RSN: FOCUS: How Far Could Republicans Take Trump's Election-Fraud Claims?

 

 

11 November 20

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FOCUS: How Far Could Republicans Take Trump's Election-Fraud Claims?

Jeannie Suk Gersen, The New Yorker
Excerpt: "There is a limit to what Biden's team can do, particularly in national security, if the Trump Administration holds up a transfer of power."

mong the “firsts” associated with the 2020 election, the most norm-shattering of all will be if the candidate who lost never concedes to the one who won. After the major news outlets called the election for Joe Biden on Saturday, Donald Trump switched from insisting, “I won this election, by a lot,” to claiming that his loss was due to election fraud. Trump’s conduct seemingly has not fazed President-elect Biden as he proceeds into the transition; at the least, it was not a surprise, since Trump spent months making ominous and ungrounded predictions of voter fraud. There is, however, a limit to what Biden’s team can do, particularly in national security, if the Trump Administration holds up a transfer of power, as the head of the General Services Administration has done thus far by not formally recognizing the transition.

As if to fill the void, on Sunday, former President George W. Bush, the previous Republican in the highest office, issued a statement pointedly supporting the legitimacy of the election results. “The American people can have confidence that this election was fundamentally fair, its integrity will be upheld, and its outcome is clear,” Bush said. Twenty years ago, it was Republicans who were outraged that Al Gore retracted his initial concession to Bush, refused to concede when Bush was narrowly ahead during recounts in Florida, and then fought Republican state officials’ move to certify Bush as the winner, by suing to have the recount continue. The Supreme Court finally ordered an end to the Florida recount, in Bush v. Gore, on December 12th, 2000, and Gore conceded the next day. Now Democrats are calling upon Republicans to accept that Biden has won, and Republicans are looking to legal remedies to try to flip the result. But, because Biden’s win does not hinge on the results in one state, as Bush’s did, and because the margin of victory is not as thin, Trump’s legal remedies are far less realistic than Gore’s were.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said, on Monday, that “President Trump is a hundred per cent within his rights to look into allegations of irregularities and weigh his legal options.” Since Election Day, Republicans have pursued a smorgasbord of lawsuits, but they have been dismissed or are otherwise unlikely to succeed. The Trump campaign filed multiple suits in Pennsylvania, Nevada, Michigan, Georgia, and Arizona, generally alleging fraud, or demanding that states stop counting ballots or allow closer observation of the counting. Though some cases are ongoing (for example, a lawsuit to compel Pennsylvania to impose an earlier date for voters’ proof of identification), the vast majority were quickly dismissed for lack of evidence.

One case that Republicans began pressing before the election has gone to the Supreme Court. On September 28th, the Pennsylvania Republican Party challenged the state Supreme Court’s decision that, notwithstanding the Election Day deadline set by the Pennsylvania legislature, mail ballots postmarked by that day but arriving up to three days afterward were to be counted. The case has already produced three orders from the Justices: first, in mid-October, the Court deadlocked 4–4 on whether to lift the state court’s order while the Republicans prepared a request to decide whether a state court may alter the state legislature’s deadline for receipt of ballots. The Court therefore left the extended deadline in place for the election. Second, days before the election, the Court refused to expedite its consideration of the Republicans’ petition, again, leaving the extension in place. And, third, three days after Election Day and before Biden was declared the winner in Pennsylvania, Justice Samuel Alito ordered County Boards of Elections to comply with existing state guidance that mail ballots received after Election Day should be segregated and “if counted, be counted separately.” Had Biden’s victory ended up depending upon Pennsylvania, or, more precisely, on the mail votes that arrived after Election Day, then a Supreme Court decision on whether those votes must be disqualified would have been relevant to the election outcome. But the fact that Biden’s win did not hinge on any one state deflated the potential for the Supreme Court to decide the election.

The Court could still agree to hear the case, in order to decide whether the Constitution’s provisions that “the Times, Places, and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof,” and that “each State shall appoint” electors “in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct,” prohibit state courts from modifying state legislatures’ election rules. Even if the answer can’t affect this Presidential race, the question could recur in future elections. But the Justices might bear in mind that any decision could still influence the perceived legitimacy of this election: even hearing this case would fuel Republicans’ claims that the election procedures were awry, while refusing to hear it would seem to Democrats a vindication of Biden’s victory.

Prominent Republicans have largely refrained from acknowledging that Biden has won, and from challenging the President’s allegations of fraud—with the notable exceptions of Representative Will Hurd and Senators Mitt Romney, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Ben Sasse, who each publicly congratulated Biden. Some Republican leaders have urged rejection of the results. On Sunday, Senator Lindsey Graham said, “Do not concede, Mr. President. Fight hard.

But what would it mean to fight hard, when Trump’s barrage of litigation is extremely unlikely to change the outcome? Graham has laid some groundwork for the strategies that might remain even after rebuffs both at the polls and in court. In an interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News last Thursday, as it became clear that Biden would soon be declared the winner, Graham signalled his approval of the idea that Republican-controlled state legislatures might appoint electors who would cast votes for Trump, even though Biden won those states’ popular votes. Referring to Article II of the Constitution, which provides that a state “shall appoint” its electors “in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct,” Governor Ron DeSantis, of Florida, also urged people in battleground states to push their Republican legislatures to override popular-vote results.

It would be outlandish for a state legislature to deviate from the wishes of the state’s voters. But states have the power to determine that fraud affected the vote count and choose Presidential electors who do not reflect that supposedly faulty result. States with Republican legislatures that could, theoretically, override a popular vote in favor of Biden include Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, and Wisconsin. This possibility remains far-fetched in any of these states, perhaps particularly Pennsylvania, where last month, the Republican majority leaders of the state Senate and House wrote, in an op-ed, “The only and exclusive way that presidential electors can be chosen in Pennsylvania is by the popular vote. The legislature has no hand in this process whatsoever.” The majority leaders reaffirmed that commitment on Friday. But, on Tuesday, a group of Pennsylvania lawmakers announced that it wants the legislative committee to conduct a “comprehensive examination” of “irregularities and inconsistencies” in the election “prior to the certification of the election results and the empanelment of Pennsylvania’s electors to the Electoral College.”

If several states’ electors were to diverge from the popular vote, in theory, on December 14th, the Electoral College vote could result in a win for Trump, and, on January 6th, the newly seated Congress tabulating the electoral votes could declare Trump reëlected. Alternatively, neither candidate might garner a majority of the electoral votes, in which case the Twelfth Amendment to the Constitution says that “the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President.” Because Democrats retain a majority of the House, one might assume that would mean a Biden Presidency. But the Twelfth Amendment specifies that each state delegation gets one vote, meaning that a state that has more Republican than Democratic representatives would likely vote for Trump. Though there will be more Democratic than Republican members, there will be more Republican than Democratic state delegations in the House. Trump could well be the House’s choice for President.

