Republicans have a right to question the election results.
This may be unpopular amongst my progressive, liberal circle, but I believe that Republicans have a right to question the election results.
I say this not because their alleged fraud claims are correct, but because at the core of what makes American democracy so great is the right of the citizenry to question authorities.
I have lived through elections in a nearly a half dozen countries. I watched as election results were announced in Uganda, after the government shut down the internet in the days leading up to the election and closed roads to polling stations in opposition-held areas. I watched as reports came in showing more votes in favor of Museveni — the incumbent and leader for over three decades — than there were recorded residents in that district.
I watched in Kenya as the opposition party began eroding faith in the electoral system years before the election took place. When the election happened — and the opposition party lost — they brought the claims of irregularities to Kenya’s Supreme Court. Just before the Court was to sit and decide the election, the driver of one of the Justices who was to vote to nullify the results was shot and killed — reportedly as an intimation effort by the sitting President not to overturn his victory.
America has many parallels to these election stories.
Our sitting President worked for years to erode credibility in our election systems and public media.
Our legislators have spent decades making it difficult for voters; closing poll stations early before working-class families are off work, limiting polling stations in opposition-held areas, the like.
And we pushed through Supreme Court justices — political appointees — just days before they might be asked to weigh in on a partisan election dispute. In many ways, we are no different than these democratic states we so readily criticize.
But the one thing that differentiates us as Americans is the right to not only question the results, but strength of our judiciary to respond to each inquiry with objectivity and impartiality.
This is what fundamentally upholds our democracy. Without it, we’ve lost the thing most core to a system of governance that gives voice to the people, and not just those in power.
As liberals, we should support — and not scorn — this process because it is core to American exceptionalism. We do not have to agree with the claims, but we do have to let them be heard and trust in the process that will evaluate their credibility.
At the same time, we need to take a much deeper look at our own hypocrisy as Americans. We are no longer the golden child of democracy — the cracks in our own system have become increasingly evident over the last four years and unless we work urgently to fix them, we risk a threat much greater than a few questioned ballot counts.
As Patrick Gathara so eloquently argued when writing about what the US can learn from Kenya’s democracy, “Trump’s tenure has exposed fundamental weaknesses and flaws in American democracy, in its ability to contain a rogue president and to hold them to account, and its reliance on the goodwill of its politicians to function.”
Now is the time for us to question the system, to allow peaceful public dissent, and to push for reform that will restore everyone’s faith in the strength and objectivity of our democratic systems. The next four years depend on it.
