theamericanconservative--2020-11-04--How the Right Can Organize Like the Left

The left understands that ideas mean nothing without power .
Instead of complaining , we should follow their lead—starting small , but with ambitious goals .
Conservatives are understandably upset .
In a period of sustained radical leftist action , including riots , arson , and a genuine effort to grow a revolutionary movement , the response at all levels is ineffectual .
Lots of conservatives are asking the same questions : what can I do ?
What can we do ?
How did we even get to this point ?
When things aren ’ t going the way you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ blame luck , or circumstances , or somebody screwing you over .
It ’ s harder to take a good look in the mirror .
But the first step is to internalize an unpleasant truth .
In this case , the unpleasant truth is that the entire conservative theory of power is wrong .
Conservatives tell ourselves power comes from ideas .
The body politic is a marketplace ; we like marketplaces !
Ideas are debated , inspire voters , draw action from politicians , and at the end of the day , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that working out for us ?
It turns out that inspiring ideas aren ’ t useful unless you train people in the mechanics of building power .
That ’ s not what we do .
As conservatives , we have trained ourselves to elect politicians , who are seemingly allergic to passing legislation , or to be pundits , who have no actual power .
State power is the only kind of power conservatives have taught their people how to understand , and when we gain it , tut-tutting conservative elites argue it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ point in the last 40 years , the conservative movement should have taught us to exercise power in ways that don ’ t involve the state .
This is what leftists do .
They actively train people to create effective pressure movements that coerce compliance with their demands .
The response of conservatives to this coercion is to double down on—the importance of ideas .
If you want to actually produce change , you can ’ t do it with debates .
You can ’ t do it with pundits .
And you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at home and assuming somebody else will do something .
You have to learn to build a team and work as part of it .
And your team has to learn to be part of a larger team .
You must , in short , build community .
If You ’ re An Elected Official The words every conservative elected official needs to have emblazoned on his or her wall , in letters four feet high and on fire , are : “ Actual Material Loss.
” Hard lefties understand that if you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you have to be able to inflict actual material loss on them .
Not devastating bon mots , not status hits , not embarrassment .
Actual material loss .
For politicians , this means votes .
For other people , usually , it means money .
Republican voters don ’ t want YouTube videos or pugnacious tweets from their elected officials .
We can produce those on our own , thanks .
What we want is material effect .
If you ’ re an officeholder , and you ’ re not willing to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ your enemies , there ’ s really not any point of you being there .
For an idea of how conservative politicians have shirked this part of their job , consider this : pro-life protestors are a rare exception to the right ’ s inability to form a crowd the way lefties do .
So why don ’ t we take a cue from leftist tactics and peacefully occupy abortion clinics ?
Because when the Democrats controlled Congress and the White House , they made doing so a federal felony .
That ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had the House , the Senate , and the presidency for two years , and they didn ’ t consider repealing that law , or amending it to give public buildings and thoroughfares the same protections as abortion clinics , effectively shutting down many leftist shenanigans .
They didn ’ t even defund Planned Parenthood .
By contrast , Democrats aren ’ t even back in power yet and already they ’ re making noises about repealing Taft-Hartley and allowing unions to use secondary boycotts .
( A secondary boycott is what the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ targets companies that advertise on Breitbart . )
Leftists know : if your enemy has a successful tactic , make it illegal or impractical .
If your friends are hampered by legislation , change it to empower them .
If you ’ re a serious donor , to one politician or many , don ’ t put quite so much funding into TV commercials for national politicians .
Instead , put money into building infrastructure where you live , with your local party and local activists .
Your money can provide cost-effective on-ramps @ @ @ @ @ @ @ foot in the door .
When it comes to activism , forget about giving tons of money to big national groups ; give modest amounts to a few local groups .
And tell your fellow donors to do the same .
Remarkably small amounts of cash can support an activist culture that not only feeds the party but creates stronger conditions on the ground , not with attention-getting stunts but with careful , thoughtful work .
As an example : there are a million national conservative sites that tell their readers breathless tales @ @ @ @ @ @ @ probably isn ’ t one in your town that will tell your neighbors what the city council and the local Democratic interest groups are up to .
Well-heeled leftists right now are funding nonprofit groups to essentially replace local newspapers and report on local conservatives .
What kind of stories do you think they ’ ll tell ?
Lots of your town ’ s stories will be useful but boring .
Others can potentially get fed into the larger conservative media ecosystem .
But either way , you ’ ll build your community @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Finally , if you ’ re in a solidly red area , look at helping out your ideological compatriots in heavily blue areas .
They could use the moral support and the help .
It ’ s always fun to tell people with more power and money what they should be doing .
But this is also on us , the people at home .
You can ’ t build a real community from Facebook and your couch .
You have to talk to people and go build your own groups , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to get what you want by pressuring opponents and using your ability to inflict actual material loss .
The conservative response to left-wing pressure campaigns has thus far mostly consisted of sternly telling individuals not to bow .
This is useless .
You can not defeat calculated strategy with personal pugnacity .
If you stand tall , a pressure campaign doesn ’ t leave you alone ; it moves on to a secondary target with the power to put pressure on you .
Pointing out hypocrisy , how the other guys would hate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ does nothing .
Actually turning the tables does .
If you ’ re just a grassroots voter , your first job is looking for a group .
Don ’ t imagine exactly what you want in your head and go looking for that , expecting to find it to the letter .
That doesn ’ t work in romance , and it doesn ’ t work in politics .
Find a group , meet people , build out of it .
If you ’ re an activist , you have two jobs : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2 ) make connections with other local groups .
Forget about big national stuff .
Build power where you are , first and foremost .
People on the right like to imagine movements as one neatly organized thing , but it turns out what ’ s most effective is coalitions of lots of different groups .
When different groups all have strong memberships , those groups can cooperate and pull off large actions .
Righties tend to focus on individual heroes , but that ’ s a mistake .
If you notice , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up on the right are just grifters of one kind or another .
If you ’ re dreaming of being famous and anointed , forget it .
You do not get to be Greta Thunberg .
You do not get to be Linda Sarsour .
Thunbergs and Sarsours do not just appear .
They can not be cloned in righty variants for instant success .
The left has the infrastructure to create them .
We do not .
The bad news is that organizing is slow and it takes time .
You will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the stuff the lefties do .
If you want to be a bodybuilder , you can not march out on stage as Mr. Olympia next week .
You have to train .
Training to be strong is a lot less fun than just being strong .
As eight-time Mr. Olympia Ronnie Coleman so wisely put it : “ Everybody wan na be a bodybuilder , but don ’ t nobody wan na lift no heavy-ass weights.
” So think about what you want and work backwards .
Grab a notebook and a pen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ down your name and your address .
Do it the way you did when you were a little kid : number , street , part of town if applicable , town , county , state , country , the world , the universe .
Circle your town name .
Then go down a few lines and write your town name by itself in big letters .
Draw a line underneath it .
Write down your political districts .
You probably don ’ t know what they all are .
If you don ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up online at your county registrar ’ s office .
We ’ re talking stuff like precinct , city council , water board .
Depending on where you are , this may take a page or two .
That ’ s okay .
It will be intensely boring .
That ’ s okay , too .
Because this boring task is to weed out the lazy .
Now turn the page and give yourself a nice double-page spread .
You ’ re going to write about you .
Left hand-page : write your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ write three columns : INTERESTS , SKILLS , ASSETS .
Under “ Interests , ” put stuff that matters to you .
Maybe you like mixed martial arts , or science fiction , or motorcycles , or gardening .
Put it down .
Under “ Skills , ” list things you can do , professional and personal , from your accounting degree to your ham radio license .
Under “ Assets , ” list material things you have that you can use for the benefit of yourself and others .
Maybe you ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for meetings .
Maybe you ’ ve got money .
Maybe you don ’ t just know about radios , you ’ ve actually got a bunch of portable radios !
Now : see those blank five lines you left between your name and the three columns ?
Go back up there and list the really deep personal stuff that matters to how you see yourself .
Does your religious faith matter deeply to you ?
List it .
Are you patriotic as hell ?
List it .
Unfailingly kind to cats ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ re done , stop for a moment .
Look at your list .
Think about what it says .
You are now going to ask yourself two questions : how can I use my interests to meet people ?
How can I use my skills in cooperation with other people to shape the world ?
If you have friends who are already like-minded , guess what ?
You ’ re ahead of the game .
You are now a group !
Get them to grab a notebook and pen and do this stuff @ @ @ @ @ @ @ meet people .
Some will be interested in helping you form and connect political groups .
On the right-hand page of the double-page spread , ask yourself this question : what are some specific things an effective organized right that is responsive to its base would do ?
Not generalities ( “ own the libs !
” ) ; those aren ’ t actionable .
Specifics .
But big , powerful things , 10,000-foot goals .
Write them down .
Look at each of those things in turn .
Now look at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the left-hand side .
Ask yourself : what can I do to get one tiny step toward that 10,000-foot goal ?
Suppose you ’ re a conservative lawyer .
You wish there were a big , well-funded right-wing legal apparatus that could sue the living bejesus out of hard-left operators and infrastructure .
The reality is that you do not have the time , money , or power for this .
What do you have ?
You have yourself .
You have your legal knowledge in whatever area you train in .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ local area .
You can not make a well-heeled nationwide organization .
But you can make a local one .
You don ’ t have the resources or the backup to sue better-connected liberal folks into next week .
But you can raise money .
You can gather information .
You can teach people about their rights .
I have an online friend of a couple decades ’ standing who is a lefty organizer , and I broke his brain by explaining to him that there was no such thing as a right-of-center @ @ @ @ @ @ @ attend demonstrations to make sure protesters ’ rights are observed . )
Guess what : legal observer training for local activist groups is something a couple of lawyers can do .
But odds are you ’ re not a lawyer .
That ’ s okay .
The world needs honest people , too .
Look at what you do , and what skills you have .
Maybe you ’ ve got a lot of free time and like research .
One essential step in a lot of organizing is what ’ s called @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all the players in a situation are and their relationships with each other .
The mapping part can be literal .
Union organizers physically map the workplace and who works where .
What far-left groups are there in your town ?
How big are they ?
What kind of stuff do they do ?
It ’ s not like the press is going to tell you , but this is important information , and you can learn it quietly .
Look at the big groups active on social media .
See what else @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Help fellow conservatives understand the big picture .
A community is less intimidating when you actually understand it .
If you like politics , here is a quick , simple way to build community .
In case you haven ’ t noticed , we are in the middle of an election season .
Political parties are kind of hyped up during election season , and they are looking for people .
So here ’ s what you do : remember when you wrote your address out ?
And then did all that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Turn back to that page in your notebook , then look up the contact page for your political party and drop them an email : “ Hi , I ’ m [ Name ] .
I live in precinct X .
Specifically , my address is Y. I ’ d like to help turn out the vote this season and be part of any precinct work that is happening .
Could I get a copy of my walk sheet ?
I ’ m happy to walk other neighborhoods , too.
” A volunteer @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a rara avis and will catch their attention .
A walk sheet is a list of people in your neighborhood ; generally you will get one for your own party or for the independents .
If you ’ re a Republican in a heavy Democrat area , you will be surprised how many of you there are .
Most people aren ’ t hugely engaged .
Many don ’ t even remember their political party registration .
( Seriously . )
You might make a couple of friends who want to start a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ good to have a 10,000-foot goal .
But it ’ s impossible to conquer your 10,000-foot goal in a day .
So have a bunch of little goals .
If you pile them up , they stack .
David Hines has a professional background in international human rights work with a focus on recovery from forced disappearances and mass homicide .
He lives in Los Angeles .

