The
Election That Broke the Republican Party
By lashing themselves to the president’s
desperate conspiracies of fraud, GOP officials have undermined their own
legitimacy.
By TIM
ALBERTA
11/06/2020
08:30 PM EST
Tim Alberta
is chief political correspondent at Politico Magazine.
Never has the unprecedented been so utterly
predictable.
At the
conclusion of a campaign that exceeded their expectations in almost every sense
— picking up House seats, thwarting an outright Democratic takeover of the
Senate, running competitively in every presidential battleground state —
Republicans could have walked away from 2020 with some dignity intact. They
could have conceded defeat to Joe Biden, celebrated their hard-fought successes
elsewhere and braced for the battles ahead.
But that
was never going to happen. This is Donald Trump’s party — at least, for another
76 days — and no Republican who hopes to remain relevant after he’s gone was
going to deny him the bloody farewell he’s been building toward.
Did we
really think the president worked so diligently these past eight months to
create an environment conducive to allegations of mass voter fraud, only to
stop short of alleging mass voter fraud? Of course not. Even if the president
had been swept in every swing state, and by big margins, he was always going to
cry foul. That he lost such close contests — and lost them in a style so
unfamiliar to so many voters — only made his reaction all the more inevitable.
“If you
count the legal votes, I easily win. If you count the illegal votes, they can
try to steal the election from us,” Trump said from the White House on Thursday
night, using the world’s most powerful podium to accuse the world’s most
powerful nation of becoming a banana republic. He impugned crooked Democratic
political machines that were allegedly denying access to Republican canvassing
observers. He decried the “election interference” wrought by inaccurate poll
numbers (a phrase the president has never used with regard to Russia). But his
biggest complaint was with the voting method that was at that very moment
turning red states to blue.
“I’ve been
talking about mail-in voting for a long time. It’s really destroyed our system.
It’s a corrupt system and it makes people corrupt,” he said. “They want to find
out how many votes they need, and then they seem to be able to find them.”
To recap:
The president scared his own voters away from voting by mail, resulting in
lopsided Democratic margins when those ballots were counted; and Republican
lawmakers in several key states refused to allow those ballots to be counted
early, resulting in delays that created an early mirage of the president
winning because the votes tallied first were those most favorable to him. Trump
has good reason to resent those mail votes: They made the ballot box more
accessible; they created the illusion that victory was possible; then they
shattered that illusion in agonizing fashion, every incremental dump of returns
amounting to a slow twist of the knife.
Biden is
now leading in four states that have yet to be called by a consensus of news
organizations. Victory in Pennsylvania or the right combination of the other
three — Nevada, Georgia or Arizona — would carry him over the threshold of 270
electoral votes and make him president-elect of the United States, a moment
that draws closer every minute. Trump is digging in, alleging a conspiracy of
unfathomable proportion, conceived and executed right beneath our noses, to
deny him a second term in the White House. His evidence for this? Invisible.
But no matter. The man who swore Barack Obama was born in Kenya, the man who
insisted that millions of illegal votes were cast in 2016, has never been
deterred by a lack of proof.
After four years of turning a blind eye to the
president’s subversive rhetoric and manic behavior and relentless dishonesty,
the ultimate test for the Republican Party was whether it would accommodate the
president’s rebellion against this country’s democratic norms or denounce it.
And yet,
this moment is not entirely about him. The question was never going to be how
Trump responded to a defeat. The question was how Republicans would respond to
Trump’s response. After four years of turning a blind eye to the president’s
subversive rhetoric and manic behavior and relentless dishonesty, the ultimate
test for the Republican Party was whether it would accommodate the president’s
rebellion against this country’s democratic norms or denounce it.
The
Republican Party has failed that test.
“President
Trump won this election,” Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader, declared
Thursday night during an appearance on Fox News, as some 140 million ballots
tabulated nationwide showed Trump badly losing the popular vote, trailing in
most battleground states and nowhere near clinching a majority in the Electoral
College. “Everyone who is listening: Do not be quiet. Do not be silent about
this. We cannot allow this to happen before our very eyes.”
What “this”
was McCarthy referring to? Not simply the steady erosion of Trump’s lead in a
handful of pivotal states, as the tabulation of millions of mail votes plodded
along. No, McCarthy was casting doubt on what was causing those margins to
close. He was insinuating that something sinister was afoot in states like
Georgia and Pennsylvania. He was nodding to the notion that partisan observers
— “poll watchers,” as they’re often called — weren’t being allowed to monitor
the process. And he wasn’t alone.
