Today, Congress will meet to count and certify the electoral votes of the states. In a normal year, this is a rather mundane task. But this is not a normal year. It is the year that Donald Trump is to be booted out of office.Trump has been to court over 60 times trying to change the votes in several states, and has lost every case that would change a single vote. He has tried to get Republican legislatures to ignore the votes in their states and pick a slate of electors that support him. He has tried to intimidate election officials into changing votes in their states. And he has lied repeatedly about the outcome of the election.
But our democratic system has held, and Trump has failed in all his efforts to remain in office. Now he is down to one last effort -- an effort to get the House and Senate to overturn the vote in several states, and substitute a slate of Trump supporters in place of the electors chosen by the voters.
This last effort is not likely to succeed, but it involves over a dozen Republican senators and more than a hundred Republican House members. All of them should be ashamed of themselves, because they are calling into question our democratic system -- and their own patriotism.
Here is part of what Michael Gerson has to say about this cowardly and anti-democratic action by these Republicans:
When Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and their GOP colleagues try to disrupt and overturn a free and fair election, they are no longer just allies of a subversive; they become instruments of subversion. They not only help a liar; they become liars. They not only empower conspiracy theories; they join a conspiracy against American democracy. They not only excuse institutional arson; they set fire to the Constitution and dance around the flame.
Their pathetic motivations no longer matter. Some are simple cowards, frightened by angry people wearing red hats. Are we supposed to indulge their cravenness out of pity? Are we supposed to sympathize with people who want to keep their jobs at the cost of their country? Others eventually want the angry people in red hats to support their political ambitions. Are we supposed to humor people who seek the presidency by spitting on the institution of the presidency? Are we supposed make allowances for a selfishness so comprehensive that it eclipses duty, loyalty and love of country?
We are witnessing what happens when treacherous politicians run in packs. A solitary betrayal of the constitutional order by a member of Congress is a source of shame and, perhaps, a cause for expulsion. When 100 and more Republicans join hands and betray the constitutional order, it is a populist cause. They gain the confidence, even the thrill, of shared disloyalty. But their oath of office — in every single case — has been dishonored. They have demonstrated their unfitness for office and called their own patriotism into question.
So maybe it is for the best that they stand up and be counted. Maybe it is best for Americans to know who will “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic” — and who will not. By all means, let’s engrave their names into a marble slab — a roll call of those who failed the most important test of self-government in our lifetimes. There are a lot of monuments honoring bravery. Let’s have one dedicated to abject cowardice. . . .
They are shredding the careful work of America’s founders. And they deserve nothing but contempt.