Conservatives are understandably upset. In a period of sustained radical leftist action, including riots, arson, and a genuine effort to grow a revolutionary movement, the response at all levels is ineffectual. Lots of conservatives are asking the same questions: what can I do? What can we do? How did we even get to this point?
When things aren’t going the way you want, it’s easy to blame luck, or circumstances, or somebody screwing you over. It’s harder to take a good look in the mirror. But the first step is to internalize an unpleasant truth. In this case, the unpleasant truth is that the entire conservative theory of power is wrong.
Conservatives tell ourselves power comes from ideas. The body politic is a marketplace; we like marketplaces! Ideas are debated, inspire voters, draw action from politicians, and at the end of the day, win.
Okay, how’s that working out for us?
It turns out that inspiring ideas aren’t useful unless you train people in the mechanics of building power. That’s not what we do. As conservatives, we have trained ourselves to elect politicians, who are seemingly allergic to passing legislation, or to be pundits, who have no actual power. State power is the only kind of power conservatives have taught their people how to understand, and when we gain it, tut-tutting conservative elites argue it is immoral to use.
At some point in the last 40 years, the conservative movement should have taught us to exercise power in ways that don’t involve the state. This is what leftists do. They actively train people to create effective pressure movements that coerce compliance with their demands. The response of conservatives to this coercion is to double down on—the importance of ideas.
If you want to actually produce change, you can’t do it with debates. You can’t do it with pundits. And you can’t do it by sitting at home and assuming somebody else will do something. You have to learn to build a team and work as part of it. And your team has to learn to be part of a larger team.
You must, in short, build community.
If You’re An Elected Official
The words every conservative elected official needs to have emblazoned on his or her wall, in letters four feet high and on fire, are: “Actual Material Loss.”
Hard lefties understand that if you want someone to change his behavior, you have to be able to inflict actual material loss on them. Not devastating bon mots, not status hits, not embarrassment. Actual material loss. For politicians, this means votes. For other people, usually, it means money.
Republican voters don’t want YouTube videos or pugnacious tweets from their elected officials. We can produce those on our own, thanks. What we want is material effect. If you’re an officeholder, and you’re not willing to materially help your allies and materially hurt your enemies, there’s really not any point of you being there.
For an idea of how conservative politicians have shirked this part of their job, consider this: pro-life protestors are a rare exception to the right’s inability to form a crowd the way lefties do. So why don’t we take a cue from leftist tactics and peacefully occupy abortion clinics? Because when the Democrats controlled Congress and the White House, they made doing so a federal felony. That’s actual material loss.
The Republicans had the House, the Senate, and the presidency for two years, and they didn’t consider repealing that law, or amending it to give public buildings and thoroughfares the same protections as abortion clinics, effectively shutting down many leftist shenanigans. They didn’t even defund Planned Parenthood. By contrast, Democrats aren’t even back in power yet and already they’re making noises about repealing Taft-Hartley and allowing unions to use secondary boycotts. (A secondary boycott is what the activist group Sleeping Giants does when it targets companies that advertise on Breitbart.) Leftists know: if your enemy has a successful tactic, make it illegal or impractical. If your friends are hampered by legislation, change it to empower them.
If You’re A Donor
If you’re a serious donor, to one politician or many, don’t put quite so much funding into TV commercials for national politicians. Instead, put money into building infrastructure where you live, with your local party and local activists.
Your money can provide cost-effective on-ramps for solid new candidates to get their foot in the door. When it comes to activism, forget about giving tons of money to big national groups; give modest amounts to a few local groups. And tell your fellow donors to do the same. Remarkably small amounts of cash can support an activist culture that not only feeds the party but creates stronger conditions on the ground, not with attention-getting stunts but with careful, thoughtful work.
As an example: there are a million national conservative sites that tell their readers breathless tales of how awful Democrats are. There probably isn’t one in your town that will tell your neighbors what the city council and the local Democratic interest groups are up to. Well-heeled leftists right now are funding nonprofit groups to essentially replace local newspapers and report on local conservatives. What kind of stories do you think they’ll tell?
Lots of your town’s stories will be useful but boring. Others can potentially get fed into the larger conservative media ecosystem. But either way, you’ll build your community, and that’s important.
Finally, if you’re in a solidly red area, look at helping out your ideological compatriots in heavily blue areas. They could use the moral support and the help.
If You’re A Random Voter
It’s always fun to tell people with more power and money what they should be doing. But this is also on us, the people at home. You can’t build a real community from Facebook and your couch. You have to talk to people and go build your own groups, and eventually you, too, can learn to get what you want by pressuring opponents and using your ability to inflict actual material loss.
The conservative response to left-wing pressure campaigns has thus far mostly consisted of sternly telling individuals not to bow. This is useless. You cannot defeat calculated strategy with personal pugnacity. If you stand tall, a pressure campaign doesn’t leave you alone; it moves on to a secondary target with the power to put pressure on you. Pointing out hypocrisy, how the other guys would hate it if the tables were turned, does nothing. Actually turning the tables does.
If you’re just a grassroots voter, your first job is looking for a group. Don’t imagine exactly what you want in your head and go looking for that, expecting to find it to the letter. That doesn’t work in romance, and it doesn’t work in politics. Find a group, meet people, build out of it.
If you’re an activist, you have two jobs: 1) grow your group locally and 2) make connections with other local groups. Forget about big national stuff. Build power where you are, first and foremost.
People on the right like to imagine movements as one neatly organized thing, but it turns out what’s most effective is coalitions of lots of different groups. When different groups all have strong memberships, those groups can cooperate and pull off large actions. Righties tend to focus on individual heroes, but that’s a mistake. If you notice, most of the would-be leaders who show up on the right are just grifters of one kind or another. If you’re dreaming of being famous and anointed, forget it. You do not get to be Greta Thunberg. You do not get to be Linda Sarsour. Thunbergs and Sarsours do not just appear. They cannot be cloned in righty variants for instant success. The left has the infrastructure to create them. We do not.
The bad news is that organizing is slow and it takes time. You will not be able immediately to compete with the stuff the lefties do. If you want to be a bodybuilder, you cannot march out on stage as Mr. Olympia next week. You have to train. Training to be strong is a lot less fun than just being strong. As eight-time Mr. Olympia Ronnie Coleman so wisely put it: “Everybody wanna be a bodybuilder, but don’t nobody wanna lift no heavy-ass weights.”
So think about what you want and work backwards. Grab a notebook and a pen. On the first page, write down your name and your address. Do it the way you did when you were a little kid: number, street, part of town if applicable, town, county, state, country, the world, the universe. Circle your town name.
Then go down a few lines and write your town name by itself in big letters. Draw a line underneath it. Write down your political districts. You probably don’t know what they all are. If you don’t, you can probably look them up online at your county registrar’s office. We’re talking stuff like precinct, city council, water board. Depending on where you are, this may take a page or two. That’s okay. It will be intensely boring. That’s okay, too. Because this boring task is to weed out the lazy.
Now turn the page and give yourself a nice double-page spread. You’re going to write about you. Left hand-page: write your name. Skip down five lines and write three columns: INTERESTS, SKILLS, ASSETS.
Under “Interests,” put stuff that matters to you. Maybe you like mixed martial arts, or science fiction, or motorcycles, or gardening. Put it down. Under “Skills,” list things you can do, professional and personal, from your accounting degree to your ham radio license. Under “Assets,” list material things you have that you can use for the benefit of yourself and others. Maybe you’ve got a space you can use for meetings. Maybe you’ve got money. Maybe you don’t just know about radios, you’ve actually got a bunch of portable radios!
Now: see those blank five lines you left between your name and the three columns? Go back up there and list the really deep personal stuff that matters to how you see yourself. Does your religious faith matter deeply to you? List it. Are you patriotic as hell? List it. Unfailingly kind to cats? Put it down.
When you’re done, stop for a moment. Look at your list. Think about what it says. You are now going to ask yourself two questions: how can I use my interests to meet people? How can I use my skills in cooperation with other people to shape the world?
If you have friends who are already like-minded, guess what? You’re ahead of the game. You are now a group! Get them to grab a notebook and pen and do this stuff, too. Then go out and meet people. Some will be interested in helping you form and connect political groups.
On the right-hand page of the double-page spread, ask yourself this question: what are some specific things an effective organized right that is responsive to its base would do? Not generalities (“own the libs!”); those aren’t actionable. Specifics. But big, powerful things, 10,000-foot goals. Write them down.
Look at each of those things in turn. Now look at the things you’ve written about yourself on the left-hand side. Ask yourself: what can I do to get one tiny step toward that 10,000-foot goal?
Suppose you’re a conservative lawyer. You wish there were a big, well-funded right-wing legal apparatus that could sue the living bejesus out of hard-left operators and infrastructure. The reality is that you do not have the time, money, or power for this. What do you have? You have yourself. You have your legal knowledge in whatever area you train in. You probably have some connections in your local area. You cannot make a well-heeled nationwide organization. But you can make a local one.
You don’t have the resources or the backup to sue better-connected liberal folks into next week. But you can raise money. You can gather information. You can teach people about their rights. I have an online friend of a couple decades’ standing who is a lefty organizer, and I broke his brain by explaining to him that there was no such thing as a right-of-center legal observer organization. (Legal observers attend demonstrations to make sure protesters’ rights are observed.) Guess what: legal observer training for local activist groups is something a couple of lawyers can do.
But odds are you’re not a lawyer. That’s okay. The world needs honest people, too. Look at what you do, and what skills you have. Maybe you’ve got a lot of free time and like research. One essential step in a lot of organizing is what’s called “power mapping”—figuring out who all the players in a situation are and their relationships with each other. The mapping part can be literal. Union organizers physically map the workplace and who works where.
What far-left groups are there in your town? How big are they? What kind of stuff do they do? It’s not like the press is going to tell you, but this is important information, and you can learn it quietly. Look at the big groups active on social media. See what else the people liking their posts are into. Help fellow conservatives understand the big picture. A community is less intimidating when you actually understand it.
If you like politics, here is a quick, simple way to build community. In case you haven’t noticed, we are in the middle of an election season. Political parties are kind of hyped up during election season, and they are looking for people. So here’s what you do: remember when you wrote your address out? And then did all that boring stuff with your political districts? Turn back to that page in your notebook, then look up the contact page for your political party and drop them an email: “Hi, I’m [Name]. I live in precinct X. Specifically, my address is Y. I’d like to help turn out the vote this season and be part of any precinct work that is happening. Could I get a copy of my walk sheet? I’m happy to walk other neighborhoods, too.”
A volunteer who knows his or her precinct is a rara avis and will catch their attention. A walk sheet is a list of people in your neighborhood; generally you will get one for your own party or for the independents. If you’re a Republican in a heavy Democrat area, you will be surprised how many of you there are. Most people aren’t hugely engaged. Many don’t even remember their political party registration. (Seriously.) You might make a couple of friends who want to start a notebook, too.
It’s good to have a 10,000-foot goal. But it’s impossible to conquer your 10,000-foot goal in a day. So have a bunch of little goals. If you pile them up, they stack.
David Hines has a professional background in international human rights work with a focus on recovery from forced disappearances and mass homicide. He lives in Los Angeles.