Yet another disastrous situation would be if some states’ officials split and choose rival slates of electors. This would leave Congress to decide which of the electoral votes from those states to count. And, even though Trump will likely fail to convince courts to credit his allegations of election fraud, he could still press his fraud claim to Congress and urge its members to disqualify some states’ electoral votes. Given Trump’s continuing hold on Republican lawmakers, it appears not out of the question that they would take such an appeal seriously. And, as I wrote last week, if Congress cannot ultimately agree on how to count the electoral votes, it is unclear how the Presidential election would be resolved. Even if the American people wanted the Supreme Court to settle it, the Constitution and other laws would not provide clear means for the Court to decide.

None of these doomsday scenarios are likely yet. Perhaps Republicans are merely tiptoeing around Trump for the time being, waiting for his lawsuits to fizzle out, and expecting them to show the fraud and illegality claims to be unfounded. But the more time that passes without Trump conceding, and without Republican lawmakers publicly acknowledging that power will indeed transfer to Biden as a result of the election, the more it is imaginable that a portion of Congress may be persuaded to use the fraud claim to decline to count some electoral votes for Biden, come January 6th. In the meantime, on Monday, contrary to the long-standing practice of the Department of Justice, Attorney General William Barr explicitly authorized federal prosecutors to investigate voting fraud in the 2020 election “prior to the certification of elections in your jurisdictions.” (Barr’s decision prompted the resignation of Richard Pilger, the director of the Department’s Election Crimes Branch.) The move, coming at this delicate time, seems designed to improve Trump’s chances of influencing states’ certification of the election results, their appointment of electors, and Congress’s counting of electoral votes. It became particularly alarming when followed by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s statement, on Tuesday, that “there will be a smooth transition to a second Trump Administration.”

As we have learned in the past four years, it was not one aberrant President, by himself, but rather Trump’s hold on important Republican Party officials, that enabled the proliferation of chaos and erosion of norms. Even now that Trump has lost the election, the death grip will perhaps be slow to loosen because of his undeniable popularity with Republican voters. And Republican leaders may expect to be rewarded rather than punished by their constituents for fighting between now and January to prevent a Biden Presidency. This form of democratic responsiveness, in which leaders need only to appease adherents of their own party, underscores the difficulties that Biden will have in fulfilling his self-proclaimed mandate to unite the country. There are still significant partisan hurdles to clear before Biden is inaugurated, even though the voters have democratically chosen him as their next President.

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This Is How Thousands Of Americans Are Preparing To Take On Trump If He Refuses To Leave Office

“When Trump a few weeks ago began saying he wouldn’t commit to a peaceful transfer of power, that’s when I decided I needed to do it.”

BuzzFeed News; Getty Images (2)

One day late last month, longtime activist George Lakey was yet again training people on how to peacefully resist a coup. But this time, he was not in Moscow or Bangkok or one of the many other far-off places where he has traveled over his 70-year career as a sociologist and writer promoting democracy and nonviolent forms of protest. He was in the United States, at his home in suburban Philadelphia.

On the other end of Lakey’s Zoom webinar were around 1,000 American voters — 500 more, he noted, than had shown up the week before — from around the country who were glued to their screens, taking careful notes.

As President Donald Trump has spent the last few months planting seeds of doubt about the integrity of the US’s electoral process and urging his supporters to “go into the polls and watch very carefully,” dozens of advocacy groups, mostly progressive, have been hard at work trying to organize and train everyday Americans for what to do if their democracy appears to fall apart before their eyes.

“When Trump a few weeks ago began saying he wouldn’t commit to a peaceful transfer of power, that’s when I decided I needed to do it,” said Lisa Graustein, a 45-year-old former public school teacher in Boston, of her decision to give up two hours of her day to partake in a training on the finer points of mass demonstrations, peaceful sit-ins, and putting public pressure on elected officials.

Lakey being arrested during a demonstration in Pittsburgh in 2013.Courtesy Choose Democracy

Graustein, who now runs a food distribution center, said she had been “semi active” in local political and activist causes in the past. Still, that was a far cry from pondering the questions Lakey asked in the training, such as: Are you a person who will stand up to authority and be a voice for others? Or hearing Lakey assure the group that dictatorships fall when the masses rise up and that nonviolent resistance — like in Argentina in 1987 and the Soviet Union in 1991 — could be used to defeat a possible power grab by Trump.

But Graustein said she and all her friends and work colleagues are anxious about the election. “People not active in previous elections are active now,” she said. And so when someone in her Quaker community told her about the training, she signed up.

The idea behind the effort was to “actually help prevent” the possibility of a coup, explained Eileen Flanagan, who moderated the training with Lakey.

The training was organized by Choose Democracy, a Washington, DC–based group that describes itself as a “crew of organizers, activists, trainers, academics, and concerned citizens preparing for the scenario of a coup in 2020.” Choose Democracy has held three training sessions so far, each larger than the last; the first training of this month had more than 1,500 trainees and more than 3,500 have been involved in all so far, said Flanagan, a member of the political action committee. The events have become so popular that the group has organized six more this month, including two designed specifically for trainers to learn how to coach more people in their communities.

Another participant, a West Coast–based healthcare union organizer, told BuzzFeed News that prior to this election she had never been involved in an exercise like Lakey’s. But this year, she felt the need to take action.

Listening to Lakey discuss the history of attempted power grabs and political moments fraught with peril in other countries, “it really brought home this idea, ‘Wow, we’re really about to cross a rubicon,’” said the union organizer, who spoke to BuzzFeed News on the condition of anonymity because she was not authorized by her employer to speak to the media.

Choose Democracy and Lakey are far from the only ones preparing for what many Trump opponents believe would be a doomsday scenario for democracy.

The preparations include voter education campaigns and planning street protests, and getting public officials to pledge to not accept the results until every vote is counted. Some groups are using political and election experts to conduct war game–type exercises.

Erica Chenoweth, an American political scientist and professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, told BuzzFeed News that the planning for a potential coup is unprecedented in US history.

“First, there’s genuine talk of trying to avoid a coup. And the talk about this is with a level of seriousness that I think we haven’t seen in the country before,” she said. “Second, there’s a genuine national infrastructure around coordinating effective people power and avoiding an election power grab that is totally novel in American politics.”

That infrastructure is being built with initiatives like Choose Democracy and many others. Another organization is Protect the Results, which was launched by Stand Up America and Indivisible, two progressive groups formed after 2016 to fight the Trump administration’s agenda. Protect the Results is a coalition made up of more than 100 bipartisan organizations composed of millions of members nationwide. It is also gearing up in case Trump prematurely declares victory; the organization will have a robust national response in the form of street protests in all 50 states to demand that every single vote be counted before a winner is decided.

“Our view is, in any scenario where Trump might refuse to concede or choose to contest the results, it will be incredibly important for Americans to respond swiftly and for there to be a plan in place for grassroots mobilization,” Sean Eldridge, the founder and president of Stand Up America, told BuzzFeed News. “We’ve already seen Trump lie about voter fraud and demand foreign election interference. He’s behind in the polls and desperate. He’s clearly willing to bully and cheat his way through this election.