“Philadelphia
elections are crooked as a snake,” Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told
Sean Hannity on another Fox News segment Thursday evening. “There’s the process
of observing an election that’s being violated.”
Hannity
asked if Pennsylvania lawmakers should invalidate the results because GOP
poll-watchers weren’t being allowed to monitor the count in Philadelphia. “I
think everything should be on the table,” Graham replied.
The only
problem? Observers were allowed to monitor the count in Philadelphia.
This is not in dispute. The Trump campaign’s own attorneys, in a court appearance Thursday, acknowledged that more than a dozen of their designated poll watchers were physically present throughout the day at the main ballot processing site. The bipartisan elections commission in Philadelphia issued a statement Thursday confirming as much: “The Trump campaign has had certified canvas observers in the Convention Center to view the counting operation all day long today as it has since the pre-canvas began on Tuesday at 7:00 a.m.” The lone point of contention was how far the poll watchers were required to stand from the ballot counters, a bit of logistical nuance that somehow spawned a sweeping claim that observers had been kicked out altogether.
None of
this stopped Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas — the man who once called Trump “a
pathological liar” — from echoing the president’s deception, following up
Graham’s performance with one that made the South Carolina senator look meek by
comparison.
“I am
angry, and I think the American people are angry,” Cruz told Hannity, his voice
wrung with outrage. “By throwing the observers out, by clouding the
vote-counting in a shroud of darkness, they are setting the stage to
potentially steal an election not just from the president, but from the over 60
million people across this country who voted for him.”
One might
assume that an Ivy League-educated lawyer like Cruz — someone who argued cases
before the Supreme Court, someone who, as he reminded Hannity on Thursday
night, worked on the Bush v. Gore case in 2000 — would make sure his assertions
were bulletproof before sharing them with millions of viewers. But that
assumption would be wrong.
A handful
of prominent Republicans have distinguished themselves over the past 72 hours
by daring to question the president’s claims and the rhetoric of the right.
Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, the party’s previous nominee for president, said Trump’s
bombast “damages the cause of freedom here and around the world.” Will Hurd,
the retiring congressman from Texas, called Trump’s unfounded allegations
“dangerous.” Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey said Trump’s speech was “very
disturbing.” A pair of military veterans in Congress, Adam Kinzinger and Denver
Riggleman, took Trump to task for disrespecting the elections process. Even
Sean Spicer, the former White House press secretary who launched the Trump
administration with a lie about inauguration crowd sizes, scoffed at the
unfounded nature of Trump’s claim.
But these
voices were the minority, drowned out by the doomsayers who seem determined to
go down with the ship. Eric Trump, the president’s middle son, warned
Republicans not to be “sheep” and urged them to “Fight against this fraud.”
Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker and a confidant to the president,
called for the arrest of poll workers. Mark Levin, a right-wing radio host with
a penchant for hysteria, urged Republican-controlled state legislatures to
ignore the results of their state elections and send electors who will vote for
Trump in the Electoral College. His missive was retweeted by the Republican
Party’s top spokesperson.
For the GOP
and its right-wing affiliates, a discernible pattern emerged over the past 72
hours. Level sweeping allegations without evidence. Use the phrases “late
ballots” and “illegal votes” often and interchangeably. Point to oddities and
irregularities, no matter how minuscule, as proof of a broader conspiracy.
Then, despite those individual claims being debunked, stand by them. If this
playbook sounds familiar, it’s because the party has taken on the identity of
its leader.
Consider
the case of Liz Harrington, the top spokesperson for the Republican National
Committee. On Thursday, right around the time she was retweeting Levin,
Harrington began broadcasting a popular conspiracy theory that Milwaukee’s high
rate of voter turnout was evidence of voter fraud. Tweeting quotes from an
article in another far-right publication — headlined “Game-On for the Coup?” —
Harrington claimed the “improbably high turnout” was “a statistical
impossibility.” She wondered how “Sleepy Joe” drove 85 percent turnout in
Milwaukee when Obama, the nation’s first Black president, had only generated 71
percent turnout there.
