Protect our democracy against hacking (part 2). Trump's autocratic goals are in plain sight
When I wrote my post on Saturday about protecting our democracy from bad-faith hackers, I thought, “maybe I should save it for Monday.” But I decided to post it immediately, because you never know what will happen on any given day in these weird times. And sure enough, Trump had a rally in Texas that shows that he is still interested in waging an active autocratic takeover. He subsequently released a statement that confessed that he literally wanted then-VP Mike Pence to overturn the 2020 election. Trump is telling us what he is up to, and he is dangling pardons to January 6 insurrectionists, which sure seems like witness tampering. He is intimidating prosecutors and always whipping up the specter or more violence. He is telling us that if he got back in power, he would become an autocrat. It is a remarkable accomplishment that we turned back his autocratic attempt in 2020, and we have to make sure that he never gets back in any seat of power again. He is an active, ongoing threat and I just can’t believe that the Justice Department is letting him continue to make public threats. It is way past time to prosecute him: the best time for that was the day he left office.
As we move forward, we must protect our voting system at every level, including the right to vote and ballot access (not disenfrancisement), and also the counting and certification process. This is where a lot of the hacking can occur. When we look at the submission of fraudulent sets of electors in 2020, you can see that the whole Electoral College process is ripe for hacking. I really wish we just had direct democratice election by popular vote, no intervening electors. But even if we can’t scrap the Electoral College in the short run, we need to work NOW to make sure that counterfeit electors and other dirty tricks don’t muck up the process.
While we are considering reforms, I would advocate that the time between the election and the inauguration of the new President and Congress be shortened to no more than 4 weeks. In other democracies, the handover happens much more quickly. It does not make any sense to have an interregnum lasting nearly three months in which a malevolent lame duck President and his Rudy Ghoulianis can wage war against the system. In normal times of orderly transition, this might have worked, and even given a new administration time to get up to speed, but we need a new posture given our current reality. In addition to challenging the election, Trump installed loyalists in key positions in the Department of Defense, Intelligence agencies, and Justice Department after he lost the election—truly unprecedented actions for a lame duck Presidnent. These actions are thought to have been a key part of the lead-up to the January 6 attempt to overturn the election. (See for example Jeffrey Clark in the Justice Department, who tried to help overturn the election, and get himself named acting Attorney General in the process.)
I believe that a change in the Inauguration date would require a Constitutional amendment. The long interregnum is also tied into the time required for the Electoral College process to play out, so it’s all inextricably tied into one big knot.
When I think about election hacking, it brings to light an inherent asymmetry between what it takes to build up a democracy and what it takes to tear it down. It can take years to pass thoughtful, negotiated legislation. Then the agents of chaos can tear successful programs down in a flash, or muck things up by blocking normal actions, or even just by taking no action at all. (We have seen this play out in North Carolina since the Republicans won a majority in the General Assembly in 2010).
Mitch McConnell and the Senate Republicans stole a Supreme Court seat simply by refusing to give hearings to President Obama’s nominee Merrick Garland. They ran out the clock on the Obama era, allowing Trump to pick Gorsuch instead.
Trump advisor Steve Bannon told us back in Februrary 2017 that he would fight daily for the “deconstruction of the administrative state.” Then the Trump administration did just that for four years, nearly succeeding. Interfering with the CDC during the pandemic led to untold numbers of needless additional covid-19 deaths.
I am still researching solutions but it can start with all of us supporting bipartisan efforts to reform the Electoral Count Act, specifically clarifying that the Vice President’s role is ceremonial, and she or he cannot just decide to change the election results.
Richard Nixon’s corruption gave rise to expansive post-Watergate reforms. Now is the time to Trump-proof our system. We have one shot at this, and thank goodness for the opportunity to do so! This time, action must win out over inaction. If we don’t get this done now, it may be too late to save election integrity in 2024.
Recommended resources:
Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present, by historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat. I highly recommend her book and her “Lucid” newsletter here on Substack. If you become a Lucid member, you can join Friday afternoon Zooms with Ruth speaking with an awesome community of 150+ citizens doing everything we can to defend our democracy. The Lucid commuity experience is part of what inspired me to start “Democracy OTL.”
Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America, by Sarah Kendzior. I give Sarah Kendzior a lot of credit for seeing Trump’s corruption coming from miles away. She never gave him a “benefit of the doubt” that he did not deserve. Her coverage continues on the “Gaslit Nation” podcast, co-hosted with Andrea Chalupa.