“So we are signaling to our community members that the most important thing they can do is to make a plan to vote and vote early — but that the work might not end on Election Day, and we might also need to be prepared to protect the results if Trump tries to put corrupt pressure on election officials or tries to undermine the results.”

The coalition includes members of the Black Lives Matter movement and organizations like Women’s March who have experience mobilizing large groups of people in multiple states.

This week, Protect the Results launched a map which Americans can use to RSVP for a protest near them — should it become necessary to take to the streets to demonstrate opposition to what the government is doing. As of Friday, the map already had more than 160 protests planned for Nov. 4, from Boston to Portland, Oregon, and everywhere in between.

Many of the groups began putting protest plans into motion after a bipartisan group of more than 100 current and former senior government and political campaign staffers and other experts in June organized the Transition Integrity Project, an exercise that has war-gamed various scenarios in which the presidential election could be disrupted. Its findings showed that an overwhelming protest presence in the streets “may be decisive factors,” the project’s website said.

The groups are also planning for Election Day itself. The nonpartisan grassroots group Common Cause is appointing “election protection volunteers,” which it describes as “voters’ first line of defense against restrictive election laws, coronavirus-related voting disruptions, or anything else that could silence their voices.”

Sylvia Albert, director of voting and elections for Common Cause, told BuzzFeed News that the volunteers will monitor the polls from outside voting stations while others watch for online disinformation and field calls to a hotline set up to take reports of voting problems, which could be anything from a lack of wheelchair access to illegal campaigning inside polling stations to explicit voter intimidation. In 2016 and 2018, the group had about 6,500 volunteers; this year, the number went up exponentially to more than 36,000.

Albert said the thousands of unarmed volunteers outside polling stations will be trained to handle situations in which they face intimidation or violence, although she believes that anything of the sort is unlikely to happen.

One such newly minted polling station observer is Jessica Mann, a 44-year-old social worker in Austin, Texas. Since early voting began in the state on Oct. 13, she has monitored activities outside various stations in three-hour shifts. A first-time-volunteer, she said she was motivated to do something after hearing Trump encourage supporters to come out and watch for “fraud” inside polling stations which raised fears of voter intimidation.

“I wanted to be there in case his monitors showed up,” Mann said. So far, she hasn’t seen any Trump supporters intimidating voters or faced intimidation herself. Under Texas state law on electioneering, Mann can only monitor a station from outside a 100-foot perimeter. (Other states have similar laws.) But she has sensed that people are more on edge than usual. “It’s a tense time and it’s an emotional time,” she said.

Many election experts worry about the probability of tense and possibly even violent confrontations this year due to challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic, tensions surrounding nationwide anti-police brutality protests, and Trump’s recent call for the violent men-only group Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by, which has emboldened far-right militant groups.

A threat assessment issued this month by the Department of Homeland Security showed that the agency also warned of the potential for political violence at and around the polls, particularly from extremists. “Open-air, publicly accessible parts of physical election infrastructure, such as campaign-associated mass gatherings, polling places and voter registration events, would be the most likely flashpoints for potential violence,” it said.

The Justice Department said it is planning to station officials in a command center at the FBI headquarters to coordinate the federal response to any election disturbances, the Washington Post reported, citing officials familiar with the matter.

Talk of a coup is not only coming from the progressive political wing. For their part, Trump-supporting conservatives have claimed the anti-coup preparation from the predominantly left-wing groups is actually the foundation of a coup itself being planned by Democrats.

The New York Times reported that after right-wing commentators began pushing disinformation about a Democrat-led coup, the unfounded allegation had spread quickly across social media. The Times’ analysis found mentions of it had “made its way into at least 938 Facebook groups, 279 Facebook pages, 33 YouTube videos and hundreds of tweets.”

With the heightened rhetoric and finger-pointing, experts say we are likely in for a hot Election Day and a chaotic post-election situation.

“With the exception of the ‘big Biden win’ scenario, each of our exercises reached the brink of catastrophe, with massive disinformation campaigns, violence in the streets and a constitutional impasse,” Rosa Brooks, a law professor at Georgetown University and cofounder of the Transition Integrity Project, wrote in the Washington Post about the war games she conducted with colleagues. “In two scenarios (‘Trump win’ and ‘extended uncertainty’) there was still no agreement on the winner by Inauguration Day, and no consensus on which candidate should be assumed to have the ability to issue binding commands to the military or receive the nuclear codes.

“In the ‘narrow Biden win’ scenario, Trump refused to leave office and was ultimately escorted out by the Secret Service — but only after pardoning himself and his family and burning incriminating documents.”

Lakey said he isn’t certain Trump will try to hold onto power no matter the election’s outcome. But the president has previously threatened to use the military to quash unrest, and he is now increasingly signaling that he could challenge the election results if they do not turn out in his favor. With this in mind, Lakey stressed the importance of being prepared.

“It’s like buying fire insurance,” he said. “You hope your home won’t catch on fire, but you want to have it if the worst should happen.” ●

LINK

FAIR: Media Fail to Prepare Public for Potential Trump Coup

 

