If it's a close election and Biden wins the popular vote but loses the electoral college, should he still concede? If Biden's oath is to protect the constitution, and Trump 2.0 guarantees the end of democracy, does he have an obligation to prevent the transfer of power to someone who will destroy it? I know it's probably a stupid question, but how can we legitimize his win when we know how it will end?
If there's any indication of manipulation, anything illegitimate, Biden and co. must take it on.
But if Trump wins outright, according to the established rules of US presidential elections, I don't think there's anything to do. Refusing to concede to the president-elect in these heightened circumstances would also cause the end of Constitutional democracy, albeit in a different way, and anti-democracy forces are the ones who'd benefit. If anything, it'd be easier for them with more of an excuse for what they already wanted to do.
A strategic challenge for anyone trying to uphold democracy is you can't save the system by breaking it.
I think so. As bad as all this is, I don't see how it would be better if Biden, Harris, and other Democrats rejected election results in some manner and tried to prevent Trump and Co. from taking power after the 2024 election had those results.
Most likely outcome of that is Trump gets power anyway, rejecting elections is seen as more "something partisans do" rather than unique to Trump/MAGA, and the Trump DOJ has more pretexts for prosecuting political opponents.
Maybe a 2016-like popular vote win but Electoral College loss would have prompted a public reaction, with mass protests and the like. I'm not sure what would've happened then—possibly quite chaotic—but we're not in that world. We're in the reality where Trump won both the Electoral and popular votes, and won every swing state.
Thank you for your reply—although I don't find it comforting. I didn't know to follow you in 2016, so I don't know how alarmed you were at the time. Until the Comey letter, I kept trying to convince myself that this wasn't really happening—that things would be ok even though I knew it wasn't true.
What I have found so incredibly demoralizing is how different rules apply to Trump and the GOP as a whole. How many times can we say imagine if Obama did it? Yet, those who can fight back within the system without breaking it seem resigned to do so—Senator Durbin comes to mind. When Biden won in 2020, I expected to feel relief, but then it hit me that this is the new normal—and these forces that favor autocracy might want it more than the pro-democracy coalition wants democracy.
If it's a close election and Biden wins the popular vote but loses the electoral college, should he still concede? If Biden's oath is to protect the constitution, and Trump 2.0 guarantees the end of democracy, does he have an obligation to prevent the transfer of power to someone who will destroy it? I know it's probably a stupid question, but how can we legitimize his win when we know how it will end?
If there's any indication of manipulation, anything illegitimate, Biden and co. must take it on.
But if Trump wins outright, according to the established rules of US presidential elections, I don't think there's anything to do. Refusing to concede to the president-elect in these heightened circumstances would also cause the end of Constitutional democracy, albeit in a different way, and anti-democracy forces are the ones who'd benefit. If anything, it'd be easier for them with more of an excuse for what they already wanted to do.
A strategic challenge for anyone trying to uphold democracy is you can't save the system by breaking it.
I've thought about your response a lot this past year. I'm just wondering if you still believe this in light of everything we know now.
I think so. As bad as all this is, I don't see how it would be better if Biden, Harris, and other Democrats rejected election results in some manner and tried to prevent Trump and Co. from taking power after the 2024 election had those results.
Most likely outcome of that is Trump gets power anyway, rejecting elections is seen as more "something partisans do" rather than unique to Trump/MAGA, and the Trump DOJ has more pretexts for prosecuting political opponents.
Maybe a 2016-like popular vote win but Electoral College loss would have prompted a public reaction, with mass protests and the like. I'm not sure what would've happened then—possibly quite chaotic—but we're not in that world. We're in the reality where Trump won both the Electoral and popular votes, and won every swing state.
Thank you for your reply—although I don't find it comforting. I didn't know to follow you in 2016, so I don't know how alarmed you were at the time. Until the Comey letter, I kept trying to convince myself that this wasn't really happening—that things would be ok even though I knew it wasn't true.
What I have found so incredibly demoralizing is how different rules apply to Trump and the GOP as a whole. How many times can we say imagine if Obama did it? Yet, those who can fight back within the system without breaking it seem resigned to do so—Senator Durbin comes to mind. When Biden won in 2020, I expected to feel relief, but then it hit me that this is the new normal—and these forces that favor autocracy might want it more than the pro-democracy coalition wants democracy.