theamericanconservative--2020-11-06--The Missing White Vote in Wisconsin Lost Trump the State

In the aftermath of the 2016 election , analysts on both the left and right noticed that President Trump had the potential to grow his base of white working-class voters .
Five Thirty-Eight ’ s David Wasserman noted that over 44 million non-college-educated white voters who were not even registered to vote before the 2016 election concentrated heavily in the Midwest , including 2.6 million in Pennsylvania , 2.2 million in Ohio , 900,000 in Wisconsin , and 500,000 in Iowa .
All the Trump campaign needed to do was locate them and register a fraction of them , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ day .
Rather than employing a strategy that looked to find the missing white working-class voter , the Trump campaign devised a plan to drive support from minority voters .
They released both the Platinum Plan for black Americans and the American Dream plan for Hispanic Americans , promising hundreds of billion dollars to revive their communities and a series of other identity-driven policies .
This was successful to a point .
The Hispanic turnout in Florida and Texas were large enough to deliver Trump a much larger victory than most people expected @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even as he shed voters in the suburbs and among Independents as well as college-educated whites .
Among black voters , exit polls showed Trump received 19 percent of the black voters between 25 and 44 years-old .
However , he didn ’ t budge the number of older black Americas who make up a majority of voters in their racial group .
That plan was always doomed to fail due to the small share of minority voters in the Midwest that were up for grabs .
There weren ’ t enough Hispanic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the GOP in those states .
So they relied on their pool of existing voters and resting their fate on a ground game .
To the Trump campaign and the Wisconsin Republican Party ’ s credit , they ran a fantastic operation in the state .
The President ’ s campaign increased his support and turnout in 22 of the 23 counties he flipped from President Obama in 2016 .
Even more astonishing , only two of those counties had turnout under 90 percent .
Some counties like Price , Marquette , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turnout .
In the county of Kenosha , which saw race riots and acts of violence from Black Lives Matter supporters and members of Antifa , Trump increased his margin from .3 percent in 2016 to 3.2 percent in 2020 , becoming the first Republican to win the county in back-to-back elections since 1928 .
The ground game and high level of support from working-class white counties couldn ’ t make up because the missing white vote stayed missing .
In the 23 Obama-Trump counties , the number of registered voters declined by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ November 2020 even though the population increased in these areas .
So Trump ’ s campaign had to work harder with a smaller group of people .
Most of the non-college-educated white Wisconsinites that didn ’ t vote in 2016 remained untapped in 2020 .
For over three years , the campaign spent hundreds of millions of dollars chasing phantom voters in deep blue states like New Mexico rather than looking at their natural base sitting underneath their nose .
Had those funds been redirected to registering and turning out between five and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they missed in 2016 , they wouldn ’ t have to worry about suburbanites defecting to Biden .
Fears of voters fraud or illegal vote count wouldn ’ t have been a concern if they just reached out to their natural constituency .
There ’ s a good chance that the same story could be told in Pennsylvania , Michigan , and Minnesota .
This election wouldn ’ t have been close if they only worked on registering the people most likely to vote for them , rather than banking on minority voters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rust Belt .
Ryan Girdusky is a host of TAC Right Now .

In the aftermath of the 2016 election, analysts on both the left and right noticed that President Trump had the potential to grow his base of white working-class voters. Five Thirty-Eight’s David Wasserman noted that over 44 million non-college-educated white voters who were not even registered to vote before the 2016 election concentrated heavily in the Midwest, including 2.6 million in Pennsylvania, 2.2 million in Ohio, 900,000 in Wisconsin, and 500,000 in Iowa. All the Trump campaign needed to do was locate them and register a fraction of them, and it would be smooth sailing till election day.
Rather than employing a strategy that looked to find the missing white working-class voter, the Trump campaign devised a plan to drive support from minority voters. They released both the Platinum Plan for black Americans and the American Dream plan for Hispanic Americans, promising hundreds of billion dollars to revive their communities and a series of other identity-driven policies.
This was successful to a point. The Hispanic turnout in Florida and Texas were large enough to deliver Trump a much larger victory than most people expected and helped keep Arizona and Nevada competitive even as he shed voters in the suburbs and among Independents as well as college-educated whites. Among black voters, exit polls showed Trump received 19 percent of the black voters between 25 and 44 years-old. However, he didn’t budge the number of older black Americas who make up a majority of voters in their racial group.
That plan was always doomed to fail due to the small share of minority voters in the Midwest that were up for grabs. There weren’t enough Hispanic voters or black Americans willing to flip to the GOP in those states. So they relied on their pool of existing voters and resting their fate on a ground game.
To the Trump campaign and the Wisconsin Republican Party’s credit, they ran a fantastic operation in the state. The President’s campaign increased his support and turnout in 22 of the 23 counties he flipped from President Obama in 2016. Even more astonishing, only two of those counties had turnout under 90 percent. Some counties like Price, Marquette, and Pepin had close to 95 percent turnout.
In the county of Kenosha, which saw race riots and acts of violence from Black Lives Matter supporters and members of Antifa, Trump increased his margin from .3 percent in 2016 to 3.2 percent in 2020, becoming the first Republican to win the county in back-to-back elections since 1928.
The ground game and high level of support from working-class white counties couldn’t make up because the missing white vote stayed missing. In the 23 Obama-Trump counties, the number of registered voters declined by nearly 8,000 voters from January 2017 to November 2020 even though the population increased in these areas.
So Trump’s campaign had to work harder with a smaller group of people. Most of the non-college-educated white Wisconsinites that didn’t vote in 2016 remained untapped in 2020. For over three years, the campaign spent hundreds of millions of dollars chasing phantom voters in deep blue states like New Mexico rather than looking at their natural base sitting underneath their nose.
Had those funds been redirected to registering and turning out between five and ten percent of those non-college-educated white voters they missed in 2016, they wouldn’t have to worry about suburbanites defecting to Biden. Fears of voters fraud or illegal vote count wouldn’t have been a concern if they just reached out to their natural constituency.
There’s a good chance that the same story could be told in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota. This election wouldn’t have been close if they only worked on registering the people most likely to vote for them, rather than banking on minority voters who just weren’t in the Rust Belt.
Ryan Girdusky is a host of TAC Right Now.


