To right of center Americans upset by my recent op ed in the Chicago Tribune
After penning an op ed that hazarded the optimist view that our country will prevail in the battle with anti-democratic forces now in control of the GOP, I got a lot of push back. One very thoughtful Republican wondered why I omitted the partisan shenanigans of Democrats in my home state of Illinois. It is a fair question, but one with an important answer.
Let me start by saying that in ordinary times I would never have written a piece that so squarely lays blame on one party. These are not ordinary times.
In fact, I have paid quite a price in my life for taking on the worst elements of Democratic party in my state. I challenged Rod Blagojevich, a sitting governor in a Democratic primary. He was a crook. I lost, and on top of that, earned the enmity of a lot of powerful people. A few years later, because partisan gerrymandering is damaging no matter which party does it, I supported the independent map effort that should not have been so quickly tossed aside by the state’s Supreme Court. I have a long history of fighting the worst political instincts in my own party. But the anti-democratic efforts we are seeing play out in America now fundamentally differ from the hackery we are all too familiar with here in Illinois.
Today’s GOP is not the party many right-of-center Americans once rallied behind. It is the party of Donald Trump. It has no platform save to get elected (really, the GOP did not adopt a platform at its last convention), and in state after state, it poses an unprecedented threat to the democracy.
To understand, start by looking at the US Supreme Court. In three rulings, a divided court undermined weakened the fabric of our democracy.
Brnovich, Attorney General of Arizona, et. al v. Democratic National Committee et al. eliminated the mandatory review of changes to voting laws in several states that was a key part of the Voting Rights Act.
Citizens United unleashed a torrent of dark money into our political system, perverting our democracy.
Rucho et. al. v. Common Cause et.al. said partisan Gerrymandering was perfectly legal
I am not an attorney and do not presume to critique the legal arguments of the Court’s majority. But I am a deeply familiar with the impacts of these decisions. There was a time when the Court understood how important it was to stand united on the most divisive issues. As a matter of process, this series of opinions, divided largely on partisan lines, undermines faith in the judiciary. As a matter substance, the opinions undermine the workings of our democracy.
We have now seen a dramatic increase in gerrymandering, particularly in swing states where, unlike here in Illinois, the impact of partisan mapmaking has enormous impact on the entire nation. These swing states all have GOP controlled legislatures--Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Georgia.
In many states, GOP legislatures now have gone beyond gerrymandering to gain control of the administration of elections. Those who think partisan maps in Illinois and elsewhere are dangerous should take a moment to imagine what partisan election control will be like. In several states, these newly enacted laws include a pathway for legislative appointment of presidential electors.
At the same time, in state after state, while loudly claiming to protect voters from fraud (of which there is no evidence) legislators are making it harder to vote in ways that disparately impact Democratic voters. Eliminating drop boxes and reducing the number of polling places in large urban counties and ending Sunday voting are examples. Making it a crime to give water to voters waiting in line goes further, as it can only be understood as intimidation.
Taken together, these three strategies radical gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the potential of election nullification, are without precedent. Gerrymandering means some votes count more than others. Voter suppression means some individuals cannot cast ballots. The new legal framework for partisan legislators to claim that elections are tainted and to appoint their own slate of electors means elections themselves may not count. Not one democratic controlled legislature has done anything like this.
These legislative efforts go hand in glove with the public lies that pave the way for them to work. The unfounded and often repeated GOP claims of voter fraud prepare the public for the kind of doubt that might permit the use of the of the new legislative tools to declare elections tainted and to appoint a different set of electors. Similarly, the GOP campaign of intimidation (Anatomy of a death threat (reuters.com)) goes well beyond anything I’ve seen in a lifetime of poll watching in Chicago. It can have no purpose other than to undermine fair elections by scarring opposition poll watchers away.
Many people correctly point out that the last Presidential election gave us many examples of Americans upholding the law and refusing to be intimidated by President Trump’s threats. I have said on the radio that the democracy owes a great debt to former GOP Vice President Dan Quayle for convincing his fellow Hoosier, Mike Pence, not to go along with President Trump’s January 6th scheme. And I have publicly applauded GOP election officials in Arizona and Georgia. But as they say on Wall Street, “part performance is no guarantee of future results.” To be sure of that, this GOP (not the GOP where so many right of center Americans found a home for year) has removed many of those courageous officials. In state after state Trumpists have worked tirelessly to put their most partisan members in those seats. (‘Slow-motion insurrection’: How GOP seizes election power | Raleigh News & Observer (newsobserver.com)) And they have upped the kind of dangerous rhetoric that prepares the public to support their most dramatic and undemocratic actions.
I firmly believe America needs both right- and left-of-center political parties. Many people I deeply respect have been life-long Republicans. What is so difficult for all Americans to grasp is that the old conservative GOP is gone. And, at this unique moment in our history there is a one-party attack on our democratic norms, and it is coming from the new Trumpist GOP. There simply is no equivalency between this threat and kind of partisan politics we have seen in Illinois and elsewhere.
Some might say that I am being alarmist. That a great democracy like ours could not fall. But scholars here and in Europe who are trained to study democratic strength and democratic decline are united in their view that ours is no longer the most democratic nation, and that we are now at risk. We should not ignore their warnings.