Except she
was wrong. According to public records, turnout in the city of Milwaukee was 87
percent in 2012. Harrington had erred by comparing Biden’s turnout of
registered voters this year with Obama’s turnout of eligible voters (a larger
pool that yields a smaller percentage) eight years ago. Insidious as the
underlying motives were, Harrington could be forgiven for this mistake. But
then she doubled down. Responding to my correction of her facts, Harrington
stated that turnout “jumped by more than 20 points” in Milwaukee County from
2016 to 2020. Again, the implication clear: Such a huge spike in activity, in a
heavily Black and predominantly Democratic area, was proof of corruption.
And again,
her facts were wrong. Turnout in Milwaukee County was 80 percent in 2016.
Turnout in Milwaukee County this year was 84 percent. That’s a very modest
increase, especially relative to the rest of Wisconsin, where some rural red
counties saw turnout boom as much as 15 percent. Harrington wasn’t concerned
with those increases — for obvious reasons.
This is the
inherent flaw with the GOP’s charge of mass voter fraud. Participation rates
spiked more in Republican areas than in Democratic ones; Trump won more votes
in cities like Milwaukee and Detroit than he did four years ago. There is no
pattern in the data to suggest anything except a high-intensity, high-turnout
election all the way around, and in many cases, particularly down-ballot,
Republicans were the beneficiary. As spectacularly as she failed to produce
evidence of malfeasance, at least Harrington tried to use actual numbers.
That’s more than could be said for most Republicans who rushed to Trump’s
defense on Thursday.
“Democrats
are trying to steal the election,” said Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia. “We won’t
let it happen.” (He included a hashtag — #stopthesteal — that plugged into a
universe of alleged crime and subterfuge, much of it focused on the same
handful of purported incidents of fraud.)
“I stand
with President @realDonaldTrump,” said Rep. Chuck Fleischmann of Tennessee. “We
need transparency in our election system. What we’re seeing is fraud, and it
must be stopped.”
“The
election results are out of control,” agreed Senator-elect Tommy Tuberville of
Alabama. “It’s like the whistle has blown, the game is over, and the players
have gone home, but the referees are suddenly adding touchdowns to the other
team’s side of the scoreboard.”
“Trump’s
points are persuasive: concerted use of fraudulent polls; stunning and
implausible ballot dumps overnight; observers barred,” said Rep. Dan Bishop of
North Carolina. “Fight!”
“Radical
Dems tried to do away with law and order and are now trying to do away with law
and order at the ballot box,” agreed Rep. Roger Williams of Texas. He later
added, “This is the most corrupt election in our lifetime. Where is the DOJ and
AG?”
This is
just a sampling of the statements made by Republicans in the wake of Trump’s
dramatic speech from the White House on Thursday night. Much of the agitation
focused on two things: Questioning the absence of a law enforcement
investigation, as Rogers did, and encouraging Republican voters to contribute
to Trump’s legal defense fund. The two sentiments go hand-in-hand: Because the
Department of Justice has not (yet) inserted itself into any of the fracases
that have sprung up in various states, the burden falls on Trump’s campaign to
substantiate their allegations of wrongdoing.
That’s a
heavy lift — one made heavier by the fact that, despite this being the most
scrutinized election in memory, there is thus far zero evidence of any scalable
fraud. This should be considered a triumph for Trump’s campaign: Over the past
few months, I’ve had numerous local GOP officials boast about their
poll-watching program, describing its sophistication, exuding confidence that they
would have eyes and ears in every room as votes were being counted. “The Trump
campaign is on it like white on rice. They’re watching everything,” Matt
Albert, chair of the Outagamie County GOP in Wisconsin, told me last month. If
anyone tried to cheat, Albert emphasized, they wouldn’t stand a chance.
There were
no notable accusations of wrongdoing on Election Day, no allegations being made
by Republicans in states like Michigan and Georgia and Pennsylvania. Then, on
Wednesday, a flicker of scandal, fueled by social media, began to illuminate
the right. By Thursday the spark had become an inferno, with millions of
Americans exposed to photos and videos supposedly verifying widespread
fraudulent activity. What changed between Tuesday and Thursday? Not the
presence of poll watchers; they were there all along. Not the sudden counting
of mail ballots; millions of them were tabulated earlier in the week in states
like Ohio and Florida, without any incident. The only thing that changed was
the president’s position in the race, which explains the sudden feeding frenzy
of rumor and speculation and conspiracy theorizing.
The truly
remarkable thing is that thus far, Trump and his Republican allies have
produced nothing to even remotely substantiate the notion of a rigged election.