theamericanconservative--2020-11-06--Revolution from the Middle

Revolution from the Middle

Though the political waters of the 2020 election remain murky , this much is clear : a specter is haunting the Republican Party—the specter of a realignment .
Millions of Americans now see the GOP as a working-class redoubt , the base from which to prosecute a revolution from a middle that is dispossessed from above and abused from below .
This populist revolt has been a long time coming .
“ How big is this populist group ?
, ” asked Michael Lind in The New Class War .
Lind ’ s colleague , political scientist Lee Drutman , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ —defined as those who favored maintaining or increasing Social Security spending while maintaining or decreasing immigration—constituted 40.3 percent of the electorate .
By contrast , Lind noted , the two groups that wanted to cut Social Security and increase immigration , “ business conservatives ” ( 3.8 percent ) , or “ neoliberals , ” and “ political conservatives ” ( 2.4 percent ) , or “ libertarians , ” made up only 6.2 percent of voters .
Put simply , the Republican Party was irrelevant before Trump ignited the populist torch because @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appealed to so few Americans .
That the messaging has been off for so long is a matter of money .
“ The business Republicans , whose preferences Republican politicians promote , ” Lind writes , “ on average make $ 69,711 a year , around $ 30,000 more than the Republican populists , whose preferences most Republican politicians ignore.
” But no amount of money could have produced the energy , the phenomenon that rallied nearly 60,000 Americans in forgotten Butler , Pennsylvania .
There is , however , a problem .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ this realignment ’ s implications or is unwilling to see it through to its logical conclusions .
The Latino question is illustrative of this issue , not because they are singularly important , but because their support for Trump and the party he reformed is either misunderstood or deliberately misinterpreted .
To the chagrin of those who spent four years portraying him as evil , national exit polls show a third of Latinos cast their ballots for Trump .
Charles Blow , a New York Times columnist , lamented that the percentage of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2016 .
“ Yet more evidence that we can ’ t depend on the ‘ browning of America ’ to dismantle white supremacy and erase anti-blackness , ” Blow huffed .
According to conservative analysts Katie Pavlich and Karl Rove , the Latino vote that caused Blow so much pain amounts to a referendum against socialism .
Former White House Press Secretary Dana Perino agrees and goes further : Latino turnout for Trump improved this time because he backed off immigration , his signature issue .
The Pavlich-Rove thesis might be correct for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump posted an 11-point improvement from his 2016 performance , bringing in 45 percent of the Latino vote .
But it can not adequately explain why in Texas , 41 percent to 47 percent of Latinos voted for Trump in heavily Latino counties that stretch across the Rio Grande Valley region .
The border wall is being built before the eyes of these Latinos , sending Perino ’ s thesis back to the land of desiccated pre-realignment ideas .
The reality is that the populist message for immigration restrictionism is broadly appealing .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ said they “ support Donald Trump ’ s immigration policies ” even if they disliked him personally .
Amid mass unemployment and economic strain triggered by the pandemic panic , 69 percent of Latinos said “ yes ” when they were asked : “ Would you support .
.
.
temporarily blocking nearly all immigration into the United States during the coronavirus outbreak ?
” More immigration means more competition for jobs , lower wages , more crowded cities , more crime .
Oddly enough , liberal media seems to understand this phenomenon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ recent study in the New York Times asked eligible voters how “ convincing ” they found Republican Party messaging .
The talking points included lines about “ illegal immigration from places overrun with drugs and criminal gangs , ” and “ fully funding the police , so our communities are not threatened by people who refuse to follow our laws.
” Nearly three out of five white respondents found these messages convincing , while precisely the same percentage of blacks agreed , as did an even higher percentage of Latinos .
In a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ al-Gharbi , Paul F. Lazarsfeld fellow in Sociology at Columbia University , came to the same conclusions .
“ In other words , far from alienating minority constituencies , Trump ’ s messaging on immigration , law and order and cultural conservativism may be an important source of his appeal to many voters of color , ” al-Gharbi wrote .
None of this is surprising .
During nationwide rioting , Gallup polling revealed 83 percent of Latinos said they wanted more or the same police presence in their area .
Along with blacks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to say they wanted police to spend more time in their communities .
Similarly , al-Gharbi notes , “ Black Americans are more supportive of limiting immigration than any other bloc of the Democratic coalition , ” and Latinos “ actually tend to be more concerned about illegal immigration than are whites or Blacks.
” Indeed , an accelerant of the realignment is the intersectionality ’ s implosion .
When disparate groups are bound by the tenuous ligature of loathing for whites , pulling in any one direction too hard is dangerous .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Fox News ran a survey in June and found 21 percent of Latinos said they supported Trump .
Also , in June , ABC News ran a poll and found 54 percent of Latino Democrats supported deploying federal forces to assist police in quelling riots across the country .
Sixty-percent of Latinos overall said the same .
The Fox survey ran again in August and September , each time showing more support among Latinos for Trump ; 34 percent in August and 38 percent in September , corresponding with Trump ’ s increasingly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in September , the Pew Research Center reported Latinos and whites accounted for the most notable decreases in Black Lives Matter support .
All of this is to say that the simplest explanation of the realignment is best : the law and order message , just like economic populism , foreign policy restraint , and immigration restrictionism , appeals broadly .
Trump showed that millions of Americans want a leader and a party with a vision of order , capable of steering our national destiny toward a better future .
But this realignment @ @ @ @ @ @ @ events , either out of doltishness or duplicity , Jared Kushner and other Republican staffers ran the White House ’ s policy shops and much of the Trump reelection campaign into the ground , focusing singularly on issues antithetical to the principles of the realignment .
Criminal justice reform , a tax plan that disproportionately benefited the mostly progressive ruling class , liberalized immigration , attacks on Social Security , race-based affirmative action plans like the “ Platinum Plan ” for blacks , and the “ American Dream Plan ” for Latinos , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , economic populism , and immigration restrictionism—all of which effectively neglected Trump ’ s largest group of supporters , working-class whites .
Ironically , were it not for the pandemic , the administration likely would have continued pursuing a more liberal immigration agenda .
Regardless of what happens in this election , we mustn ’ t allow the realignment Trump effected to be squandered by the Republican Party .
This is not pro-corporate , pro-amnesty , “ tax cuts ” conservatism .
This is a nascent working-class , blue and white collar movement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the future .
Because , on the one hand , this is a genuine people ’ s movement , a movement capable of uplifting the lives of millions of decent , hardworking Americans .
On the other hand , it is the only basis for a countervailing force capable of issuing a real challenge to the ruling class that decided America deserved to die , and that its people deserved to be forgotten .
Pedro L. Gonzalez is an assistant editor at American Greatness .
Follow him on Twitter @ emeriticus .

