Election deniers are running to control voting. Here's how they've fared so far
https://www.npr.org/2022/07/29/election-deniers-secretary-of-state
NPR - July 29, 2022
Election officials and democracy experts are sounding the alarm, as Republicans who deny the 2020 election results have now moved closer to overseeing the voting process in five different states.
Arizona could become No. 6 on Tuesday, when GOP voters there will decide in that state's primary whether they want to nominate one of the two election deniers running for secretary of state.
"These are the people who set the rules, who count the votes, and ultimately who are responsible for defending the will of the people," said Joanna Lydgate, the CEO of States United Action, a nonpartisan organization that has been tracking election-denying candidates running for governor, attorney general and secretary of state nationwide. States United shared its most recent findings exclusively with NPR ahead of their release.
Election deniers running for secretary of state nominations in 2022 [Republican candidates in November]
Michigan
Won - Kristina Karamo: Pushed 2020 election conspiracy theories, and a conspiracy theory that it was actually antifa who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6. Trump Endorsed
Indiana
Won - Diego Morales: Called the 2020 election "a scam."
New Mexico
Won - Audrey Trujillo: Shared a number of conspiracy theories about voter fraud on Twitter.
Nevada
Won - Jim Marchant: Said the 2020 election was stolen from him and Trump.
[Much more to this story via the link above]
In a cynical sense, you have to admire the con, don't you. You invent a phoney narrative about a rigged election. In this you are aided by the 30% fundamentalist American Taliban who think that Trump was sent by god. So if he loses, since he was backed by god, then the election must have been rigged. (But then why didn't god stop the rigging?
)
Once the phoney rigged election narrative is accepted by enough people, even if they don't actually believe it, it's enough to accept the effect, you convince them to put into place people from your "own side". That very notion is contrary to democratic ideas. But since enough people now believe that the "other" side are crooks and liars, then the only alternative is to put people from "your side" into place.
The way to fix this for all time is to NOT allow the election process to be managed by partisan players, like many other countries do. But since everything the US does is the best possible way to do things, by fiat, then this never enters into the discussion.
I'm pessimistic for your country. A con this transparent and malodorous should not gain traction, but it has and is becoming more and more entrenched in some circles. And many politicians see that using this Trumpian base is the only way for them to win, so they court this thinking.
Do you have any politicians left who think in terms of public service or is it all one big game to attain the prize? Do they remember what the prize is for?
You are in danger of becoming a dysfunctional nation because of dog whistle culture war flash points, almost none of which ever actually affect anyone except by media hysteria. It's very sad to watch this.
In this spirit of pessimism, I think we should keep a watch out for these things: (1) criminalizing LGBT behaviour; it was illegal once, it could be again. It won't be difficult to rouse up people to support this, many are there already; (2) re-introduction of slavery, but it won't be called that, it will surface in different ways in a Jim Crow manner, bringing back confederate statues etc. because of, you know, history; (3) removal of voting rights, but not by procedural methods, actual denial of voting privileges for certain people, muslims, unmarried women, etc., surfacing in non-obvious ways. This is all wild-ass conjecture, of course, but I don't think these things are that far-fetched.
There was an article published in Macleans during the 2016 election campaign about a religious community in Indiana (I think) where the pastor said to the interviewer that he was against a woman's right to vote because, and get this, it was then possible for her to vote against her husband's election choice. This was said without irony. Scripture stated that a wife must support her husband and giving her an independent vote went against the word of god. Of course, what is left unsaid is that this is an
interpretation of some biblical passage, but it is stated as factual. That group did not wear masks because god would not permit them to contract Covid.
A country that accepts mass murders in schools while doing almost nothing about it for mostly incoherent reasons is not in a good place.
