Republicans are already trying to meddle in elections. They are trying to steal an election preemptively in Alaska. The Department of Justice has sued to block the certification of Alaska ballots if the Republican incumbent loses. Trump and the GOP have so denigrated our election process that the move is not even getting much attention.
The Department of Justice is trying to overrule the Alaska Supreme Court. There are two men named Dan Sullivan on the ballot. One is the current senator; the other is a stalking horse. The case has already gone before the state supreme court, and the second Dan Sullivan has been allowed to stay on the ballot.
DOJ says the second Dan Sullivan on the ballot should not be able to run because he’s just trying to steal votes from incumbent U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan. The ballot identifies one as “Sullivan, Daniel J. Jr.” and the other as “Sullivan, Dan S. (Registered Republican) Incumbent.” Can you tell which one is the incumbent Republican? You would have to be MAGA stupid to confuse them.
Don’t expect any Republicans to speak up about the shenanigans. They’ve already shown a willingness to undermine democracy, or to look the other way while their fellow travelers do it. Even Thom Tillis is getting into the act, saying it should be investigated. According to a report in the Washington Post, officials in numerous states are concerned about Republicans trying to undermine the election.
In North Carolina, we know better than anybody. Last cycle, they tried to steal a state Supreme Court seat by changing the rules after the election was over. Only a ruling from a federal judge stopped them, but they are constantly pushing up against the guardrails meant to protect our democracy. They have become an anti-democratic party, rigging elections and casting doubt on the system to delegitimize it in the minds of citizens.
In this state, Republicans shifted control of the board of elections from the governor’s office, where it had lived for decades, to the state auditor’s office, where they’ve stacked the board with GOP activists and partisans. They redistricted congressional seats in the middle of the decade to try to rig another seat for Republicans. And, of course, few elected Republicans will admit that the 2020 election was not stolen, and even fewer will speak out against the pardoning of the people who stormed the Capitol.
As early voting gets underway with unusually high turnout both in North Carolina and across the country, Republicans are needling Democrats about their accusations of voter suppression. But just because Republicans have failed to suppress the vote doesn’t mean they haven’t tried.
It’s indisputable that Republicans try to put up more barriers to voting while Democrats try to reduce them. Republicans call their attempts at restriction “voter integrity” instead of voter suppression. They claim they’re protecting elections against massive voter fraud that’s never occurred.
To hear Republicans tell it, Democrats have opened the borders to bring large numbers of immigrants to vote illegally. It’s an absurd theory rooted in right-wing fantasies, but it’s given credence by Republicans who should know better.
We never heard much about voter fraud until Barack Obama was elected president, and then suddenly it was a major GOP talking point. Republicans just couldn’t believe that many Americans would actually vote for a Black man for president. There must have been voter fraud, they decided, and they would make sure it didn’t happen again. They’ve been trying to rig elections ever since.
In North Carolina, we’ve been ground zero in the GOP assault on democracy. Their monster voter-suppression bill was struck down by the federal courts for targeting African American voters “with almost surgical precision.” The state is one of the most gerrymandered in the country. They tried to steal a state Supreme Court seat by changing the rules of the election after it was over. And they’ve taken over the state board of elections and packed it with activists.
They passed a bill this year aimed at making it easier to disqualify mail-in ballots, to combat the imaginary fraud. Governor Josh Stein has urged people to vote in person. He’s also questioned the motives of the new state board of elections under state Auditor Dave Boliek. It’s good to have our elected officials watching out for people instead of their political party.
In North Carolina, we know, firsthand, that Republicans will do whatever they can to alter elections in their favor. Alaska will almost certainly not be the only state they try to sabotage this year. The American people are really the only check on them. Democrats need to win by large enough margins to remove any doubt about the outcome. Then they need to protect our democracy from Republicans who want to dismantle it.