Though the political waters of the 2020 election remain murky, this much is clear: a specter is haunting the Republican Party—the specter of a realignment. Millions of Americans now see the GOP as a working-class redoubt, the base from which to prosecute a revolution from a middle that is dispossessed from above and abused from below. This populist revolt has been a long time coming.
“How big is this populist group?,” asked Michael Lind in The New Class War. Lind’s colleague, political scientist Lee Drutman, calculated in 2015 that “populists”—defined as those who favored maintaining or increasing Social Security spending while maintaining or decreasing immigration—constituted 40.3 percent of the electorate. By contrast, Lind noted, the two groups that wanted to cut Social Security and increase immigration, “business conservatives” (3.8 percent), or “neoliberals,” and “political conservatives” (2.4 percent), or “libertarians,” made up only 6.2 percent of voters.
Put simply, the Republican Party was irrelevant before Trump ignited the populist torch because its attitudes, opinions, and ideas appealed to so few Americans. That the messaging has been off for so long is a matter of money. “The business Republicans, whose preferences Republican politicians promote,” Lind writes, “on average make $69,711 a year, around $30,000 more than the Republican populists, whose preferences most Republican politicians ignore.” But no amount of money could have produced the energy, the phenomenon that rallied nearly 60,000 Americans in forgotten Butler, Pennsylvania.
There is, however, a problem. The Republican Party is either unaware of this realignment’s implications or is unwilling to see it through to its logical conclusions. The Latino question is illustrative of this issue, not because they are singularly important, but because their support for Trump and the party he reformed is either misunderstood or deliberately misinterpreted.
To the chagrin of those who spent four years portraying him as evil, national exit polls show a third of Latinos cast their ballots for Trump. Charles Blow, a New York Times columnist, lamented that the percentage of Latinos voting for Trump actually increased from 2016. “Yet more evidence that we can’t depend on the ‘browning of America’ to dismantle white supremacy and erase anti-blackness,” Blow huffed. According to conservative analysts Katie Pavlich and Karl Rove, the Latino vote that caused Blow so much pain amounts to a referendum against socialism. Former White House Press Secretary Dana Perino agrees and goes further: Latino turnout for Trump improved this time because he backed off immigration, his signature issue.
The Pavlich-Rove thesis might be correct for Cubans and Venezuelans in Florida, where Trump posted an 11-point improvement from his 2016 performance, bringing in 45 percent of the Latino vote. But it cannot adequately explain why in Texas, 41 percent to 47 percent of Latinos voted for Trump in heavily Latino counties that stretch across the Rio Grande Valley region. The border wall is being built before the eyes of these Latinos, sending Perino’s thesis back to the land of desiccated pre-realignment ideas.
The reality is that the populist message for immigration restrictionism is broadly appealing. In 2018, 58.5 percent of Latinos said they “support Donald Trump’s immigration policies” even if they disliked him personally. Amid mass unemployment and economic strain triggered by the pandemic panic, 69 percent of Latinos said “yes” when they were asked: “Would you support . . . temporarily blocking nearly all immigration into the United States during the coronavirus outbreak?” More immigration means more competition for jobs, lower wages, more crowded cities, more crime. Oddly enough, liberal media seems to understand this phenomenon better than many conservative sources.
A recent study in the New York Times asked eligible voters how “convincing” they found Republican Party messaging. The talking points included lines about “illegal immigration from places overrun with drugs and criminal gangs,” and “fully funding the police, so our communities are not threatened by people who refuse to follow our laws.” Nearly three out of five white respondents found these messages convincing, while precisely the same percentage of blacks agreed, as did an even higher percentage of Latinos. In a separate analysis for NBC News, Musa al-Gharbi, Paul F. Lazarsfeld fellow in Sociology at Columbia University, came to the same conclusions. “In other words, far from alienating minority constituencies, Trump’s messaging on immigration, law and order and cultural conservativism may be an important source of his appeal to many voters of color,” al-Gharbi wrote.
None of this is surprising. During nationwide rioting, Gallup polling revealed 83 percent of Latinos said they wanted more or the same police presence in their area. Along with blacks, Latinos were more likely than whites to say they wanted police to spend more time in their communities. Similarly, al-Gharbi notes, “Black Americans are more supportive of limiting immigration than any other bloc of the Democratic coalition,” and Latinos “actually tend to be more concerned about illegal immigration than are whites or Blacks.”
Indeed, an accelerant of the realignment is the intersectionality’s implosion. When disparate groups are bound by the tenuous ligature of loathing for whites, pulling in any one direction too hard is dangerous. Again, Republicans are missing this.
Fox News ran a survey in June and found 21 percent of Latinos said they supported Trump. Also, in June, ABC News ran a poll and found 54 percent of Latino Democrats supported deploying federal forces to assist police in quelling riots across the country. Sixty-percent of Latinos overall said the same. The Fox survey ran again in August and September, each time showing more support among Latinos for Trump; 34 percent in August and 38 percent in September, corresponding with Trump’s increasingly hard stance against rioting. Finally, in September, the Pew Research Center reported Latinos and whites accounted for the most notable decreases in Black Lives Matter support.
All of this is to say that the simplest explanation of the realignment is best: the law and order message, just like economic populism, foreign policy restraint, and immigration restrictionism, appeals broadly. Trump showed that millions of Americans want a leader and a party with a vision of order, capable of steering our national destiny toward a better future. But this realignment is already at risk. Misreading these events, either out of doltishness or duplicity, Jared Kushner and other Republican staffers ran the White House’s policy shops and much of the Trump reelection campaign into the ground, focusing singularly on issues antithetical to the principles of the realignment.
Criminal justice reform, a tax plan that disproportionately benefited the mostly progressive ruling class, liberalized immigration, attacks on Social Security, race-based affirmative action plans like the “Platinum Plan” for blacks, and the “American Dream Plan” for Latinos, took the place of law and order, economic populism, and immigration restrictionism—all of which effectively neglected Trump’s largest group of supporters, working-class whites. Ironically, were it not for the pandemic, the administration likely would have continued pursuing a more liberal immigration agenda.
Regardless of what happens in this election, we mustn’t allow the realignment Trump effected to be squandered by the Republican Party. This is not pro-corporate, pro-amnesty, “tax cuts” conservatism. This is a nascent working-class, blue and white collar movement, and it holds the keys to the future. Because, on the one hand, this is a genuine people’s movement, a movement capable of uplifting the lives of millions of decent, hardworking Americans. On the other hand, it is the only basis for a countervailing force capable of issuing a real challenge to the ruling class that decided America deserved to die, and that its people deserved to be forgotten.
Pedro L. Gonzalez is an assistant editor at American Greatness. Follow him on Twitter @emeriticus.


theamericanconservative--2020-11-06--It’s Still Trump’s GOP, Not Liz Cheney’s

Whatever happens with the election , there 's no going back to the foreign policy interventions and nation building of yesterdecade .
U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney ( R-WY ) leaves the podium after speaking during a news conference with other Republican members of the House of Representatives at the Capitol on July 21 , 2020 in Washington , DC .
( Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images ) At the time of this writing , the outcome of the 2020 presidential election remains unclear .
Final tabulations in multiple states remain days away , while other declared results are already being @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a path to victory in the Electoral College , the edge clearly belongs to former vice president Joe Biden .
If Donald Trump is defeated , whither the hopes of conservative restrainers ?
“ Backwards , ” whisper the creatures emerging from their crawlspaces at the first opportunity .
On the eve of the election , for example , Politico published a fawning profile of Congresswoman Liz Cheney of Wyoming , who is laying the groundwork to become speaker of the House in a future Republican majority .
An ideological mirror of her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for a restoration of the early 2000s Bushite foreign policy of globe-trotting regime change and democratic nation building administered by a national security state in Washington D.C. Their cause , however , is as infertile as their past efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan .
That is because despite his poor record , Donald Trump has created a permanent and growing disconnect between the War Party and the GOP .
There is no need to sugarcoat how Donald Trump has squandered four years of opportunity in foreign policy .
His promises to bring the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ promises ” to be kept at a permanently delayed date .
He has intensified U.S. interference in Yemen , Syria , Somalia , and Venezuela .
He ’ s overseen the continued deterioration of relations with Russia , while leaving North Korea at the diplomatic altar .
And he ’ s brought the United States and Iran into a first exchange of direct , open conflict .
A big-picture assessment , however , requires not looking at how Trump failed to bring what restrainers wanted , but how he succeeded in destroying @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s election caused the departure of the most loathsome of the war peddlers—including Bill Kristol , David Frum , Jamie Kirchick , Steve Schmidt , and Max Boot—from Republican ranks .
United under the banner of “ Never Trump , ” for four years they used every inch of column space , every CNN interview , and a small fortune to cleave off a portion of the Republican base that they believed would be happy to return to the world of 2006 .
The result ?
Exit polls show Trump winning 93 percent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percentage than he won in 2016 .
As an election post-mortem summarized , Never Trump hawks “ basically do not exist anywhere outside of the Washington Beltway or cable news green rooms—and after tonight ’ s results , we shouldn ’ t have to see them on TV or even see their tweets ever again.
” That the average American has the same respect for the War Party ’ s minions as they have for a tobacco executive should come as no surprise .
Polling continually shows a supermajority of Americans ready and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
That includes 77 percent of Republicans , 40 percent of whom want to decrease military engagement with the rest of the world as well .
These voters are a vanguard that will stop any future Bushite ascendance , whether from Nikki Haley or the spawn of Dick Cheney .
Slowly , Republican members of Congress are beginning to reflect the wishes of their voters .
One year ago this month , I wrote about the emerging cadre of antiwar conservatives in the House of Representatives .
While most broke under pressure to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , not all did .
It ’ s a more active and vocal Republican contingent than has existed for decades and it ’ s growing fast .
Following Tuesday ’ s results , Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming will join Rand Paul and Mike Lee in the U.S. Senate , while Nancy Mace of South Carolina will lock arms with Representatives Thomas Massie and Matt Gaetz .
Both women are vetted and proven war skeptics who are determined to challenge Liz Cheney at every turn .
Beyond government , the creative destruction brought by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ given a new lease on life to restrainers long excluded from the Beltway ’ s incestuous institutions .
That includes the continued ascension of publications like The American Conservative , which has become a wheelhouse for the most important foreign policy conversations happening on the right ; Tucker Carlson , whose program has become the highest rated in cable news history , no doubt aided by his antiwar opening monologues ; the Quincy Institute , which is dragging other think tanks kicking and screaming into dialogues about shifting U.S. positioning overseas ; and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of right-of-center veterans who are lobbying to end the country ’ s unconstitutional wars .
The American empire was formed over the course of a century , and currently encompasses over 850 overseas military bases .
Hundreds of billions of dollars are exchanged every year through facets of the military-industrial complex , while thousands of very powerful people make their cushy salaries off the current imperialistic system ( and will fight tooth and nail to keep it that way ) .
One election was never going to change that .
Donald Trump was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
But he ’ s kicked in the door and let us in , even if we wish he ’ d tidied up better before he left .
We have principled leaders in government .
We have the infrastructure .
And most importantly , we have the voters .
Liz Cheney and her misbegotten hangers-on may not realize it yet , but their heyday has long past .
It ’ s our party now and we ’ re going to bring America home .
Hunter DeRensis is the communications director of BringOurTroopsHome.US and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Follow him on Twitter @ HunterDeRensis .