View article on FAIR's website Media Fail to Prepare Public for Potential Trump Coup ROBIN ANDERSEN   On Sunday evening, two days before Election Day, Trump told reporters in Charlotte, North Carolina, “We’re going to go in the night of, as soon as that election is over, we’re going in with our lawyers.” The Washington Post (11/2/20) reported Monday morning that the “president’s comments are among his most unambiguous yet….” Here the paper could have followed with “...of Trump’s ongoing efforts to steal the election.” (See FAIR.org, 9/15/20.) But instead WaPo printed, “that he is embracing an aggressive legal strategy in an election that has already been beset with a multitude of lawsuits.” The Washington Post (11/2/20) transmits without interference Donald Trump's promise to annul votes cast against him. The piece follows with another Trump lament: “I think it’s terrible when we can’t know the results of an election the night of an election in a modern-day age of computers,” said Trump, before alleging that the Democratic governors of Pennsylvania and Nevada would somehow interfere with accurate counting. The short article amounts to little more than a series of Trump statements, nonsensical, obfuscating and pernicious, left to stand without comment, background, context or challenge, unless “alleging” and “somehow” count as explanation. To make sure that readers have heard every word out of Trump’s mouth, the paper positioned a video on top of the print story, featuring only Trump, who speaks on a landing strip against an evening sky in front of a microphone on a stand set up for the occasion. No graphic explanatory text or comments of any kind are seen. The Post piece illustrates the way corporate media have covered Trump so much of the time, as what David Barsamian called “stenographers to power.” That was the headline of a post John Nichols  (The Nation, 11/23/04) wrote after the 2004 election, which quoted Britain’s Daily Mirror marveling at election results that gave George W. Bush a second term: “How can 59,054,087 be so dumb?” Nichols’ answer cited an ad for the Weekly Guardian: “Many US citizens think the world backed the war in Iraq. Maybe it’s the papers they’re reading.” In the weeks leading up to the election, Trump repeated his election night expectations (CBC, 10/29/20): It would be very, very proper and very nice if a winner were declared on November 3, instead of counting ballots for two weeks, which is totally inappropriate, and I don't believe that's by our laws. Writing in the journal Science (10/16/20), historian Jill Lepore traced the history of calling election results. In 1800, the presidential contest that pitted Thomas Jefferson against John Adams began in March and ended in November. The winner was declared only weeks before inauguration. Today, both voting and counting in the United States are much faster, “if not always more fair.” Lepore warned, “This year, the communication of results long before they can possibly be known threatens to undermine not only the election but democracy itself.” The AP (10/31/20) ran an explainer that cited Lepore’s opinion piece, but of the elite press, only the Washington Post (10/31/20) chose to re-publish the wire-service copy, and it failed to include the argument in subsequent news reporting on the election. After alluding to the fact that Trump is going to try to keep votes from being counted for no good reason, CNN's John Avlon (10/28/20) advises viewers to "keep cool." Instead, corporate media approached election night with circuitous, often tepid reporting, scattered with euphemisms that obscured GOP voter suppression efforts and the clear possibility that Trump will try to steal the election. On CNN’s Reality Check (10/28/20), for example, John Avlon had three minutes to explain election night, and as he stood in front of a large map of the US, pointing to Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, he said, as if talking to a third-grade Zoom class: We’ve been telling you to expect election week, not election night. These three swing states will not start counting most early ballots until Election Day, which means that we won’t know the final results [right away]. He tells viewers that Democratic votes may increase when mail-in ballots are counted, and goes on to employ a dandy new media phrase: “It’s the so-called ‘blue shift,’ and it’s legitimate, not fraudulent as the president says.” The “blue shift” is what the New York magazine (10/8/20) called “a thoroughly rotten premise that a ‘blue shift’ toward Joe Biden as mail ballots come in has to represent fraud and a ‘Democratic coup.’” Trump’s claims of a “Democratic coup” are part of media discourse now, but a Trump coup is not. Avlon’s final words are a mastery of vague phraseology joined together in a nonsensical mush: But this is already the most litigious election ever. And there are reports of post office slowdowns. It’s all a reminder that nothing is preordained. Keep cool. Remember the right to vote is really the fight to vote. And democracy is on the ballot. And that’s your reality check. We are left to ponder the precise moment when one person, one vote became the right to vote is the fight to vote. For all its expressed concern, this word salad hides a deliberate GOP strategy designed to suppress the vote. Instead, CNN offers calm, patience and an acceptance of a new normal—a threatened electoral process that just is. When Avlon says 2020 is the most “litigious election ever,” he neglects to connect that litigation to the Trump campaign, which has hired a massive legal network with dozens of attorneys to bring legal challenges in key battleground states (Politico, 9/27/20). Most cases revolve around restricting time frames for mail-in ballots, and the length of time allowed to count them. Business Insider (9/27/20) offered details on Trump's efforts to stop people from voting, but no context on what this means for democracy. Even though media report such legal maneuvers, they rarely if ever use the words “voter suppression.” Business Insider (9/27/20) reports “an all-out legal war to stop the expansion of vote by mail,” detailing actions against New Jersey, Nevada, North Carolina, Iowa, Pennsylvania and Montana, states that have allowed voters to cast their ballot by mail more easily because of the pandemic. But after detailing the legal arguments, the article simply ends. No words explain what it means, why such legal maneuverings are being done, and what the consequences might be for the election--and democracy. Indeed, a FAIR study (9/15/20) searched eight large-circulation newspapers for the keywords “Trump,”  “election” and “steal,” and found that from July 7 to September 7, “there wasn’t a single article reporting that Trump is trying to steal the 2020 election.” Trump himself continues to boast about his successes at blocking the democratic process. At a press conference in Las Vegas between campaign stops, Trump said (Business Insider, 10/28/20), "Hopefully, the few states remaining that want to take a lot of time after November 3 to count ballots, that won't be allowed by the various courts.” In contrast to most news reporting, Seth Meyers (Late Night, 10/28/20), a comedy host, actually articulated an expository discourse, delivered in his clipped sardonic style, proclaiming: The plan is clear. Trump and the GOP are doing everything they can to suppress and undermine mail-in voting, hoping they can prematurely declare victory on election night. Seth Meyers (Late Night, 10/28/20) asks Brett Kavanaugh: "What are you talking about?" He also noted that nothing in the Constitution or federal law requires that all ballots be counted by 11:59 PM on November 3: “Election night is just a thing invented by radio and TV channels for ratings.” It’s a media creation. Meyers connected the dots between GOP actions and rhetoric, and the Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore. He pulled quotes from Brett Kavanaugh’s latest amateurish legalese, as the Supreme Court justice reached into the air for reasons to claim that counting ballots after Election Day would be suspicious: “States want to avoid the chaos and suspicion of impropriety that can ensue if thousands of absentee ballots flow in after election day and potentially flip the results of an election.” Meyers responded with incredulity: “What are you talking about? If there are more ballots to count, then that means that there are no results to flip!” Alarmed by Kavanaugh’s performance, an article headlined “He’s Down to Steal This Thing” in Common Dreams (10/27/20) quoted the Atlantic's Adam Serwer, “Kavanaugh is announcing to the world that if it will help Trump win, he will join a decision to not count votes” Slate (10/27/20) also sounded an alarm, worrying that Kavanaugh “has given the nation another legitimate reason to fear that this election may end with a Bush v. Gore–like disaster for American democracy, but even worse than the original." Legal correspondent Mark Joseph Stern pointed out that just minutes after the Supreme Court issued its ruling Monday night, Trump falsely tweeted that there are "big problems and discrepancies with mail-in ballots all over the USA." But again, it was Meyers who used the most forceful and direct language: It couldn’t be any clearer that Trump and his allies on the Supreme Court are telegraphing their plan to orchestrate a sequel to Bush v. Gore, by hoping Trump is ahead on election night and then prematurely declaring him the winner before all the votes are counted. Unfortunately, Meyers ended his piece with, “There is one way we can stand up to this and it's by voting in overwhelming numbers to repudiate Trump.” This seems to imply that if Trump succeeds in stealing the election, we have only ourselves to blame, for not voting overwhelmingly in person and risking our lives in the process. Indeed, organizations and activists have worked tirelessly to mobilize get-out-the-vote campaigns, and, by all measures, early voting by Democrats has been something like an insurrection. But increased violence and intimidation from Trump caravans roaming the streets nationally, legal shenanigans and court decisions have been so pervasive, especially in swing states, that Trump proudly boasted on election night that “we have already won,” calling the election a fraud. Legitimating Legal Strategies to Suppress the Vote As Trump openly cited his legal efforts to stop mail-in ballots, media would add, “arguing without evidence that such plans would lead to widespread voter fraud.” Indeed, no such evidence exists.  