OK, we want to know who won? With how many delegates? Where? And we want to know it before dinner, right? Stop! Recall the tensions over the Iowa caucus. Because the results came in more slowly than expected, Trump and his allies questioned the outcomes, undermined the legitimacy of the results, and set us against each other. This could happen again with the Super Tuesday vote and even more so for the November election.
Running an open, fair election is a massive and challenging task. The Presidential election is one of the largest and most complicated democratic processes that we undertake as a nation. Getting it right takes hundreds of thousands of workers and volunteers doing a series of critical tasks. These are jobs – many done by volunteers – which we do only once every four years. It is essential that the job is done well enough that we have faith in the results. If many of our fellow citizens do not trust the results, our democracy is on the ropes headed for a knockout.
We get easily frustrated when there are changes from early polling results to the final outcome that reflects a complete count of all voters. Reasons for the delay include some inevitable mistakes or incompetence and but hopefully NOT any sabotage. Results may appropriately change over time because we of our decentralized voting system that includes thousands of jurisdictions operating with huge differences in their vote counting technologies.
Donald Trump has repeatedly attempted to undermine our faith in the election process and he has zeroed in on changing results as one of his key targets. In 2018, Trump and a number of his allies cast doubt on the results of races in Florida and California saying that there must have been fraud because results changed as the count continued into the night and the days that followed. Trump’s line of attack is the real fraud!
Large states and cities have many more voters and often rely heavily on absentee or mail ballots. Moreover, Democratic voters live disproportionately in large cities and use absentee ballots at a higher rate than Republicans and the unaffiliated. Because of this the late count tends to trend towards the Democrats. This is so common that the phenomenon is known as the “Blue Wave.”
A first step to ensuring a legitimate election is to practice patience. Patience is resistance! Wait for the full election results. Don’t repeat the unsubstantiated accounts claiming irregularities in the process that fill social media feeds and come from partisans. If the delay in the count becomes an issue in the media or among your friends, take it upon yourself to understand the reasons that the count is delayed and actively urge others to be patient.
The second step is to explicitly build electoral resilience. As citizens we can take a proactive role in ensuring the fairness of the election beyond working on behalf of our favored candidate. Election judges, precinct observers, and many other election jobs are performed by citizens giving their time once every two or four years. Be one of them! Political parties and independent citizen watchdogs can work to improve the reliability of the vote in places that have experienced problems in the past or where new machines are being used for the first time.
Call To Action
Commit to taking an active role in guaranteeing election legitimacy.
Be patient waiting for the complete vote from the Super Tuesday states and each election through November. Do not repeat online rumors! Please share this edition of MWR in your networks!
Educate yourself on the workings of your local election system. Study and understand how the vote is conducted in your jurisdiction. What have been the problems in the past? Are they fixed? If not, do whatever you can to press for change before November!
Volunteer for a job or role that strengthens your local election system – election judge, poll or count observer or ballot access advocate. Join an election watchdog group.
For anyone interested in a more detailed analysis of the weaknesses and potential crisis points in the 2020 election, we recommend Richard Hasen’s, Electoral Meltdown. Hasen’s earlier book The Voting Wars is a thorough examination of the problems in 21st Century American elections.