At the time of this writing, the outcome of the 2020 presidential election remains unclear. Final tabulations in multiple states remain days away, while other declared results are already being challenged. While both candidates can claim a path to victory in the Electoral College, the edge clearly belongs to former vice president Joe Biden.
If Donald Trump is defeated, whither the hopes of conservative restrainers?
“Backwards,” whisper the creatures emerging from their crawlspaces at the first opportunity. On the eve of the election, for example, Politico published a fawning profile of Congresswoman Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who is laying the groundwork to become speaker of the House in a future Republican majority. An ideological mirror of her father, she and her cohort long for a restoration of the early 2000s Bushite foreign policy of globe-trotting regime change and democratic nation building administered by a national security state in Washington D.C.
Their cause, however, is as infertile as their past efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is because despite his poor record, Donald Trump has created a permanent and growing disconnect between the War Party and the GOP.
There is no need to sugarcoat how Donald Trump has squandered four years of opportunity in foreign policy. His promises to bring the troops home have not materialized and remain “promises” to be kept at a permanently delayed date. He has intensified U.S. interference in Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and Venezuela. He’s overseen the continued deterioration of relations with Russia, while leaving North Korea at the diplomatic altar. And he’s brought the United States and Iran into a first exchange of direct, open conflict.
A big-picture assessment, however, requires not looking at how Trump failed to bring what restrainers wanted, but how he succeeded in destroying what they needed gone.
Trump’s election caused the departure of the most loathsome of the war peddlers—including Bill Kristol, David Frum, Jamie Kirchick, Steve Schmidt, and Max Boot—from Republican ranks. United under the banner of “Never Trump,” for four years they used every inch of column space, every CNN interview, and a small fortune to cleave off a portion of the Republican base that they believed would be happy to return to the world of 2006.
The result? Exit polls show Trump winning 93 percent of the Republican vote, a higher percentage than he won in 2016. As an election post-mortem summarized, Never Trump hawks “basically do not exist anywhere outside of the Washington Beltway or cable news green rooms—and after tonight’s results, we shouldn’t have to see them on TV or even see their tweets ever again.”
That the average American has the same respect for the War Party’s minions as they have for a tobacco executive should come as no surprise. Polling continually shows a supermajority of Americans ready and eager to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan. That includes 77 percent of Republicans, 40 percent of whom want to decrease military engagement with the rest of the world as well. These voters are a vanguard that will stop any future Bushite ascendance, whether from Nikki Haley or the spawn of Dick Cheney.
Slowly, Republican members of Congress are beginning to reflect the wishes of their voters. One year ago this month, I wrote about the emerging cadre of antiwar conservatives in the House of Representatives. While most broke under pressure to support Trump’s escalation with Iran, not all did. It’s a more active and vocal Republican contingent than has existed for decades and it’s growing fast. Following Tuesday’s results, Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming will join Rand Paul and Mike Lee in the U.S. Senate, while Nancy Mace of South Carolina will lock arms with Representatives Thomas Massie and Matt Gaetz. Both women are vetted and proven war skeptics who are determined to challenge Liz Cheney at every turn.
Beyond government, the creative destruction brought by the Trump presidency in conservative circles has given a new lease on life to restrainers long excluded from the Beltway’s incestuous institutions. That includes the continued ascension of publications like The American Conservative, which has become a wheelhouse for the most important foreign policy conversations happening on the right; Tucker Carlson, whose program has become the highest rated in cable news history, no doubt aided by his antiwar opening monologues; the Quincy Institute, which is dragging other think tanks kicking and screaming into dialogues about shifting U.S. positioning overseas; and activist organizations like BringOurTroopsHome.US, a collection of right-of-center veterans who are lobbying to end the country’s unconstitutional wars.
The American empire was formed over the course of a century, and currently encompasses over 850 overseas military bases. Hundreds of billions of dollars are exchanged every year through facets of the military-industrial complex, while thousands of very powerful people make their cushy salaries off the current imperialistic system (and will fight tooth and nail to keep it that way).
One election was never going to change that. Donald Trump was never going to be a miracle worker. But he’s kicked in the door and let us in, even if we wish he’d tidied up better before he left.
We have principled leaders in government. We have the infrastructure. And most importantly, we have the voters. Liz Cheney and her misbegotten hangers-on may not realize it yet, but their heyday has long past. It’s our party now and we’re going to bring America home.
Hunter DeRensis is the communications director of BringOurTroopsHome.US and a regular contributor to The American Conservative. Follow him on Twitter @HunterDeRensis.


theamericanconservative--2020-11-07--No Surrender — At Least Not Yet

No Surrender — At Least Not Yet

The old guard wants us to lay down and take it , but this election is far for over .
It 's time to fight , and Trump is our man .
Mitt Romney would have conceded by now .
John McCain would have conceded Tuesday night .
George Bush would have called it quits , and then invaded Iraq for good measure .
Thank God in heaven for Donald J. Trump .
Speaking late Thursday from the White House , President Trump predicted that , if all legal votes ( and only legal votes ) were counted , they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ election .
Over the past few days , former Vice President Biden has consistently made similar claims , without the caveat that votes must be legally cast .
As has become the norm when conservatives voice concerns over a questionable election , the president ’ s observations and forecast were quickly “ fact-checked ” by the mainstream media and censored by Big Tech platforms—while Biden ’ s went unchecked .
The facts , we are told , show a clear Biden victory .
Any suggestion to the contrary , any attempt to investigate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as right-wing conspiracizing , or the petulant protestations of a sorry bunch of sore losers .
( Russiagate , it seems , has been memory-holed . )
The decent thing , they say , would be concession—take the numbers at face value and call it a day .
To his great credit , it looks like Trump will do no such thing .
This election has essentially come down to six states : Arizona , Georgia , Michigan , Nevada , Pennsylvania , and Wisconsin .
Of these six , only Arizona and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Wisconsin have already been called for Biden by most sources , and Pennsylvania and Georgia are expected to follow close behind .
Even if Arizona and Nevada both went for Trump in the end—the latter seems likely , while the former is a long shot—victory in the other four would secure Biden a comfortable electoral college win at 289 .
It can hardly be ignored that the major blue cities in each of these states—Atlanta , Detroit , Philadelphia , and Milwaukee—are all dominated by strong , old-school , Tammany-style machines .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democratic machines are not exactly known for the integrity of their elections .
This is the question being asked by Trump and other right-wingers : not whether some massive conspiracy has been orchestrated at the national level , with Biden pulling the strings from a basement in Delaware , but whether the substantial misconduct that has long defined city political machines is influencing outcomes in these four key locations .
This is not a question on which we can play it safe and civil .
We need a full court press to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unwilling to provide them .
Pay attention to the mainstream argument : Trump ’ s claims have not been conclusively proven , and so the mere suggestion is considered far beyond the pale .
For many , the president ’ s assertion that 1 ) misconduct has been observed on a large scale in all of these key locations and 2 ) this misconduct will be challenged in court , is the conclusive proof they need that we are sliding into the dictatorship they predicted four years ago .
The concerns are rebuked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unsubstantiated , “ without evidence ” —and the narrative that Biden is the clear winner tightens its grip with every word out of every anchor ’ s mouth .
But more than enough preliminary evidence has been provided in each of these places to justify—no , demand—investigation .
The fundamental reason all these claims remain “ unsubstantiated ” is that the very people who reject them on this basis are the ones who are supposed to be substantiating them—and they have absolutely , entirely abandoned this basic duty .
Anyone who tries to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a kook or ( in Trump ’ s case ) a caudillo .
We can hardly expect an honest accounting of what ’ s happened in the blue cities when talking about what ’ s happened in the blue cities has suddenly become the eighth deadly sin .
This is why—besides his unique perspective and approach drawing together the broadest coalition a Republican has built in sixty years—Trump is actually the perfect man for the moment .
The entire media establishment is aligned to declare a Biden victory prematurely , with no intention @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state governments in the places that matter are hardly more reliable—Michigan Attorney General Jocelyn Benson is an alumna of the SPLC , and Pennsylvania AG Josh Shapiro promised four days before the election that Trump would not win the state .
The docile functionaries and milquetoast figureheads of the pre-Trump GOP could not have handled the fight ahead—and likely would have run from it .
In fact , we know that they would have , because that ’ s exactly what they ’ re urging Trump to do now .
If you Google @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , it ’ s going to take a whole lot of digging to actually find the speech Trump delivered on Thursday .
What you will find instead are abundant “ fact-checks ” of the speech that don ’ t actually check any of the facts , and page upon page of ritual denunciations by the chattering classes .
These denunciations are hardly limited to the left-wingers behind the anchors ’ desks at every major network .
CNN is proudly touting a clip of Rick Santorum , former Republican senator from PA and current @ @ @ @ @ @ @ source , expressing his shock and disappointment that the president would call into question certain aspects of the election .
Santorum voiced his hope that “ Republicans will stand up at this moment and say what needs to be said about the integrity of our election.
” ( The irony is apparently lost on him . )
Similarly , Scott Walker , who was one of the first to exit the Republican primary field in 2016 and lost his reelection bid for governor of Wisconsin in 2018 to Democrat Tony Evers , has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a recount—which the Trump campaign has already called for—would be pointless .
He has observed that , in normal elections , recounts have done very little to alter tallies .
There ’ s no sense to this line : this is not a normal election .
Delays in ballot counting alone are enough to cause concern .
Add to that the occasional full stops , after which huge quantities of Biden ballots conveniently appear .
Add to that Wisconsin ’ s level of voter turnout—not over 100 % , as some online rumors @ @ @ @ @ @ @ high .
It would be the farthest thing from a surprise if a more careful inspection really did shake things up this time around .
The same is true in Michigan , where Biden has made similarly stunning gains in witching-hour ballot dumps .
On top of that , the transposition of a few thousand Trump votes to Biden in Antrim County has now been chalked up to a glitch in the tabulation software—software that happens to be used in 46 other counties .
We now know there is a problem with the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even the slightest chance that even the smallest repetition of that glitch has occurred elsewhere demands the strictest scrutiny be applied to the Michigan vote .
All this and more can be said for Pennsylvania and Georgia , the two states most vital to the president ’ s reelection .
Pennsylvania in particular is playing fast and loose with mail-in ballots , and dubious rules changes need to be challenged in court .
Philadelphia has a reputation for machine-style corruption that puts Daley-era Chicago to shame .
Election workers there have also repeatedly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ process they are legally entitled to oversee .
The same thing is happening in Detroit , where cardboard has actually been placed over the windows to prevent people from seeing inside the central counting location .
If you have nothing to hide , right ?
The president has every reason not to take the narrative at face value .
This doesn ’ t mean we throw out the election , and it doesn ’ t mean we ’ re undermining democracy .
It means we need to exhaust every avenue and turn over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ brought before a court needs to be , and every ballot that raises red flags needs to be explained .
Put the screws to every machine operative from Milwaukee to Atlanta , and make sure every word holds up .
Somebody needs to give a very good answer as to why the number of ballots left to count in Fulton County keeps changing every time we go to sleep—and changing by margins that boggle the mind .
Force the people who run the machines to speak , and see how long their story @ @

