The election is over. A six million popular vote majority and a 306 to 234 Electoral College vote make it crystal clear that it’s a Biden victory by any measure.
During the impeachment hearings, Republican senators screamed that it’s “for the people to decide” in the November election.
It’s clear that people have spoken — a larger popular majority than Secretary Clinton’s in 2016, and an Electoral College majority equal to that which Trump declared as a “landslide victory” in 2016. But that’s not clear enough for Trump and his sycophantic Republican enablers. “A massive systemic conspiracy,” they cry, followed by desperate attempts to wrest the victory away from the voters and hand it back to the most incompetent and corrupt president in recent American history. If that fails, cast Biden’s election as “illegitimate.”
A farce is defined by Webster as “an exaggerated comedy based on humorous or unlikely events.” The Trump/Republican reaction to this election precisely fits that definition.
Rudy Giuliani’s recent Three Stooges operation at a Philadelphia parking lot sandwiched between a porn book store and a crematorium was followed by another whopper before a Pennsylvania judge. In throwing out the case, the U.S. District Court judge wrote that Trump had asked the court to disenfranchise almost seven million votes. He chastised Trump’s ace attorney with some harsh words: “One might expect that when seeking such a startling outcome, a plaintiff would come formidably armed with compelling legal arguments and factual proof of rampant corruption.”
Other battleground states that rejected Trump were also targeted with unsubstantiated claims of fraud. In Michigan’s Wayne County, Republican members of its Board of Canvass initially refused to certify the vote for no valid reason. They then changed their minds and certified the vote. The smoke thrown up around this fiasco prompted Trump to invite Michigan’s two top state legislators to the White House, clearly to convince them to delay state certification and throw the decision to Michigan’s Republican legislature, and name Trump electors to the Electoral College.
The Trump campaign had earlier met with Pennsylvania Republicans, exploring how the legislature could name Trump electors to the Electoral College.
Considering how flagrantly wrong and disruptive such an action would be, the correct response would have been for these Michigan legislators to decline Trump’s invitation. But how could they resist that invitation to the White House to share cheeseburgers with Trump himself? They couldn’t. Upon returning, these two rubes assured the public that all would “proceed as normal.” Sure, if “normal” was for Republicans to continue pressuring the State Canvassing Board not to certify Michigan’s statewide vote count. The Board eventually certified the vote — with one Republican abstention.
Then we have the Wisconsin farce where Trump pays three million dollars for a recount in Milwaukee and Dane Counties. After a brouhaha at the Wisconsin Elections Board where Republican board members haggled about rules for the recount and alleged fraud, the count is proceeding as this is written — amidst Republican “observers” harassing counters, challenging ballots for the most trivial of reasons.
Wisconsin’s Assembly Speaker Robin Vos refuses to state that Biden won the election, insisting that we must investigate these felonies where people improperly voted absentee. Sure, these absentee ballots with incomplete addresses must be “horrible crimes.” This is the same dimwit that during the spring Wisconsin election made a spectacle of himself on national television, while wearing surgical gear, reassuring the public that “it’s safe out there.”
Georgia has a long record of voter suppression. Its Secretary of State, Brad Raffensberger, is an admitted Trump supporter. Being in the spotlight, he wanted no part of flagrant voter suppression. In spite of long voting lines in Democratic precincts, Democrats turned out, giving Biden a narrow victory.
Republican response to Biden’s Georgia victory was furious, including its two U.S. Senators demanding Raffensberger’s resignation and Georgia’s Republican congressional delegation piling on. South Carolina Senator Graham, who has absolutely no business interfering in a Georgia election, asked Raffensberger if there were a way to throw out an entire County’s ballots if any irregularities were found. To Raffensberger’s credit, he rebuffed Graham, and defended the integrity of Georgia’s election; Biden’s victory was legitimate.
A Georgia recount affirmed the Biden victory. Georgia’s Governor Kemp affirmed that the election must be certified, subject to an “additional audit.” For this, he was chastised by the prominent Trump attorney who made her name by spreading wild conspiracy theories, including links between long deceased Venezuelan strong man, Hugo Chavez, Gorge Soros, and massive influence of communist money through Venezuela, China and Cuba; and election software designed to flip votes from Trump to Biden. This being too much for even for Trump’s legal team, or what’s left of it, she has been dismissed.
If you don’t like the numbers, keep counting until they turn out differently. Georgia is going through its third vote tabulation. If that doesn’t “come out right,” try something else. Republican strategy from the beginning was to delay and obfuscate long enough to throw responsibility to Republican legislatures that would name Trump electors to the Electoral College. Had Biden’s margin been razor thin, the plot just might have worked.
This total farce could have been avoided had Republican senators acted like senators instead of a spineless gaggle of fawning sycophants. Utah’s Mitt Romney was first to defend Biden’s victory. But as he can be senator for life if he so desires, he hardly deserves a profile in courage award. After securing another six-year term, Nebraska’s Senator Sasse peeps around the corner, suggesting that acknowledging Biden’s victory might be a good idea. Pennsylvania’s Senator Toomey is finally facing reality.
But most of them, including Wisconsin’s obsequious Senator Ron Johnson, have continued mouthing weasel words along the lines of “Trump has the right to do this,” and, “We have to wait and let this play out.”
In addition to delaying the transition, this unprecedented saga is a step toward normalizing malicious tactics that threaten smooth and peaceful transfer of power.
This total farce was not funny.
— John Waelti’s column appears every Saturday in the Times. He can be reached at jjwaelti@tds.net.
