove counted votes to either reverse the outcome or prevent any outcome

- ask state legislatures to select Trump-loyal electors to go against the people’s vote

 

That’s probably not even the full list. I likely forgot one thing or another. But look at it. Read it again. The Republican Party is actively trying to overturn a United States presidential election, and with that, take down any semblance of democracy this country once possessed.

 

…and don’t try to tell me there was widespread voter fraud. That’s been debunked, even by the few Republican politicians with any sense of decency left in them - like Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. There was a recount in Georgia, and while it’s true Trump picked up some votes in said recount, Biden was still announced as the winner. Biden is currently up by 155,000 votes in Michigan and 82,000 in Pennsylvania. No number of lawsuits could overturn those two results. That alone puts Biden at 285 electoral votes – 15 more than he needs to be elected, and that’s not even counting his victories in Wisconsin or Arizona, which vault him to 306. Biden currently leads nationally by 4% and 6 million votes, and is about to eclipse 80 million votes overall – which is an all-time record in this country. We had record-breaking turnout this year. Donald Trump is attempting to overturn the most democratic election in this country’s history.

 

For those who are still convinced Donald Trump is telling the truth in his voter fraud claims, answer these questions:

- Why does his team continue to lose case after case in court?

- Why are recounts not going their way?

- Why are Trump-appointed judges not siding with him in his lawsuits?

 

Because there is zero evidence of widespread voter fraud. Period.

 

Sadly, even if Trump and his cronies aren’t successful in their attempt to transform our republic into a dictatorship, it’ll take years to undo the damage they’ve already imposed on our country. A democracy only works if both sides feel it’s legitimate, and Donald Trump has successfully sown doubt in 30% of this country that our elections are as rigged as Russia’s. He’s successfully convinced these people that asinine conspiracy theories shared by QAnon are more credible than facts shared by fact-checkers. He’s successfully persuaded them to not believe anything uttered by the mainstream news media; to not believe what they see and hear; to think science is a hoax; and to believe that “alternative facts” are an actual thing. Donald Trump is attempting to destroy this country in order to remain in power and prevent any possibility of prison time, and the Republican Party is largely standing by, watching him burn the Constitution, but saying nothing – fearful of political backlash. In the end, Donald Trump will lose this battle, but the war will be far from over - for as long as the Republican Party puts party over country, they will place power over people in order to maintain power over people. The people stood up and fought to keep the republic in tact this time. We must keep standing up and fighting to maintain it, or else that flag we so love will be nothing but a colorful piece of cloth; the Constitution will be nothing but pieces of paper; and the United States of America will be nothing but a faux patriotic nation, seeking another to spread democracy to it.