Mitt Romney would have conceded by now. John McCain would have conceded Tuesday night. George Bush would have called it quits, and then invaded Iraq for good measure. Thank God in heaven for Donald J. Trump.
Speaking late Thursday from the White House, President Trump predicted that, if all legal votes (and only legal votes) were counted, they would show that he has won the election. Over the past few days, former Vice President Biden has consistently made similar claims, without the caveat that votes must be legally cast. As has become the norm when conservatives voice concerns over a questionable election, the president’s observations and forecast were quickly “fact-checked” by the mainstream media and censored by Big Tech platforms—while Biden’s went unchecked.
The facts, we are told, show a clear Biden victory. Any suggestion to the contrary, any attempt to investigate reports of Democratic misconduct, is dismissed as right-wing conspiracizing, or the petulant protestations of a sorry bunch of sore losers. (Russiagate, it seems, has been memory-holed.) The decent thing, they say, would be concession—take the numbers at face value and call it a day. To his great credit, it looks like Trump will do no such thing.
This election has essentially come down to six states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Of these six, only Arizona and Nevada really remain question marks. Michigan and Wisconsin have already been called for Biden by most sources, and Pennsylvania and Georgia are expected to follow close behind. Even if Arizona and Nevada both went for Trump in the end—the latter seems likely, while the former is a long shot—victory in the other four would secure Biden a comfortable electoral college win at 289. It can hardly be ignored that the major blue cities in each of these states—Atlanta, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Milwaukee—are all dominated by strong, old-school, Tammany-style machines. It can hardly be forgotten that urban Democratic machines are not exactly known for the integrity of their elections.
This is the question being asked by Trump and other right-wingers: not whether some massive conspiracy has been orchestrated at the national level, with Biden pulling the strings from a basement in Delaware, but whether the substantial misconduct that has long defined city political machines is influencing outcomes in these four key locations. This is not a question on which we can play it safe and civil. We need a full court press to get answers from people who have shown themselves unwilling to provide them.
Pay attention to the mainstream argument: Trump’s claims have not been conclusively proven, and so the mere suggestion is considered far beyond the pale. For many, the president’s assertion that 1) misconduct has been observed on a large scale in all of these key locations and 2) this misconduct will be challenged in court, is the conclusive proof they need that we are sliding into the dictatorship they predicted four years ago. The concerns are rebuked with the usual dismissals—unfounded, unproven, unsubstantiated, “without evidence”—and the narrative that Biden is the clear winner tightens its grip with every word out of every anchor’s mouth. But more than enough preliminary evidence has been provided in each of these places to justify—no, demand—investigation.
The fundamental reason all these claims remain “unsubstantiated” is that the very people who reject them on this basis are the ones who are supposed to be substantiating them—and they have absolutely, entirely abandoned this basic duty. Anyone who tries to look into the evidence is denounced as a kook or (in Trump’s case) a caudillo. We can hardly expect an honest accounting of what’s happened in the blue cities when talking about what’s happened in the blue cities has suddenly become the eighth deadly sin.
This is why—besides his unique perspective and approach drawing together the broadest coalition a Republican has built in sixty years—Trump is actually the perfect man for the moment. The entire media establishment is aligned to declare a Biden victory prematurely, with no intention of investigating election inconsistencies. Local and state governments in the places that matter are hardly more reliable—Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is an alumna of the SPLC, and Pennsylvania AG Josh Shapiro promised four days before the election that Trump would not win the state. The docile functionaries and milquetoast figureheads of the pre-Trump GOP could not have handled the fight ahead—and likely would have run from it.
In fact, we know that they would have, because that’s exactly what they’re urging Trump to do now. If you Google “trump+thursday+speech” or any similar query, it’s going to take a whole lot of digging to actually find the speech Trump delivered on Thursday. What you will find instead are abundant “fact-checks” of the speech that don’t actually check any of the facts, and page upon page of ritual denunciations by the chattering classes.
These denunciations are hardly limited to the left-wingers behind the anchors’ desks at every major network. CNN is proudly touting a clip of Rick Santorum, former Republican senator from PA and current senior political analyst at that esteemed news source, expressing his shock and disappointment that the president would call into question certain aspects of the election. Santorum voiced his hope that “Republicans will stand up at this moment and say what needs to be said about the integrity of our election.” (The irony is apparently lost on him.)
Similarly, Scott Walker, who was one of the first to exit the Republican primary field in 2016 and lost his reelection bid for governor of Wisconsin in 2018 to Democrat Tony Evers, has issued a number of tweets insisting that a recount—which the Trump campaign has already called for—would be pointless. He has observed that, in normal elections, recounts have done very little to alter tallies. There’s no sense to this line: this is not a normal election. Delays in ballot counting alone are enough to cause concern. Add to that the occasional full stops, after which huge quantities of Biden ballots conveniently appear. Add to that Wisconsin’s level of voter turnout—not over 100%, as some online rumors earlier suggested, but still near unbelievably high. It would be the farthest thing from a surprise if a more careful inspection really did shake things up this time around.
The same is true in Michigan, where Biden has made similarly stunning gains in witching-hour ballot dumps. On top of that, the transposition of a few thousand Trump votes to Biden in Antrim County has now been chalked up to a glitch in the tabulation software—software that happens to be used in 46 other counties. We now know there is a problem with the way the votes are counted, and even the slightest chance that even the smallest repetition of that glitch has occurred elsewhere demands the strictest scrutiny be applied to the Michigan vote.
All this and more can be said for Pennsylvania and Georgia, the two states most vital to the president’s reelection. Pennsylvania in particular is playing fast and loose with mail-in ballots, and dubious rules changes need to be challenged in court. Philadelphia has a reputation for machine-style corruption that puts Daley-era Chicago to shame. Election workers there have also repeatedly blocked GOP poll watchers from observing the process they are legally entitled to oversee. The same thing is happening in Detroit, where cardboard has actually been placed over the windows to prevent people from seeing inside the central counting location. If you have nothing to hide, right?
The president has every reason not to take the narrative at face value. This doesn’t mean we throw out the election, and it doesn’t mean we’re undermining democracy. It means we need to exhaust every avenue and turn over every stone. Everything that can be brought before a court needs to be, and every ballot that raises red flags needs to be explained. Put the screws to every machine operative from Milwaukee to Atlanta, and make sure every word holds up.
Somebody needs to give a very good answer as to why the number of ballots left to count in Fulton County keeps changing every time we go to sleep—and changing by margins that boggle the mind. Force the people who run the machines to speak, and see how long their story lasts.


theamericanconservative--2020-11-07--Last Minute Election Rule Changes Raise Big Questions

