There is a dangerous delusion in America — a delusion that threatens to destroy our democracy without the American people even knowing it. It is the myth that “America is the greatest democracy in the world,” and with it, the assumption that our elections are free and fair. Most Americans simply assume that when voters in this country go vote, their votes will be recorded accurately, and the “winner” of the election will be the candidate who really won the most votes.
Put aside the issue of the Electoral College for a moment — an undemocratic institution that arguably was created by the Founders precisely to prevent a dangerous demagogue such as Donald Trump from ever ascending to the presidency even if he is chosen by the most voters (which in this case, he wasn’t anyway, since he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by a historically huge 2.9 million votes and counting).
The more serious problem with American democracy is that it might not be democratic at all — not anymore. Many jurisdictions use electronic voting machines, which IT experts have shown can be easily hacked. And without an auditable paper trail, the hacking can probably never be proven.
Now I ask you to imagine President Donald Trump in 2020, as the election season is in full swing. Let’s say he hears from his authoritarian dictator pal Vladimir Putin that Russia is again going to influence the U.S. election, like they did in 2016, this time to help Trump get reelected. Trump, with full control of the FBI, CIA, NSA, and all other government agencies, makes sure that nothing is done about the problem. Trump miraculously gets reelected — despite a terrible economy, a war with China, or whatever other messes he has gotten our country into during his first term — and guess what?! somehow, amazingly, he loses the popular vote again, while winning exactly the right states he needs for an Electoral College victory, by razor-thin margins, just like in 2016.
And then, the same thing happens again in 2024, for Trump’s hand-picked successor.
I am afraid this is exactly what will happen. And without a way to audit the voting machines, the American people will never know that their democracy has been hacked by foreign powers. They will never know that American democracy has gone poof! — that it has all become a sham — while elections continue to happen, on schedule, with results that usually stray far from the exit polls in all the right places to ensure the outcome the regime in Washington/Moscow wants.
Think this is crazy talk? You need to open your mind and start thinking like people think in countries that don’t have the supposed “greatest democracy on earth.” Intelligent people in all those other countries are very open to the idea that their elections could be rigged by shadowy powers. In fact, in many countries, people know that their elections are usually or even always rigged by the powers that be.
Oh, but that could never happen here in America, right? Somehow, somebody would stop it. Right? Our people are braver, our belief in democracy stronger, our resolve to protect our freedom fiercer and more determined. Right?
Wrong. And the reason it’s wrong is precisely because we think our country is above all that kind of rotten stuff like fake elections that happens in other, “inherently less democratic” countries. Americans have developed a huge blind spot about the inherent fragility of democracy and freedom, and we will likely continue believing, long after most people in other countries would have stopped believing, that our elections are free and fair and secure. We will continue believing in the integrity of our democracy because it is part of our national mythology. We will keep our heads in the sand, close our eyes tightly, and pledge allegiance to the flag with loudly strained voices, trying to drown out our doubts and preserve the myth of American exceptionalism that we so desperately want to believe.
And therein lies the incredible danger we face. Americans’ lack of experience with losing our democracy and freedom to tyrants — and our self-satisfied, now awkwardly fear-tinged, bombastically proclaimed belief that “it can’t happen here… no, it couldn’t possibly happen!” — is what makes us the most vulnerable to tyrants’ attempts to take it away.
Trump and the Russians may be trying, in this very election, to take it away. They may have already succeeded. And once it is lost — once all the vast powers of the presidency are in Trump’s madly tweeting, short-fingered hands — American democracy and freedom may be lost forever.
We don’t know whether the 2016 election was stolen by Russian hackers. We don’t know whether Donald Trump colluded with the nefarious actors or knew what they were doing. But we do know he encouraged Russia to hack the election — he said so himself on national TV — and that the CIA says Russia did in fact do what Trump asked.
Isn’t that enough, Electoral College, to deny Trump the awesome power of the presidency?
Isn’t that enough, American people, to fear that our very democracy itself is at stake, and that it might perish if Trump becomes president?
If Trump “grabbed ‘em by the pussy” and got away with it, who’s to say he won’t grab America’s democracy against our will, by our most sensitive and vulnerable parts — the shabby, insecure electoral system itself, that we use for voting? Why in the hell should we trust that a man of his character would refrain from ensuring his reelection by whatever means necessary?
I am afraid for my country. I am afraid for the world. And every last one of us should be too. Not to be afraid of the possible total loss of American democracy, knowing what we already know, would be the most irresponsible and escapist position imaginable. These are not normal times. This is a moment that future historians in some still-free country may look back upon and point to as the moment when the American experiment in democracy died.
Let’s hope the Electors save our country on December 19. If they don’t, and Trump becomes president, I believe it is every American’s solemn duty to advocate for national legislation to require that all voting machines be hacker-proof and have an auditable paper trail, with required random forensic audits in every election. Otherwise, we may find that our elections in the future are little better than elections in Russia. And that would be a sad way for our democracy to end — like WWE wrestling, where the spectacle goes on, but the winners are predetermined, and some foolish people (mostly the kind who wear MAGA-emblazoned red baseball caps), "still believe it’s real.”