But media have failed to draw out this lie. “Arguing without evidence” means he is lying. Habitual use of this now iconic phrase has lost any punch. Contextual journalism would explain that fraud claims are being used as a justification to suppress voting and vote-counting, in hopes of holding onto the White House despite losing the election. The New York Times Magazine (6/2/20) reports that William Barr's "reputation as a wise old man" has been "tarnished" by his stint in the Trump administration—"in the eyes of some." Reporting has consistently failed to point out that Trump and Republicans, especially Trump’s Attorney General William Barr, are validating open voter suppression with such claims. The New York Times Magazine (6/2/20), in a 9,000-word-plus profile celebrating Barr’s long career (describing him as “rumpled,” with a soft speaking voice), quotes his claim that “there are a number of foreign countries that could easily make counterfeit ballots, put names on them, send them in. And it’d be very hard to sort out what’s happening.” The words stand without counter or comment, or 2020 election consequences. No mention is made of the ways these strategies are tied to the history of anti-democratic voting procedures. Details of court cases are not tied to Trump’s threat that he will not leave the White House. No warning that these are the actions of an autocrat laying the groundwork for a coup. At a press conference held on September 23, when asked if he would commit to a peaceful transferal of power after the election, Trump hedged: Well, we’re going to have to see what happens. You know that I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots and the ballots are a disaster—the ballots are out of control. You know it. And you know who knows it better than anybody else? The Democrats know it better than anybody else. For months, Trump has been pounding that same message: Mail-in ballots are an evil Democratic scheme to rig the election, so he won’t accept the results, and he won’t leave. But that logic remains unspoken in most press accounts. And they dare not call it a coup. Call It a Coup Bill McKibben (New Yorker, 6/3/20) addresses "what happens if Trump...manages to make himself a full-on tyrant." Often-arrested climate activist Bill McKibben observed back in June that Trump seemed to be gearing up for “a coup” (New Yorker, 6/3/20). McKibben argued that Trump’s “constant shout-outs to the Second Amendment people” was nothing less than a clarion call for violent disruption. As Trump trailed in the polls, the danger mounted. “It’s hard to know what, precisely, a coup looks like if the leader is already the president,” but McKibben offered a disturbing dystopian vision of state terrorism and a media blackout: Try to imagine troops ordered to use live rounds rather than rubber bullets, no social media on which to talk about it, and Fox News as the only sanctioned TV channel. He added, “Indeed, if you’re black, facing live ammunition is already an outsize reality here.” If Trump tries to carry out such a coup, McKibben warns, “Americans would be in a difficult predicament: whether to submit to that rule or stand up to it.” As one who fully understands the power of nonviolent civil disobedience, McKibben amassed an extensive list of tactics pulled from a mentor of his named Gene Sharp, who catalogued 198 “methods of nonviolent actions” that people have used to stand up to authority. He recommended that we all spend some time with the list. “It could come in handy—soon.” On October 28, five days before Election Day, The Nation presented Democrats with a three-point strategy of what they must do should Trump try to stage a coup. First, unlike what Al Gore did in 2000, “Joe Biden must not concede unless and until a complete and fair count of every ballot cast shows conclusively that he is the loser.” The second action calls on Democratic governors to appoint Biden electors if Republicans refuse to count every ballot before the Electoral College votes on December 14. They must also battle Republican state legislators should they try to appoint fraudulent Trump electors. The third point calls for congressional Democrats to fight for democracy by every means available, from political, procedural and legal tools to exclude Trump’s electors from states where he didn’t win—or where Republicans attempt to prevent a full count. Essentially, the writers call for Democrats to do what Republicans have done so successfully, and what Democrats have failed to do for years: fight an all-out political guerilla war. If necessary, Democrats must order “the sergeant at arms to remove Mike Pence and the Republicans from the House chambers in order to indefinitely delay the counting of Electoral College votes until Trump concedes.” Most importantly, Democrats must call on “protesters to physically shut down the Capitol with nonviolent civil disobedience in order to prevent fraudulent Electoral College votes from being counted.” Writing in the Progressive (10/26/20), Stephen Zunes, who has studied pro-democracy civil insurrections around the world, agreed with The Nation. He documented the ways successful popular insurrections have been able to reverse the tide of stolen elections by mobilizing large numbers of supporters within days. Other actions include large-scale noncooperation events that challenge the legitimacy of the incumbent government, including strikes, civil disobedience and the establishment of an alternative center of power. If enough people are in the streets engaging in nonviolent actions, centrists, who have been robbed of victory, and civil society can be mobilized. This may lead to “loyalty shifts” among regime allies, including noncooperation, defections and desertions by government officials and security forces. Establishment Media Will Urge Calm, Tell Us to Wait Intercept (8/11/20): Trump can  be stopped "if most Americans are willing to put their trust in people power — rather than courts, norms, and elites — to save democracy." Judging by the coverage and language to date, media will call for stability and defer to power. They will tell us to wait while they appeal to legal reasoning, offering long detailed accounts of court filings until time runs out. Writing for the Intercept (8/11/20), Frances Fox Piven and Deepak Bhargava recognized these tactics as the standard playbook of authoritarians everywhere: cast doubt on the election results by filing numerous lawsuits and launching coordinated federal and state investigations, including into foreign interference; call on militia groups to intimidate election officials and instigate violence; rely on fringe social media to generate untraceable rumors, and on Fox News to amplify these messages as fact; and create a climate of confusion and chaos. Piven and Bhargava reported that the Biden campaign is recruiting lawyers, not organizers. They are consulting Democratic Party operatives, “good-government types,” constitutional lawyers and other “experts,” who will urge us not to “politicize” the process. The party will tell us to wait for the “rule of law,” trust the process and the courts, and stay home and let the “smart boys in DC work things out on our behalf.” But as hard as it would be for Democrats to reverse years of shunning progressive activism, positioning themselves above the fray and putting their faith in political norms and legal strategies—even though they have failed—it is even harder to imagine establishment media bearing witness to an all-out fight for democracy. So accustomed are they to legitimating presidential power, it will be as uncharacteristic of them to change course as it will be for Democrats to take action. Most likely, media will cover protests with a false-balance frame that pits democratic insurgents against white nationalist Trump supporters, treating them as equivalent. After all, Trump has given a green light to white nationalist groups, and the Republican Party deputized 50,000 “poll watchers” to intimidate minority voters on Election Day. We see a glimpse of this in New York magazine (10/8/20), where Ed Kilgore disagreed with the election-theft scenario laid out by Barton Gellman in the November issue of the Atlantic. Kilgore characterized Gellman’s writing as a crystallization of “progressive fears about what Trump might be cooking up.” A Trump coup is seen as a left-wing fear, not a struggle between pro-democracy citizens and every effort by a demagogue to stage a coup. We need only to look at corporate media coverage of the Black Lives Matter movement, that has vilified protestors as the primary instigators of violence and theft, rather than police and the structural racism they are protesting against. Media have gone so far as to preemptively blame BLM for Trump’s reelection (FAIR.org, 11/03/20). In addition, FAIR (10/30/20) reported that media covered protests of the latest police killing in Philadelphia in deliberately inflammatory language, and Forbes (10/28/20) repeated White House claims that the protests were “the most recent consequence of the liberal Democrats’ war against the police.” Judith Shulevitz's article (Atlantic, 10/31/20) is not nearly as hostile to the idea of protest as the headline and photo would suggest. Media would most likely delegitimize civil actions in other ways as well. In fact, the Atlantic (10/31/20), in an article illustrated with the large, unpleasant picture of a wide-open mouth, went so far as to say, “Protests Won’t Be Enough to Stop a Coup.” Why? Because “resistance requires a lot more strategy.” This article is actually a rare, well-researched informative guide, cataloguing the writings and strategies of resistance. So where did the headline come from? It draws attention to the fact that corporate media have been overwhelmingly silent on the hundreds of organized groups preparing to respond in the streets using nonviolent resistance. Democracy’s defenders have prepared long documents detailing actions and strategies, such as this resource guide, completely missed by corporate media. But Common Dreams (10/27/20), among other alternative news sites, has reported on how “organizers across the country are planning at least 375 events at government buildings and other public spaces,” and are urging supporters to visit the Protect the Results coalition's website. Will the media continue to align themselves with a demagogue by failing to identify his refusal to leave as a “coup,” or will they finally embrace the perspective demanded by their First Amendment mandate and, in the name of democracy, uphold freedom of expression should American citizens collectively take to the streets to defend  our democracy? As Piven and Bhargava understand, rational debate, rule-following and conflict avoidance "don’t work against autocrats.” After cataloguing the overwhelming evidence to date of Trump’s tactics to steal the election, in the early morning hours of November 4, the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank acknowledged that Republicans were working furiously to stop votes from getting counted, “in hopes that this could turn another popular-vote defeat into another electoral-college victory.” Media may make it seem like a legitimate legal process, but it would be a Trump coup d'état.

