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It’s also true. If Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination, American voters who want the nation to remain a full-fledged democracy have to back Biden, even if they hate him.
Theoretically, part of living in a democracy is that you get a real choice between at least two qualified candidates for major offices. But while Biden obviously isn’t canceling the upcoming election as autocrats do, he isn’t leaving much intellectual space to vote against him either. In speeches, TV ads and comments to reporters, Biden and his campaign staffers are reeling off Trump’s misdeeds and explicitly stating that whether the United States remains a democracy will be decided by this year’s election.
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Framed that way, Americans who prefer lower taxes, limits on abortion and other conservative policies can’t really vote for Trump — at least if they believe in maintaining democracy. And while Biden himself isn’t doing this, many Democratic activists and voters are imploring progressives who are skeptical of the president to rein in their criticisms and under no circumstances consider either abstaining from voting or backing scholar Cornel West or another third-party candidate. Protecting democracy, these Democrats argue, means that liberal and centrist Americans must unify behind Biden.
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In short, the argument from many Democrats is that Americans who care about democracy must vote for Biden in 2024 to preserve their right in future elections to actually vote for their preferred candidate among a field of options.
I find this argument very unsettling, for a number of reasons. It denies people on the left and right who don’t agree with Biden on policy the clearest, most consequential way to show their disapproval — voting against him. It allows those who agree with Biden on policy (more centrist Democrats) to invoke electoral considerations as a pretext to discourage the president’s critics (usually more progressive Democrats) from speaking out against, say, his Israeli-Palestinian policies.
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Also, Biden himself adopting the “vote for me or lose democracy” message seems insincere and political. For much of his first three years in office, the president emphasized economic policies and his ability to work across party lines while playing down democracy issues and the growing radicalism of the Republican Party. That didn’t work politically. Biden is very unpopular and trails Trump in many polls. He’s leaning hard into democracy and Trump bashing now because that’s probably the only way he can win reelection.
And if the election is defined as democracy vs. dictatorship, the contrast Biden used in a recent speech, that sidelines other important issues. A U.S. general election is in many ways a national conversation between citizens, politicians, civil society groups and the media about the state of America and what should change. But if one candidate wants to end democracy and the other doesn’t, it’s hard to focus on their differing views on charter schools or taxes. All of those issues pale in comparison to democracy itself.
So I wish I could say that Biden was exaggerating the threat of Trump when he all but tells Americans that they must vote for him. I wish we could have an election where policy issues were front and center.
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But Biden and the Democrats are right. If Trump is elected, he will end American democracy as we know it — or at least severely erode it.
Trump spent his last few months in office trying to use his powers to steal an election that he clearly lost. He is unapologetic about his actions before and on Jan. 6, 2021. It’s likely that he would try again to reverse the results if his preferred candidate lost — and might be more successful in a second attempt, knowing what didn’t work the first time.
And the aftermath of the 2020 election wasn’t a unique time in Trump’s presidency. His tenure was full of undemocratic acts, such as trying to stop independent investigations of himself and launch probes against his political rivals. He is promising an even more radical approach if elected to a second term.
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So everything is on the line this November. Americans who live in California, Idaho or other states that are either clearly blue or clearly red can openly express their dissatisfaction or policy differences with Biden and vote for Trump, West or not vote at all. But if you live in Wisconsin, Michigan or another swing state and Trump is the Republican nominee, you need to vote for Biden, even if you hold views to his left or right and spend every day before and after the election bashing him.
That’s the reality. And that reality illustrates a deeper, even more troubling truth: The United States is so far off track that being pro-democracy is now a distinguishing characteristic for a presidential candidate (Biden) and nearly half of the voters are going to back the antidemocratic alternative (Trump). If our elections now are about saving democracy, then democracy is already semi-dead.
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One of the main campaign messages so far from President Biden and Democrats is that to protect democracy, American voters have only one legitimate choice in the upcoming election: Biden. That message is obviously self-serving and perhaps even contradictory and antidemocratic.
It’s also true. If Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination, American voters who want the nation to remain a full-fledged democracy have to back Biden, even if they hate him.
Theoretically, part of living in a democracy is that you get a real choice between at least two qualified candidates for major offices. But while Biden obviously isn’t canceling the upcoming election as autocrats do, he isn’t leaving much intellectual space to vote against him either. In speeches, TV ads and comments to reporters, Biden and his campaign staffers are reeling off Trump’s misdeeds and explicitly stating that whether the United States remains a democracy will be decided by this year’s election.
Framed that way, Americans who prefer lower taxes, limits on abortion and other conservative policies can’t really vote for Trump — at least if they believe in maintaining democracy. And while Biden himself isn’t doing this, many Democratic activists and voters are imploring progressives who are skeptical of the president to rein in their criticisms and under no circumstances consider either abstaining from voting or backing scholar Cornel West or another third-party candidate. Protecting democracy, these Democrats argue, means that liberal and centrist Americans must unify behind Biden.
In short, the argument from many Democrats is that Americans who care about democracy must vote for Biden in 2024 to preserve their right in future elections to actually vote for their preferred candidate among a field of options.
I find this argument very unsettling, for a number of reasons. It denies people on the left and right who don’t agree with Biden on policy the clearest, most consequential way to show their disapproval — voting against him. It allows those who agree with Biden on policy (more centrist Democrats) to invoke electoral considerations as a pretext to discourage the president’s critics (usually more progressive Democrats) from speaking out against, say, his Israeli-Palestinian policies.
Also, Biden himself adopting the “vote for me or lose democracy” message seems insincere and political. For much of his first three years in office, the president emphasized economic policies and his ability to work across party lines while playing down democracy issues and the growing radicalism of the Republican Party. That didn’t work politically. Biden is very unpopular and trails Trump in many polls. He’s leaning hard into democracy and Trump bashing now because that’s probably the only way he can win reelection.
And if the election is defined as democracy vs. dictatorship, the contrast Biden used in a recent speech, that sidelines other important issues. A U.S. general election is in many ways a national conversation between citizens, politicians, civil society groups and the media about the state of America and what should change. But if one candidate wants to end democracy and the other doesn’t, it’s hard to focus on their differing views on charter schools or taxes. All of those issues pale in comparison to democracy itself.
So I wish I could say that Biden was exaggerating the threat of Trump when he all but tells Americans that they must vote for him. I wish we could have an election where policy issues were front and center.
But Biden and the Democrats are right. If Trump is elected, he will end American democracy as we know it — or at least severely erode it.
Trump spent his last few months in office trying to use his powers to steal an election that he clearly lost. He is unapologetic about his actions before and on Jan. 6, 2021. It’s likely that he would try again to reverse the results if his preferred candidate lost — and might be more successful in a second attempt, knowing what didn’t work the first time.
And the aftermath of the 2020 election wasn’t a unique time in Trump’s presidency. His tenure was full of undemocratic acts, such as trying to stop independent investigations of himself and launch probes against his political rivals. He is promising an even more radical approach if elected to a second term.
So everything is on the line this November. Americans who live in California, Idaho or other states that are either clearly blue or clearly red can openly express their dissatisfaction or policy differences with Biden and vote for Trump, West or not vote at all. But if you live in Wisconsin, Michigan or another swing state and Trump is the Republican nominee, you need to vote for Biden, even if you hold views to his left or right and spend every day before and after the election bashing him.
That’s the reality. And that reality illustrates a deeper, even more troubling truth: The United States is so far off track that being pro-democracy is now a distinguishing characteristic for a presidential candidate (Biden) and nearly half of the voters are going to back the antidemocratic alternative (Trump). If our elections now are about saving democracy, then democracy is already semi-dead.
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