America’s Democracy Survives a Surprise Attack From the Office of US President
By Asot Michael
After the fears, anxieties, and emotions of the past two months, America transitioned to a new presidency at the appointed time, the noisy, anti-democracy theater and shenanigans of the out-going president notwithstanding.
Congratulations and best wishes for success to US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, of Jamaican and Indian descent, the first woman to occupy America’s second most powerful office.
The US President was sworn in on January 20th, 2021, noted in his victory speech last year that the black people of America always had his back and he is going to have theirs. As well he might. Black lives matter. And from Detroit, Michigan to Atlanta, Georgia, black lives (including the lives of black Caribbean people resident in America) mattered big time in delivering a victory for the Biden/Harris ticket.
In many respects, this was a historic US election. The largest voter turnout ever — 159,633,396 people voted to represent 66.7 percent of the electorate. 2020 saw the highest number of votes ever polled by victorious and losing presidential candidates. Biden won 81,283,098 votes or 51.3 percent of the votes cast to become the first U.S. presidential candidate to have received more than 80 million votes. Trump won 74,222,958 votes, or 46.8 percent of the votes cast — more votes than any other presidential candidate has ever won, with the exception of Biden.
America’s 45th President lost the 2020 election by 74 votes in the 538-vote electoral college and over 7 million in the popular vote. But he refused to concede, claiming without any credible evidence that the election was stolen. Trump made over 60 requests to the court to give him victory because he has huge problems with the count of votes in states where he lost, even in those run by officials of his Republican Party, but no problems at all with the count of votes in states where he won. The courts refused. And in the very same situation in which the US State Department would be pressuring leaders elsewhere to do the honorable thing as required by the democratic process, Trump intensified his assault on the democratic process to the deafeningly loud sound of silence from his Republican colleagues.
The United States of America, the self-appointed guardian of democracy and free and fair elections around the world suffered the embarrassment of international ridicule of its own electoral process and democracy when Trump supporters stormed the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021 in a deadly insurrection intended to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power.
The US House of representatives impeached Trump for the second time in his presidency on January 13th, 2020 for inciting the insurrection that threatened the lives of hundreds of US lawmakers. Now the world waits to see whether there are enough US Senators willing to convict him for the high crime in the seat of US power and authority that they witnessed firsthand as targets of the brutal assault.
Those who follow international politics would have lost count of the number of times the US has urged candidates in electoral contests, especially in the developing world, to respect the will of the people and the many occasions on which the US has demanded that losing incumbents concede defeat and refrain from obstructing the transition to new leadership. But Trump wants none of this in America. So he took a warpath of revenge — undermining the democratic process, endangering national security, pardoning cronies, and even firing his own political appointees who he cited as disloyal.
US diplomats abroad — the face and voice of America in the world community — have been humiliated into cluelessness on how to defend this indefensible leadership assault on democracy in a country that prides itself on policing democratic governance in the free world.
Just last year U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo harassed Guyanese President David Granger to “step aside” following the disputed March presidential election in which preliminary data showed a victory for opposition candidate Irfaan Ali. At a press briefing, Pompeo said Washington was restricting the U.S. visas of “individuals responsible for or complicit in undermining democracy in Guyana….
“The Granger government must respect the results of democratic elections and step aside,” Pompeo said.
But since the election of November 3rd, 2020 Pompeo has been busy peddling the evidence-free charge of voter fraud in support of the Trump campaign to frustrate the popular will and bully the court into subverting the people’s choice by handing him a second term. And hundreds of other Republican members of the US government supported Trump to hold up the proud United States of America, “the beacon of democracy”, as a pitiful example of hypocrisy to the world community.
Yet, in the final analysis, America’s security architecture in defense of democracy and the constitutional rule of law triumphed against an enemy operating from the privileged position of US president. Trump did everything possible to overturn the results of the election and to compromise the Biden presidency. But he could not defeat the institutions of governance designed to safeguard America’s democracy even though those institutions allowed him to have his way up to the very end.
He refused to attend the Biden/Harris inauguration. Instead, he ordered the use of the presidential helicopter and jet to fly him from the White House to his own farewell ceremony at Andrews Airforce base and then to his home in Florida.
For all, we have heard about America not liking despots and America’s commitment to helping people around the world avert the dangers of dictatorship, in a moment of truth, when a dictator reared his head, it was reassuring to see America’s decisiveness and success in defense of government of the people, by the people, for the people.
For those in the Republican party with the power to bring Trump under control, but who cower in mortal fear of bruising his ego and incurring the brutality of his rage, there is a lot to resolve in order to rescue the party from the clutches of the very anti-democracy influence and elements it claims to stand against.
America moves on. Under the cloud of a virus that has affected over 25 million Americans, claimed the lives of over 400 thousand, and brought the economy to its knees, the Biden/Harris team begin its term in office more challenged to deliver on the promise of improving lives than any other administration. The essence of this awesome responsibility to heal, unite and build is captured in the inspirational lines of Amanda Gorman — National Youth Poet Laureate and the youngest inaugural poet in US history:
“… We’ve seen a force
that would shatter our nation
rather than share it.
Would destroy our country
if it meant delaying democracy.
And this effort very nearly succeeded.
But while democracy can be periodically delayed,
it can never be permanently defeated.
In this truth, in this faith we trust.
For while we have our eyes on the future,
history has its eyes on us.
This is the era of just redemption
we feared at its inception.
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs
of such a terrifying hour
but within it, we found the power
to author a new chapter…”
Hopefully, we in the Caribbean are watching, learning, and taking our notes.