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RSN: Stephen Eric Bronner | Requiem for a Teacher

 

 

05 November 20

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RSN: Stephen Eric Bronner | Requiem for a Teacher

Stephen Eric Bronner, Reader Supported News
Bronner writes: "No one should be allowed to scream fire in a crowded theater; respect for all beliefs is required in a multicultural universe, and so is empathy for the subaltern. Freedom of speech has its psychological and social - bordering on the political - limits."

n the 19th of October 2020, a young French high school teacher named Samuel Paty was decapitated. An apparently devout 21-year-old Muslim had become furious that caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad were being shown in class. Demonstrations all over France greeted news of this senseless tragedy. A slain high school teacher instantly turned into a symbol of republican secularism, or what the French call läicité. Police raids were launched against Muslim associations, and there was talk in official circles of deporting hundreds. Mr. Paty’s death has sparked a new wave of Islamophobia and, while Marine La Pen’s neo-fascist National Front is having a field day, President Emmanuel Macron is covering his right flank in preparation for the 2022 election.

Such is the context of a religious “honor killing” that is nothing more than a fanatical act of egoism and revenge. The progressive response is not very difficult to articulate: make clear who is the victim, seek prosecution of the alleged killer and all accomplices, oppose ideological exploitation of the incident, reject arbitrary deportation of Muslims, and affirm the principle of free speech and academic freedom. But it would be a mistake to consider this self-evident. This “post-truth” society of hyper-sensitized “woke” and “cancel” culture too often turns abdication of responsibility into an ethical principle.

From reporting in The New York Times (October 20, 2020) and personal conversations with acquaintances, “explanations” abound that tend to mitigate or even disqualify outright condemnations of what took place. They highlight Mr. Paty’s supposed lack of sensitivity; he should have known that using religious caricatures in class could only cause conflict and hatred. If this teacher’s murderer clearly took matters too far, he still supposedly represents the oppressed, and he was thus justified in feeling insulted. Satirizing someone’s religion is “hurtful.” Whatever Mr. Paty’s intentions, he should have anticipated a controversy that might provide grist for the mill of anti-immigrant reactionaries. In short, he should have been more careful and circumspect.

Little wonder that civil liberties are imperiled. Is pandering to prejudice the criterion for responsible pedagogy? No better objective apology for anti-immigrant sentiments exists than this fanatic’s reaction to a set of cartoons: “devotion” of this sort is nothing but a way of avoiding social responsibility and the dictates of reason. Mr. Paty might have expected criticism and controversy, but not what occurred. Teaching something volatile in a class is not the same as screaming fire in a crowded building: Mr. Paty’s actions occurred in a class where free discourse should be taken for granted. As for empathizing with the marginalized: the murder of this teacher was a decision based on the arrogant and self-righteous assumption that this youth’s feelings somehow expressed the interests of Islam. Not only the act, but this whole line of thinking, is inexcusable. Enough important Muslim leaders in France, such as the imams Hassan Chalgoumi and Hocine Drouiche, whom I am proud to count as friends, make no such excuses and offer no qualifications for such barbaric behavior.

Academic freedom exists to protect the teacher intent on saying something that might provoke controversy; not pandering to parochialism. Mr. Paty apparently did not endorse the blasphemous cartoons but, even if he did, showing them might have rested on little more than the desire to discuss them. Lack of empathy, or the like, should itself have become a topic of debate. There is nothing racist about this pedagogue having his students see the cartoons. In this same vein, the first pages of my book on the notorious Protocols of Zion – A Rumor about the Jews – were devoted to a reprint of this fabricated anti-Semitic pamphlet about a Jewish conspiracy to rule the world. I felt that reading what has been called a ”warrant for genocide” would give students a jolt; it did.

Education should make students uncomfortable. In fact, Theodor Adorno once said that great works should “hurt.” He was right. Critique is predicated on questioning the assumptions underpinning any idea that is taken on faith alone, and unsettling individuals is the most basic purpose of “critical thinking,” no matter what the subject. No intolerant or absolutist interpretation of religion or any body of knowledge that is insulated from criticism can demand respect. Authentic believers have enough confidence in their convictions to extend the rights they exercise to those who worship differently – or do not worship at all. It is those outside the mainstream, the heretics and the free-thinkers, who most rely on the right to free speech. It is for their benefit, not those in power, that this right must be understood as universal.

Immanuel Kant was initially a supporter of the French Revolution; that is, until censorship was imposed and the right to free speech was suppressed. He realized that it underpins all other rights, which is what renders Samuel Paty’s murder doubly senseless. Without free speech, the liberal rule of law and due process cannot function. There can be no freedom of assembly, no right to protest, no meaningful education – and no freedom of religion – without free speech. Through the attack on free speech and academic freedom, indeed, the dogmatists and fanatics are simply taking another step in destroying the very system that enables them to exercise their faith.

R.I.P. SAMUEL PATY

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Stephen Eric Bronner is Board of Governors Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Rutgers University and Co-Director of the International Council for Diplomacy and Dialogue. His most recent book is The Sovereign (Routledge).

Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.

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Protesters hold letters that spell Count Every Vote as they cross an overpass while marching in Portland, Oregon, November 4, 2020. (photo: Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP)

Donald Trump Is Trying to Steal the 2020 Election. America Is Ignoring Him.
Alex Ward, Vox
Ward writes: "President Donald Trump is actively trying to stop votes from being counted in the 2020 presidential election and making false claims that Democrats are stealing a win from him. It would all be so damn terrifying if we weren't all, well, used to it."

Something noteworthy — and oddly hopeful — about the 2020 election: People are ignoring Trump’s antics.

Let’s be clear about what’s happening: As his opponent Joe Biden edges closer to victory, Trump is launching tweet after tweet after tweet in an attempt to delegitimize the election. He’s filed lawsuits to stop the vote count in Pennsylvania and Michigan without evidence of wrongdoing. And he gave an early Wednesday address in which he prematurely claimed victory even though there were millions of votes to be counted in battleground states.

Seeing a leader aim to subvert the electoral process in an attempt to maintain power is the kind of behavior the US government would condemn if it were happening in any other nation. But it’s not. It’s happening here.

While Trump’s behavior is troubling — and make no mistake, it’s deeply troubling — what’s most noteworthy is how almost everyone is ignoring it.

States are continuing to count votes, as they are legally bound to do, despite the president’s wishes. Trump-friendly networks like Fox News are denouncing Trump’s proclamation of an election win as “extremely inflammatory.” Basically, everyone is carrying on with the election even as Trump openly wars against it.

Perhaps it’s not so surprising. Trump has spent the last five years claiming elections have been rigged against him, that the press is the enemy of the people, and that a “deep state” conspires against him. He has had no problem sending militarized law enforcement around the country to dole out punishment to those ideologically opposed to him.

That Trump would say and act in such a way isn’t a bug, it’s a feature. In that sense, one would think the US would be in crisis, inching toward a democratic finish line it may not reach, all because Trump keeps pushing it back or erasing it altogether.

But it’s not. It’s moving forward with an election that, as of Wednesday evening, looks likely to have former Vice President Joe Biden legitimately replace Trump. The only people Trump has successfully rallied to his cause are those in his very immediate orbit, not the broader public and not even most of his allies.

Directly following Trump’s claim that he won on Wednesday morning, Vice President Mike Pence hedged with a simple, “We are on the road to victory,” and said that the campaign was confident Trump would win reelection after all votes were counted. The usual process, then, not Trump’s heavy-handed method.

The oddly hopeful message of the 2020 election so far may therefore be the abject failure of Trump’s authoritarian machinations to keep the country stuck where it is. If anything, it looks like the country is swiftly moving along despite him.

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President Donald Trump. (photo: Jabin Botsford/Getty)

Judith Butler | Is the Show Finally Over for Donald Trump?
Judith Butler, Guardian UK
Butler writes: "We know that Trump will try to do anything to stay in power, to avoid that ultimate catastrophe in life - becoming 'a loser.'"
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People gather at a memorial for George Floyd outside Cup Foods in Minneapolis. (photo: AP)

Police Officers Accused of Killing George Floyd to Be Tried Together, in Minneapolis
Holly Bailey, The Washington Post
Bailey writes: "The former police officers charged with killing George Floyd will be tried together in March in a downtown Minneapolis courthouse, though the judge overseeing the criminal case said he would reconsider a change of venue motion if security or other issues arise."
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Poll workers review voter ballots at the Denver Elections Division headquarters in Denver, Colorado, Nov. 3, 2020. (photo: Jason Connolly/AFP)

Colorado Passes Resolution to Award Electoral Votes to Whoever Wins the Popular Vote
Joseph Choi, The Hill
Choi writes: "Colorado has passed Proposition 113, joining the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which is an agreement to give all of a state's electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Colorado currently controls nine electoral votes."

olorado has passed Proposition 113, joining the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which is an agreement to give all of a state’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Colorado currently controls nine electoral votes.

The ballot measure passed with 52 percent of the vote, The Denver Post reports, with 88 percent of votes reported statewide.

Colorado first enacted the proposition into law in 2019, but the decision had to be confirmed by vote cast by Nov. 3. The Centennial State joins 14 other states and the District of Columbia in enacting the proposition into law. Other states that have joined the compact include California, Connecticut and Maryland.

As the nonprofit group National Popular Vote reports, the jurisdictions that have enacted Proposition 113 into law account for 196 electoral votes. The proposition would go into effect when states that have a total number of 270 electoral votes pass such a measure.

Colorado state Sen. Michael Foote (D), a proponent of the bill, said on Wednesday, “The national popular vote is a very straightforward concept. One person should always equal one vote, and the presidential candidate who gets the most votes should win the election.”

Critics of the proposition claim that it will cause presidential candidates to only go to where major sources of votes can be found, such as heavily populated cities in California and New York. Supporters counter that states like Colorado are already ignored under the current Electoral College voting system.

“Coloradoʼs votes should be decided by Coloradans,” said former Colorado House Speaker Frank McNulty (R), a critic of the measure. “This is going to reduce Coloradoʼs clout, and itʼs going to reduce our influence on issues like transportation, water, health care and funding for our military bases.”

The push for a popular voting system first began when former President George W. Bush defeated Democratic candidate Al Gore in 2000, despite Gore winning the popular vote. As the Post reported, Maryland was the first state to join the proposal 13 years ago.

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Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman Al Saud (L) meets U.S. president Donald Trump at the White House in Washington, U.S., 14 March 2017. (photo: AP)

Some Middle East Leaders Have a Big Stake in US Election
Umar A Farooq, Middle East Eye
Excerpt: "While the world is closely watching the US election, the leaders of some Middle East countries have a lot riding on who wins the race for the White House."

While the majority of people in the Middle East favour a Biden victory, strongmen across the region are hoping for a Trump re-election

Across the region, surveys have shown that the majority of people are dissatisfied with US foreign policy and would favour a Joe Biden victory over President Donald Trump.

Michael Robbins, the director of research at the Arab Barometer research institute, said Trump's actions in the region had not aligned with the interests of ordinary people and a change in the Oval Office could help Washington's standing moving forward.

"They [the people] don't agree with the way their leaders have made the deals with Washington for their own interests," Robbins said during a zoom call on Monday arranged by the Brookings Institution.

"If Biden wins, he has a huge task if he wants to go and shape ordinary citizens' opinions of the United States differently."

Here's a look at some world leaders who have a personal stake in the race, with their fortunes depending heavily on the success - or failure - of President Trump.

Israel

Perhaps none has more riding on a Trump victory than Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Israeli leader, who's had a rocky relationship with President Barack Obama, has praised Trump as "the greatest friend" Israel ever had.

Since Trump was elected to office, he has made numerous concessions to Israel, including recognising Jerusalem as Israel's capital, withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal and offering a Middle East plan that heavily favours Israel over the Palestinians.