Nearly all forms of government—certainly including democracy , oligarchy , aristocracy , and monarchy—require two things for stability and longevity .
The first is legitimacy , a sense among citizens that the system is inherently fair and just , and that power is derived in a defensible manner .
The second is a means of succession , with transfers of power , when desired or needed , that are accepted and bloodless .
In the modern era , certainly since the 1788 beginning of the grand American experiment in self-government , a conviction has emerged that legitimacy can be derived @ @ @ @ @ @ @ governed .
That was a breakthrough concept when it emerged in modern guise with the American Founders .
But history demonstrates that , at various times and in various circumstances , popular feelings of legitimacy have undergirded many kinds of regimes and nations through the centuries .
The succession challenge is another matter .
History emphatically reveals that it inevitably will emerge as a dangerous problem for any regime other than a democratic one .
Human nature being what it is , the lack of a legitimately derived and clearly defined succession regimen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ old protocols and unleash bloody contentions for power .
And that , the U.S .
Founders believed , would destroy the people ’ s protections against arbitrary and tyrannical government .
Only in a democratic regime , with popularly rendered , regular and relatively frequent transfers of power , can the people be assured that they are fortified against such tyranny .
Thus did the Founders mesh the legitimacy challenge and the succession challenge into a single coherent protection against oppression .
At its foundation was the view that human beings are corruptible @ @ @ @ @ @ @ power must be dispersed widely and transferred regularly .
This has come down to us as a sacred concept .
But now it is being undermined by people who are attacking the legitimacy concept indirectly by trying to game the succession system to their own partisan advantage .
We might start with President Trump ’ s allegation on Thursday that his opponents in the canvas just past set out brazenly to sabotage the election through the manufacture of illegal votes .
“ If you count the legal votes , I easily win , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you count the illegal votes , they can try to steal the election.
” This is an irresponsible statement , without foundation , and it certainly undermines the nation ’ s sense of legitimacy .
Thus , it deserves the opprobrium it has received from many quarters .
So do the multiple lawsuits initiated by the president and his campaign that suggest widespread malfeasance in the vote counting of several states .
But , like many of the vociferous attacks on Trump from his passionate adversaries over the past five years , it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Friday ’ s Wall Street Journal , Washington lawyers David B. Rivkin and Andrew M. Grossman report that over the past year or so Democratic forces unleashed “ an unprecedented legal campaign to upend longstanding rules of election administration.
” The result on election day was considerable confusion about voting rules in several states , and that confusion now lingers as the nation goes about the elaborate process of certifying the election results amid multiple lawsuits designed to clarify what those rules were or should have been .
A good example is Pennsylvania @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2019 to allow all voters to cast mail-in ballots and to establish a ballot-receipt deadline of 8 p.m. on election day .
There ensued four lawsuits by Democrats seeking extensions on the ballot-receipt deadline .
Three were rejected by the courts , but the fourth succeeded in getting a three-day ballot-receipt extension , along with a presumption that unpostmarked ballots should be accepted .
The court essentially produced legislation from the bench , notwithstanding the clear language in the U.S. Constitution that vests authority for writing election rules in state legislatures , not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bureaucracies .
The U.S. Supreme Court punted on this question when it essentially denied requests by Pennsylvania ’ s Republican Party and GOP-controlled legislature to block the lower-court ruling .
But it still must review the case on the merits , and that poses far more complexities after the election than it would have posed beforehand .
The Court ’ s four conservative justices have strongly contested the idea that state courts or agencies can constitutionally supersede state legislatures in formulating election laws .
The Washington Post ’ s Robert Barnes wrote on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Court in the wake of the election .
“ Those strong endorsements of the legislatures ’ powers [ by conservatives ] could be meaningful in post-election disputes , ” he suggested , noting that several other cases , besides Pennsylvania ’ s , involve states where Democrats control the governorships but Republicans control the legislatures .
Thus do we see the ongoing liberal push to leverage the courts to supersede or override legislative prerogative now infecting the process of elections .
As Rivkin and Grossman write , “ The media is already @ @ @ @ @ @ @ litigate its way to victory , but practically every issue in play arises from the Democrats ’ march through the courts in the run-up to Election Day.
” The reality is that it simply isn ’ t clear what the law is in the various states or who is empowered to enact it .
And that ’ s a big problem in a time when partisan polarization is at its highest pitch since the run-up to the Civil War , when political suspicion and mistrust flow freely , when faith in the country @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and when urban business owners feel a need to board up their stores against the possibility that the election outcome could ignite street riots and destruction .
Yes , Trump ’ s outcry about a stolen election was reckless and outrageous .
But so was Joe Biden ’ s fanciful prediction last spring that Trump was going to “ try to kick back the election somehow , and come up with some rationale why it can not be held.
” Or his allegation that Trump sought to enhance his electoral prospects by pressuring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as a condition for coronavirus funding .
We all have reason for concern when the country ’ s venerable mode of presidential succession becomes a political football , when the imperative of protecting that element of our hallowed governmental system gives way to sly efforts to manipulate it .
We have had constitutional crises in the past involving deadlocked or disputed presidential elections .
In 1800 an Electoral College deadlock was thrown into the House of Representatives and required 35 votes before Thomas Jefferson eventually emerged the victor .
In 1824 the responsibility @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , where Speaker Henry Clay engineered the election of John Quincy Adams–then accepted the job of secretary of state from the new president he had installed in office .
In 1876 , Democrat Samuel Tilden won both the popular balloting and the Electoral College vote but lost the election when the outcomes of four states were challenged by Republicans and Congress stepped in to tilt the outcome to Republican Rutherford Hayes under the guise of an adjudicating commission that was supposed to be impartial but wasn ’ t .
And in 2000 the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Court , which ruled in favor of the Republicans and the election of George W. Bush .
There were unsavory aspects in all of these political dramas and certainly plenty of room for dispute , emotion , and partisan rationalization on the part of both sides .
But American resilience prevailed each time , and none of these episodes seriously eroded the nation ’ s sense of legitimacy .
The country pretty much picked up where it had left off .
But never have we seen the careless lighting of matches in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the one we ’ re living in these days .
It ’ s a dangerous turn of events and cause for concern and caution .
Robert W. Merry , former Wall Street Journal correspondent and president of Congressional Quarterly , is the author of books on American history and foreign policy .

Nearly all forms of government—certainly including democracy, oligarchy, aristocracy, and monarchy—require two things for stability and longevity. The first is legitimacy, a sense among citizens that the system is inherently fair and just, and that power is derived in a defensible manner. The second is a means of succession, with transfers of power, when desired or needed, that are accepted and bloodless.
In the modern era, certainly since the 1788 beginning of the grand American experiment in self-government, a conviction has emerged that legitimacy can be derived only through the explicit consent of the governed. That was a breakthrough concept when it emerged in modern guise with the American Founders. But history demonstrates that, at various times and in various circumstances, popular feelings of legitimacy have undergirded many kinds of regimes and nations through the centuries.
The succession challenge is another matter. History emphatically reveals that it inevitably will emerge as a dangerous problem for any regime other than a democratic one. Human nature being what it is, the lack of a legitimately derived and clearly defined succession regimen will invite usurpers who will upend the old protocols and unleash bloody contentions for power.
And that, the U.S. Founders believed, would destroy the people’s protections against arbitrary and tyrannical government. Only in a democratic regime, with popularly rendered, regular and relatively frequent transfers of power, can the people be assured that they are fortified against such tyranny. Thus did the Founders mesh the legitimacy challenge and the succession challenge into a single coherent protection against oppression. At its foundation was the view that human beings are corruptible and that power corrupts. Thus, power must be dispersed widely and transferred regularly.
This has come down to us as a sacred concept. But now it is being undermined by people who are attacking the legitimacy concept indirectly by trying to game the succession system to their own partisan advantage.
We might start with President Trump’s allegation on Thursday that his opponents in the canvas just past set out brazenly to sabotage the election through the manufacture of illegal votes. “If you count the legal votes, I easily win,” declared the president. “If you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election.”
This is an irresponsible statement, without foundation, and it certainly undermines the nation’s sense of legitimacy. Thus, it deserves the opprobrium it has received from many quarters. So do the multiple lawsuits initiated by the president and his campaign that suggest widespread malfeasance in the vote counting of several states.
But, like many of the vociferous attacks on Trump from his passionate adversaries over the past five years, it masks a more complex reality. In Friday’s Wall Street Journal, Washington lawyers David B. Rivkin and Andrew M. Grossman report that over the past year or so Democratic forces unleashed “an unprecedented legal campaign to upend longstanding rules of election administration.” The result on election day was considerable confusion about voting rules in several states, and that confusion now lingers as the nation goes about the elaborate process of certifying the election results amid multiple lawsuits designed to clarify what those rules were or should have been.
A good example is Pennsylvania, which revised its election rules in 2019 to allow all voters to cast mail-in ballots and to establish a ballot-receipt deadline of 8 p.m. on election day. There ensued four lawsuits by Democrats seeking extensions on the ballot-receipt deadline. Three were rejected by the courts, but the fourth succeeded in getting a three-day ballot-receipt extension, along with a presumption that unpostmarked ballots should be accepted. The court essentially produced legislation from the bench, notwithstanding the clear language in the U.S. Constitution that vests authority for writing election rules in state legislatures, not in state courts or executive-branch authorities or bureaucracies.
The U.S. Supreme Court punted on this question when it essentially denied requests by Pennsylvania’s Republican Party and GOP-controlled legislature to block the lower-court ruling. But it still must review the case on the merits, and that poses far more complexities after the election than it would have posed beforehand. The Court’s four conservative justices have strongly contested the idea that state courts or agencies can constitutionally supersede state legislatures in formulating election laws.
The Washington Post’s Robert Barnes wrote on October 30 that this issue could bedevil the Court in the wake of the election. “Those strong endorsements of the legislatures’ powers [by conservatives] could be meaningful in post-election disputes,” he suggested, noting that several other cases, besides Pennsylvania’s, involve states where Democrats control the governorships but Republicans control the legislatures.
Thus do we see the ongoing liberal push to leverage the courts to supersede or override legislative prerogative now infecting the process of elections. As Rivkin and Grossman write, “The media is already accusing the Trump campaign of attempting to litigate its way to victory, but practically every issue in play arises from the Democrats’ march through the courts in the run-up to Election Day.” The reality is that it simply isn’t clear what the law is in the various states or who is empowered to enact it.
And that’s a big problem in a time when partisan polarization is at its highest pitch since the run-up to the Civil War, when political suspicion and mistrust flow freely, when faith in the country’s governmental institutions is waning, and when urban business owners feel a need to board up their stores against the possibility that the election outcome could ignite street riots and destruction.
Yes, Trump’s outcry about a stolen election was reckless and outrageous. But so was Joe Biden’s fanciful prediction last spring that Trump was going to “try to kick back the election somehow, and come up with some rationale why it cannot be held.” Or his allegation that Trump sought to enhance his electoral prospects by pressuring the Postal Service into making operational changes as a condition for coronavirus funding.
We all have reason for concern when the country’s venerable mode of presidential succession becomes a political football, when the imperative of protecting that element of our hallowed governmental system gives way to sly efforts to manipulate it.
We have had constitutional crises in the past involving deadlocked or disputed presidential elections. In 1800 an Electoral College deadlock was thrown into the House of Representatives and required 35 votes before Thomas Jefferson eventually emerged the victor. In 1824 the responsibility of selection again went to the House, where Speaker Henry Clay engineered the election of John Quincy Adams–then accepted the job of secretary of state from the new president he had installed in office. In 1876, Democrat Samuel Tilden won both the popular balloting and the Electoral College vote but lost the election when the outcomes of four states were challenged by Republicans and Congress stepped in to tilt the outcome to Republican Rutherford Hayes under the guise of an adjudicating commission that was supposed to be impartial but wasn’t. And in 2000 the disputed Florida outcome went to the Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the Republicans and the election of George W. Bush.
There were unsavory aspects in all of these political dramas and certainly plenty of room for dispute, emotion, and partisan rationalization on the part of both sides. But American resilience prevailed each time, and none of these episodes seriously eroded the nation’s sense of legitimacy. The country pretty much picked up where it had left off.
But never have we seen the careless lighting of matches in a political environment as dry and combustible as the one we’re living in these days. It’s a dangerous turn of events and cause for concern and caution.
Robert W. Merry, former Wall Street Journal correspondent and president of Congressional Quarterly, is the author of books on American history and foreign policy.