The Crisis of American Democracy Is Not Over
The 2020 campaign was long and brutal, unfolding before a backdrop of death and economic decline. When all the votes are counted, a challenger will have unseated an incumbent president for only the 10th time in American history. Donald Trump’s presidency is over.
Blinded by their contempt for Hillary Clinton, much of the 2016 electorate failed to see the danger Trump posed to popular sovereignty. Since taking office, the president has used the levers of government to enrich himself and his allies; purge those who resisted his schemes; turn the powers of law enforcement and intelligence agencies against his enemies and apply those powers to benefit his co-conspirators; socially engineer a whiter America in order to preserve the nation’s traditional aristocracy of race; and attempt to destroy the ability of the United States to hold free and fair elections. Even now, he calls for the results to be altered in his favor—a call that the majority of his supporters have refused. But just enough of them have embraced it to remind everyone of the stakes.
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