The White House also brokered the establishment of diplomatic ties between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

But Netanyahu's close relationship with Trump, and more broadly the Republican Party and its evangelical Christian base, has come with a price.

It's undercut Israel's traditional bipartisan support in Washington and alienated many Democrats, especially the rising progressive wing and the largely liberal Jewish-American community.

While Biden, who served as vice president under Barack Obama from 2008 to 2016, has said he's a "stalwart support of Israel", the presidential candidate has also said he would rejoin the nuclear deal if Iran returns to compliance.

Sidelined and humiliated by Trump, the Palestinians have made no secret about their hopes for a Biden victory.

"If we are going to live another four years with President Trump, God help us," Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh said last month.

Gulf rulers

Saudi Arabia's King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates, were no big fans of the Obama administration.

Their countries welcomed Trump's withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal and the imposition of sanctions that have sent Iran's economy into a freefall.

Trump also stood by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) in the face of sharp criticism after the killing of Middle East Eye columnist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in late 2018.

Trump vetoed a Senate resolution that would have ended US support for the Saudi and UAE-led war in Yemen which has created the world's most devastating humanitarian crisis.

The Gulf monarchs fear that a Biden presidency could be an extension of the Obama era, with renewed engagement with Iran and greater concern for human rights.

The former vice president has previously said he plans to "reassess" Washington's ties with Riyadh, and end US support for the war in Yemen.

Jean-François Seznec, a Middle East expert at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, told Middle East Eye that some of the Democratic wrath against Riyadh may have been a "cudgel" against Trump, rather than a push to reposition America's stance in the region.

"I think there will be negotiations because neither party, whether the Democrats or Republicans, can afford to ever break with Saudi Arabia, especially when Iran is still and will still be the main enemy of the United States," Seznec said.

Iran

Iran's supreme leader has suffered the equivalent of a diplomatic whiplash between the Obama and Trump administrations.

People crowded the streets to praise the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, hoping for normalised ties with the West and an ultimate end to international sanctions that had strained the country's finances.

Then, just three years later, Trump's unilateral withdrawal from the deal subsequently led to Iran resuming nuclear activities and a resumption of hard-hitting sanctions.

Tensions ratcheted up in a series of incidents culminating with an Iranian missile attack on US forces in Iraq after an American drone strike killed a top Iranian general.

Biden has said that he's willing to sit back down with Iran if it honors the limits of the nuclear deal. Another Trump term could see tensions again return to a boil.

However, Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has insisted that the result of the election "will not affect" Tehran's policy towards Washington.

"Our policy... is clearly defined. It does not change with the movement of individuals," he said on Tuesday.

"It does not matter to us who comes and goes."

Egypt

For Egypt, Trump's ascension to the presidency meant Cairo once again had a powerful supporter in the White House.

Under Barack Obama, the US suspended direct military aid in the wake of the Egyptian coup in 2013, including blocking the delivery of Apache attack helicopters, F-16 fighter jets and more than $250m.

That was a major blow for one of the biggest recipients of economic and military aid from Washington.

Trump has instead moved to boost direct aid to Egypt, including seeking $1.4bn for "bilateral assistance" in 2021, much of it for military and security assistance at a time when Egyptian security services are routinely targeting activists and dissidents.

Still, while a Biden presidency may be more vocal about issues of human rights in the country, there may not be much change in the US's approach to Egypt under President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, as the former vice president will have other areas in foreign policy - such as dealing with China's growing influence - on his agenda.

"I would get the sense that the Egypt-US relationship is sort of on autopilot, and it's no longer the priority used to be for both sides," Adel Abdel Ghafar, a senior fellow with Brookings, said during Monday's virtual call.

"And even from the Egyptian side, looking towards deeper relationships with Russia and China and so on."

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Voter drops off their ballots. (photo: Ricardo Arduengo/Getty)

In Swing States, Biden Voters Have Climate Anxiety. Trump Voters Don't.
Emily Pontecorvo, Grist
Pontecorvo writes: "Countless surveys have found that a majority of American voters are concerned about climate change. But in key swing states, 11th-hour polling from the New York Times and Siena College found that the climate-related issues that hit closest to home remain deeply polarizing."

In Arizona, for example, voters were asked how worried they were about rising temperatures from global warming affecting their lives. Home to some of the fastest-warming cities in the United States, average temperatures in Arizona have risen by 3 degrees F since 1970. In Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix, heat-related illnesses and deaths have been trending upward for at least a decade.

But the poll found that these statistics haven’t freaked everyone out to the same degree. While 90 percent of Biden supporters responded that they were at least “somewhat worried” about extreme heat, with 62 percent reporting that they were “very worried,” only 22 percent of Trump voters reported being at least “somewhat worried.” An Arizona Trump supporter interviewed by the Times recognized that it was a hot place to live, but said “that’s why we have air-conditioners.” To the contrary, heat-related illnesses and deaths disproportionately impact poor communities that lack access to, or can’t afford, adequate cooling.

A similar trend was documented in Florida, where likely voters were asked how worried they were about sea-level rise having a significant impact on their lives. Biden, who has made climate change a centerpiece of his campaign strategy in the last few weeks, is banking on voters caring about the issue in Florida. He recently made an appeal to Florida voters with a new ad that focuses on the state’s struggles with rising water.

In it, two residents of Jacksonville talk about increased flooding in their city, from the horrors of Hurricane Irma to regularly dealing with water pooling in their neighborhoods, rising to their front doors. “We need help out here,” says 22-year-old Amirah Jackson.

But based on the Times/Siena poll, it’s unclear whether that message will resonate with voters who aren’t already all-in for Biden. While 84 percent of Biden supporters were at least somewhat concerned, again only 22 percent of Trump supporters reported some concern. Florida may be one of the first of the swing states to report preliminary results on Tuesday, since counties were able to begin processing early and mail-in ballots weeks in advance, and the race between the candidates is tight. The poll found Biden leading Trump by 3 points; however, that lead was within the margin of error of 3.2 percentage points.

In Pennsylvania, the most prominent climate-related issue isn’t the physical effects of a warming planet, but the implications for a significant economic driver in the state: fracking. And it’s clear that Pennsylvania voters’ feelings about the practice of drilling for oil and gas using hydraulic fracturing techniques are more varied and nebulous, particularly on the left.

In response to the Times/Siena poll, only 27 percent of voters said they opposed fracking entirely, as compared to the 52 percent majority reported in an August poll conducted by CBS News. Among Trump supporters in Pennsylvania, 86 percent were pro-fracking, but those in Biden’s camp were more mixed, with 25 percent pro-fracking and 47 percent opposed to it. That means nearly a third of Biden-supporting respondents said they did not know or declined to answer.

Trump and Vice President Mike Pence have repeatedly lied on the campaign trail about Biden’s position on fracking to win over voters, arguing that the former vice president would ban the practice, despite Biden’s insistence that he would not, and the fact that as president he wouldn’t even have the power to do so. We’ll soon find out whether the issue is as central to the Pennsylvania vote as Trump thinks it is.

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