This is unprecedented
Accusations of Republican ploys to distract and threats of violence are alarming. First, just as Trump’s cognitive decline and legal perils took the spotlight, the DOJ Special Counsel Robert Hur released his report on Biden’s classified documents investigation.
Instead of a two-page exoneration, Hur released non-conforming 300-page hit piece, in apparent collusion with the GOP, to create a distraction from Trump. Taking the bait, the White House Press Corps disgraced themselves by pelting Biden with unserious questions, while disregarding Trump’s treasonous campaign speeches.
Some on the left have accused AG Merrick Garland of being too weak. But Garland has steadfastly fought to restore trust in our institutions. He showed strength by not taking the bait and redacting Hur’s report. Had he done so, he would have been accused of the same thing Trump’s craven AG Bill Barr did by grossly misrepresenting the Mueller Report. Just as Garland made the right call in the E. Jean Carroll defamation case, he made the right call not appointing a liberal Special Counsel and being accused of partisan politics. To preserve democracy, we must avoid dirty Republican tactics, which have now descended into threats of violence.
After a three-hour closed-door meeting, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell suddenly backed off a bipartisan immigration bill that took four months to negotiate. In Wyoming, Democrats are afraid to declare party affiliation due to threats. In her piece about Republican violent threats, Joyce Vance discussed liberal Supreme Court Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan siding with conservatives to keep Trump on the Colorado ballot.
This chilling effect of violent threats is why the Brazilian courts banned their former President Bolsonaro from running again until 2030, after he incited the insurrection of January 8, 2023. As precedent, the courts cited Brazil’s brutal 20-year dictatorship in the 1960s. Germany has strict laws criminalizing anti-hate activity due to Hitler’s genocidal dictatorship in the 1940s. Here in the U.S. the only precedent we have is the obscure Civil War-era Section 3 of the 14th Amendment passed in 1872. Everything else is unprecedented.
Doomsday rhetoric provides fodder to our enemies, and Trump is providing enough of that, most recently encouraging Putin to attack NATO. Instead, we must stand by our Democratic leadership who have not only shown how to win in court, but also how to win every election since November 8, 2016.
As an American, I, hereby, accuse Republicans of voter disenfranchisement. We the people demand fair elections free from interference designed to disrupt our democracy. We need transparency to know what is really going with the Republican Party. But we must have faith in the process. That is why we must vote Democrat.
Chicago native Lorraine Evanoff earned her degree in French from DePaul University then became a Certified Financial Manager. She worked as a finance exec in film production for seven years in Paris, then in Silicon Valley during the dot-com era, and later for various Hollywood production companies, notably as CFO of National Lampoon. She is currently living in Los Angeles with her husband.