Republicans saved democracy in 2020
Special counsel Jack Smith’s latest indictment of former president Donald Trump serves as a reminder that
Trump strenuously tried to overturn the 2020 election. It also reveals who saved American democracy: Republicans.
That’s not the reigning narrative. Former vice president Mike Pence has received some credit for his courage in resisting Trump’s entreaties, but not nearly enough. The same is true of Republican leaders at every level of government who put country over party.
Trump pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” votes sufficient to overturn his state’s results — and pressured Gov. Brian Kemp to try to replace the state’s electors. These two officials investigated allegations of voter fraud and found them all without merit. They remained staunchly supportive of Georgia’s election outcome, earning Trump’s unending enmity. They also endured serious primary challenges from Trump-endorsed opponents and personal threats. That they took on those challenges head-on is praiseworthy; that they prevailed politically in last year’s primaries is a stunning personal rebuke to the former president.
Smith’s indictment shows their courage was the norm, not the exception. Despite frequent phone calls, emails and personal meetings, no Republican governor or statewide official overseeing an election succumbed to Trump’s blandishments. The indictment specifically cites legislative leaders in Arizona and Michigan, who refused to try to overturn the result and appoint Trump’s electors despite his team’s overtures.
In fact, the GOP controlled legislatures in the closest states in 2020, yet none of their leaders wavered as Trump’s team pushed the “independent state legislature” theory, which holds that the Constitution bestows on state legislatures plenary power to determine the contours of state-operated elections and to appoint presidential electors. That theory has been since rejected by the Supreme Court. Republican-appointed judges displayed the same courage under fire. Not one Trump-appointed district judge allowed his baseless lawsuits to proceed. The Supreme Court also rejected Texas’s bid to overturn the results in four close states, holding that Texas did not have standing to sue. Trump responded angrily on Twitter, but that sound and fury signified nothing.
This refusal to throw the country into a constitutional crisis extended even to high-ranking members of Trump’s administration. Attorney General William P. Barr and virtually every other top Justice Department appointee did not bend when Trump told them to declare the election was corrupt. White House counsel Pat Cipollone was a model of probity, consistently supporting the rule of law over Trump’s whims. Their bravery contributed to the final outcome.
If you think this commendation is misplaced, imagine what would have happened if some or all of these people had been partisan rather than patriotic. State legislatures would have openly challenged the election outcome, presenting Congress with a genuine controversy. Judges or justices would have ruled in Trump’s favor despite the lack of evidence, throwing the country into chaos. The Justice Department would have put its considerable weight behind the push for a putsch, making Joe Biden’s eventual triumph much more difficult. Each person in this chain could have acted differently. Would you have been so brave under the pressure of the president of the United States?
It’s certainly true that many Republicans did seek to overturn the election results, including the many state attorneys general and members of Congress who signed on to the Texas case. But would they have done so if they thought they had a serious chance of prevailing? Those who joined the suit — and perhaps even those who brought it — likely knew they were demagogically playing to the base rather than engaging in a realistic effort to undermine the election.
The same verdict applies to Republican House members and senators who voted not to certify Arizona’s and Pennsylvania’s electoral votes. They knew the vote would fail, and thus they could throw red meat to the base without risk that they would succeed. If they are to be castigated, then we must also castigate the 32 Democratic members of Congress who voted in 2005 not to certify Ohio’s 2004 electoral college votes, a move that would have prevented President George W. Bush’s reelection had it succeeded.
Past is not prologue, and national Republican leaders largely have not found the courage to say what they know is true: Trump lost, and fraud was not a factor. This does not obviate the bravery they showed when it mattered. If you love our democracy, thank Republicans for the fact we still have it.