I never imagined it would come to this, but Jennifer and I have started talking about how we may need to be prepared to go to Washington, D.C., on short notice to join protests there if Donald Trump attempts to undermine the presidential election. That was even before we read this OpEd piece in today’s New York Times about the work being done by the Transition Integrity Project to prepare for such an eventuality.
If, just a few years ago, I had read anything like what I wrote above, I would have dismissed it as the ravings of an alarmist lunatic. Even as I sat down to draft this post I found myself thinking, do I want to be that guy — the crackpot who publishes ideas like this on the internet?
But I am neither a radical nor a catastrophizer. Trump has essentially announced his intentions to thwart mail-in balloting in November because it could result in a Democratic victory. If he were to federalize the National Guard in order to halt the counting of ballots, who would stop him? Bill Barr? Or how about the Supreme Court, which itself put an end to the recounting of ballots in Florida in 2000?
This article by George Lakey of Waging Non-Violence cites a 2017 study by political scientist Stephen Zunes who looked at twelve attempted coups around the world since 1958 and found that eight were defeated by nonviolent resistance. Nonviolent resistance may be on the verge of toppling “Europe’s last dictator,” Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, even as I write this.
The thought that there might actually be a coup attempt in the United States is appalling. It is contrary to everything I’ve ever believed or wanted to believe about my country. But the fact that we deplore the idea doesn’t protect us from the possibility. There has never been a president like Donald Trump.