His efforts in this regard have been more a publicity stunt than a serious
legal challenge; the president’s political fixers, including erstwhile campaign
manager Corey Lewandowski and American Conservative Union Chair Matt Schlapp
and former ambassador Ric Grenell, have scrambled around the country holding
press conferences alleging rampant abuse yet failed to offer any examples of
it. (Grenell presented an elderly blind woman in Nevada who claimed her ballot
was stolen; Clark County officials confirmed they had already met with the woman,
given her the chance to authenticate a new ballot for the election, and that
she declined.)
In lieu of
any exhibits with which to prosecute their case, Republicans fell back on rumor
and innuendo that withstood laughably little scrutiny. There was the video from
Detroit that ostensibly showed a suitcase full of ballots being hauled by wagon
outside the TCF Center, the city’s hub for election processing. (Turns out it
was camera equipment for the local ABC affiliate.) There was the
Facebook-fueled uproar in Maricopa County, Arizona, over ballots being rejected
because they were filled out with Sharpie markers. (They were not rejected;
county officials confirmed that the markers were actually the best option for
filling out ballots.)
By far, the
episode that attracted the most attention was inside the TCF Center in Detroit,
where election officials covered the windows of the vote-processing area
because the workers inside felt intimated by the swelling crowds outside. As a
matter of perception, the maneuver was rash; video loops of the windows being
papered over were destined to play for years to come. As a practical matter,
however, this changed nothing. Scores of Republican poll watchers were in the
room before, during and after the windows were covered. Cameras were rolling
around the clock, in every part of the room, as they are in Philadelphia and
other major vote-counting hubs. There was no lack of transparency. The Michigan
Republican Party has been monitoring precincts in Detroit for years; this
election was no different.
“They had
136 people in the room,” said Josh Venable, who for years ran the state GOP’s
Election Day operation, which included training and supervising hundreds of
poll watchers.
“There’s a
process for those people; there are rules. I’ve worked extensively with the
elections officials in the city of Detroit, and they take it very seriously.
They do everything by the book. Are there errors that happen? Sure. But that’s
not fraud. In all my years watching elections in Detroit, I never saw any sort
of fraud. Stolen ballots? Bused in voters? It never happens. You know why?
Because you can’t get away with it. It’s way easier to just try and win the
election.”
To be
clear, this echoes the overwhelming consensus within the community of election
experts. Karl Rove, the “architect” of George W. Bush’s winning campaigns,
jeered the notion of some elaborate scheme to steal the election, saying it
“would require a conspiracy on the scale of a James Bond movie.” Ben Ginsberg,
the Republican Party’s top election lawyer for the past several decades,
recently wrote in The Washington Post, “Proof of systematic fraud has become
the Loch Ness Monster of the Republican Party. People have spent a lot of time
looking for it, but it doesn’t exist.”
Venable,
who worked in the Trump administration as chief of staff to Education Secretary
Betsy DeVos — and who recently wrote an op-ed explaining his support for Biden
— said the president’s rhetoric has become “increasingly dangerous.” He fears
that Republicans who repeat it are openly inviting violence.
“This is something out of the Pinochet regime. These
Republicans who are indulging the president, they all know better. That’s what
I find so disturbing: They know exactly what they’re doing, and they don’t
care.”
Josh Venable
“This is
something out of the Pinochet regime. These Republicans who are indulging the
president, they all know better. That’s what I find so disturbing: They know
exactly what they’re doing, and they don’t care,” Venable said. “This effort to
question the integrity of the electoral process of the United States of America
— by people of great power and prominence, people who know it has zero basis in
fact — it’s just astonishing to me. And it’s frightening.”
The irony
of Trump’s presidency is his unremitting wrath over being viewed as an
illegitimate president — when it was his attempts to portray Obama as an
illegitimate president that endeared him to the American right and planted the
seeds of his political rise. There is no shortage of symmetry now, with his
campaign for reelection in peril and the twilight of his reign upon him, in
Trump’s efforts to make his successor as illegitimate as his predecessor.
A healthy
Republican Party would not abide this. Then again, a healthy Republican Party
would not have winked and nodded at birtherism, nor would it have nominated
Trump to the presidency in the first place. In November 2016, Republicans
looked upon Trump’s victory and wondered if there was any going back. In
November 2020, they looked upon Trump’s defeat and decided the answer was no.
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