Oz race shows how Trump still danger
It was only hours after voting ended that Donald Trump pushed Mehmet Oz, the former president’s favored candidate for Pennsylvania’s open Senate seat, to declare victory in a razor-thin Republican primary — even though votes were still being counted. But on Friday the talk show host-turned-politician took Trump’s advice, claiming for himself “the presumptive Republican nomination.” The declaration’s timing appeared to be purposely provocative: It was delivered on the day that a statewide recount began, and as arguments about whether to count thousands of mail-in ballots continued. Less than 1,000 votes separate Oz and David McCormick, his GOP primary rival.
This is yet another clear-as-day warning of how Trump and his followers sneer at the democratic process and will seek to undermine it if the people make choices he does not like. The Oz episode highlights one key Trump strategy — declaring victory before full election results are in — that the former president embraced in 2020 and might have an easier time executing in 2024. Trump or another presidential candidate would not need to be ahead in early returns to try to flip the game board. He would just have to make the results seem murky enough to encourage others to declare him the winner.
Delayed or chaotic vote-counting might be as or more likely in 2024 as in 2020. CNN reported that Trump acolytes across the country are pressing to ditch machines, based on the false conspiracy theories about election equipment that Trump has promoted. Even if they succeeded in only a few localities, they could still induce delays and introduce substantial errors into statewide vote tallies as ballots are painstakingly counted by hand. If fraud is their concern, the right policy is to let machines count paper ballots, then to conduct statistically sound audits after the tally.
Legislatures in some Republican-run states have empowered partisan poll watchers, who could be bolder than they were in 2020. The Trump-led campaign to undermine faith in democratic institutions has pushed many experienced election workers to retire because they have suddenly become targets for partisan attack and increasingly fear for their safety.
Moreover, many problems that existed in 2020 have not been addressed. Pennsylvania still prohibits election workers from processing mail-in ballots before Election Day, which virtually guarantees a laborious post-election count that leaves close races long undecided.
As Trump has shown repeatedly, he and his followers will use any appearance of turmoil to disparage the democratic process and deny legitimate election results. And Congress must update the 1887 Electoral Count Act, the law that governs how presidential electoral votes are tallied, to limit the risk that partisans could step in to declare their own winner based on another wave of Trump-style election lies.