I detest Donald Trump. I believe he is the worst president in history, with no one in modern times even coming close. I believe he has done long-lasting damage to the country, to our government, to our climate and to the world. I don’t see myself ever changing my mind on that. But a part of me – a small, but increasing part of me – is hoping he gets reelected.
How could I possibly hope for that? Before you stop reading this and dismiss it all as the ranting of a crazy person, please consider my logic, broken down into the nine steps below. (TL;DR at the end)
First – our governmental, political and electoral systems are completely broken. There’s gerrymandering and voter suppression. There’s a complete distrust and politicization of the Supreme Court – punctuated by the Merrick Garland-Neil Gorsuch-Brett Kavanaugh debacles, but which was brewing with Bush v. Gore and Citizens United long before that. Polarization is at an all-time high; compromising and cooperation with the other side are seen as weaknesses.
Second – as a result of the systems being broken, gone are the days of politicians working together with honor to try to solve the problems facing our country and our world. They are replaced with days of politicians scheming ways to get power, and once they get power, to do everything they can to exploit it and hold onto it. And Republicans are better at it than Democrats.
Third – our broken governmental, political and electoral systems are not going to fix themselves just by ridding ourselves of Trump. Whether Trump is replaced by a Democrat a more reasonable Republican, and whether that is in 2021 or 2025, politicians are not going to start to work together again to solve problems. They (particularly Republicans) were on the path of exploiting holes in the Constitution to enhance their power long before Trump, and will continue down this path long after he is gone.
Fourth – to fix our broken systems, we need to amend the Constitution. The Constitution that has guided our nation for nearly 250 years is no longer working. It was designed to set the framework for a government made of people that, by and large, acted honorably. While the Constitution correctly anticipated that individuals may get corrupted by power and thus there was a need for checks and balances, it did not anticipate that technology could be used to engineer congressional districts to deny fair representation in Congress, nor did it anticipate that a majority of the Senate would abdicate its responsibility to advise and consent as to the judicial nominations of a duly-elected President.
Certain portions of the Constitution need a page-one rewrite. We don’t need a governing document that assumes our politicians will act reasonably or that they won’t exploit it where they can. Rather, we need one that accounts for the reality that every loophole will be found and abused. The Constitution should set term limits and rotating seats for the Supreme Court and perhaps other federal judges, such that judicial seats are open for nomination on a schedule (and hearings for them are required) so the perpetual gamesmanship over the judiciary would end. We need to forbid gerrymandering and voter suppression practices. We must give large states the right to split up into smaller states if they choose to do so, so that their citizens have the right to determine whether they would be better served by getting additional representation in the Senate. Citizens United must be undone and meaningful campaign finance reform must be permitted and enacted. Implementing a solution such as the one proposed here, in both houses of Congress, so we get rid of the winner-take-all mentality and replacing it with a system that rewards candidates who can get broad support of the electorate would motivate our politicians to work together. Lastly, replacing the Electoral College with a popular vote (or at least mandating that each state’s electoral college vote be proportionate to the populate vote in that state) must also be considered. I could go into many more details as to each of these proposals, but people much smarter than I am can come up with much better ideas.
Fifth – the only way we can amend the Constitutions with such reforms is if Democrats have leverage to make it happen. Republicans will never agree to change a system that they have been far more adept at exploiting, especially when they have institutional advantages in power due to small, rural states having outsized power due to the Senate and Electoral College.
Sixth – the way Democrats can gain the necessary leverage to amend the Constitution is to control the Presidency and have working majorities in both house of Congress (e.g., 55 Senate seats, to account for the inevitable Joe Manchin-types who likely would not support these efforts). If the Democrats control our federal government, they can – without amending the Constitution – exert their power by, for example: expanding the size of the Supreme Court and filling it with liberal justices (or in a more extreme case, deprive the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court altogether and create a new ultimate appeals court consisting solely of liberal judges) and by carving Washington, DC into 5, 10 or 100 areas and admitting each one as a state, thereby netting 10, 20 or 200 new reliably liberal Senators.
Now, do I actually want Democrats to do this? No, I don’t. In my heart, I am still plagued by what plagues most Democrats – the desire for them to play fair and do the right thing. But Democrats need to threaten to do this – or perhaps pass legislation that does this, but which would go into effect after a year. Immediately following introducing such legislation, they should introduce a Constitutional amendment that would prevent the legislation from going into effect and sets forth the fixes to our systems outlined in my fourth point above. Then Republican-dominated states would have a choice: they could sign onto the amendment that fixes our systems (perhaps after reasonable negotiations) or they can be forever locked out of the United States Senate, which means they could never have a voice in approving federal judges or cabinet members ever again, nor could they ever retaliate by trying to add new Republican states.
Seventh – Democrats do not have a plausible path to 55 Senate seats unless Trump is reelected. A great showing for Democrats in the 2020 Senate races would yield about 51 Senate seats – losing Alabama but picking up seats in Colorado, Maine, Arizona, North Carolina and Georgia. A perfect showing would likely tack on 1-2 additional seats, for a ceiling of about 53 seats. While this should be enough to stymie Trump’s legislation and remaking of the judiciary, I do not believe Democrats could expect to push through such deeply controversial legislation with only 53 seats, many of which from deeply Republican states.
Eighth – If Democrats win the presidency in 2020, they will almost certainly lose Senate seats in 2022. Democrats have rarely done well in midterm elections when they control the White House (1998, during the Bill Clinton impeachment being the only exception). Additionally, economic trends and cycles suggest that the economy is due for a recession soon, which will quite likely hurt the party of the President even more than a typical midterm cycle. Accordingly, if a Democrat defeats Trump in 2020, it is unlikely that Democrat will ever have a large enough Senate majority to enact the reforms needed.
Ninth – If, however, Democrats control 49-53 Senate seats after the 2020 election and Donald Trump is reelected, the same logic would give Democrats a very strong chance of picking up an additional 4-6 seats in the Senate in 2022, thereby giving the Democrats the seats they need to enact the needed reforms, assuming a Democratic president is elected in 2024. This would not be an unreasonable assumption given Trump’s relatively low popularity and the historically difficult task of one party winning three consecutive presidential elections.
Thank you for getting all the way to the end. Now that you have done it, I would love it if you could help me see where my logic is wrong. Because the idea that even a part of me could be hoping for Trump to get reelected is making it exceedingly difficult to look at myself in the mirror.
TL;DR – Unless we amend the constitution to enact meaningful changes to how our judiciary is appointed, combat gerrymandering, incentivize cooperation, protect voter rights, campaign finance regulation and other similar issues, our governmental, electoral and political systems are irredeemably broken and will continuing getting more dysfunctional. The only way to amend the constitution in such a way is for Democrats to control the presidency, House and Senate (having at least 55 seats in the latter to account for red state Democrats that may not support the process). Democrats have no plausible path to 55 seats in 2020, but they would in 2022 if Trump is reelected. Accordingly, focusing on gaining a Senate majority in 2020 and expanding it by campaigning against Trump in 2022 is the best way to fix our systems for the long term.
