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How to Reform the Presidency After the Wreckage of Trump
AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyHow to Reform the Presidency After the Wreckage of TrumpOur post-Watergate laws and practices for the presidency need revamping.Bob Bauer and Mr. Bauer served as White House counsel to President Obama and as senior adviser for the Biden campaign. Mr. Goldsmith served in the George W. Bush administration as an assistant attorney general and as special counsel to the Department of Defense. They are the authors of “After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency.”Dec. 18, 2020, 5:00 a.m. ETCredit…Damon Winter/The New York TimesNow that Donald Trump’s time in the White House is ending, an urgent task is the reform of the presidency that for four years he sought to shape in his image and to run in his personal and political self-interest. What the those years have shown is that the array of laws and norms that arose after Watergate and Vietnam requires an overhaul.Any program for reform of the presidency must give precedence to our health and economic crises. It must also acknowledge political realities. Some reforms can be carried out by the executive branch, but others require legislation. Those must attract at least modest bipartisan support in the Senate.With these constraints in mind, an agenda for reform of the presidency could realistically reflect the following priorities:Executive Branch ReformsThese reforms should focus on restoring the integrity of the rule of law, especially to check presidential interventions in law enforcement for self-protection or to harm political enemies. The Constitution vests executive law enforcement power in the president, so the executive branch must institute most of these reforms. Internal branch reforms lack legal enforceability but can establish or reinforce guardrails that constrain even norm-breaking presidencies, especially by influencing presidential subordinates.Because President Trump defied them regularly, and sometimes his Justice Department did, too, there’s a lot of skepticism about norms. But actually norms succeeded more in checking him than has been appreciated — for example, in ensuring that Robert Mueller, despite Mr. Trump’s opposition, could complete his inquiry; in protecting federal prosecutors in New York in any investigation of matters related to Mr. Trump; and in preventing the Justice Department from carrying out the president’s desire to prosecute his enemies.Reforms should include sharpening Justice Department regulations against political bias in law enforcement; extending to the attorney general the department norms against interfering in investigations; clarifying the rules for investigations of presidents and presidential campaigns to protect against the political impact of investigative steps or announcements, like actions taken close to an election; and changing the regulations so that a special counsel possesses enhanced independence from the attorney general and can report to Congress and American people the facts of any credible allegations of criminal conduct against a president or senior executive branch official.Congressional ReformsCongress should by statute supplement the executive reforms. Three should have broad public support and should be easier for Republican legislators to vote for once Mr. Trump is out of office.First, Congress should transform into law the anti-corruption norms of presidential behavior that have long been accepted by both parties but were flouted by Mr. Trump. That would include requiring presidents and presidential candidates to make a timely disclosure of their tax returns. It should also bar the president, under threat of criminal penalty, from any role in the oversight of any business; ban presidential blind trusts, which in this context are inconsistent with core concepts of transparency and accountability; and establish procedures for Congress to police the “emoluments” the president would receive from foreign states.Second, Congress should expressly bar presidents from obstructing justice for self-protection, protection of family members and to interfere in elections. It should also make it a crime for a president to offer a pardon in exchange for bribes, including clemency granted for silence or corrupt action in a legal proceeding.Third, Congress must upgrade legal protections against foreign electoral interference, a concern for both the American people and the U.S. intelligence community. Congress should require campaigns to report to the F.B.I. any contacts from foreign states offering campaign support or assistance. And to clarify that foreign governments cannot offer, and presidential campaigns cannot solicit or receive, anything of value to a campaign, like opposition research, it must criminalize any mutual aid agreements between presidential campaigns and foreign governments.One sharp conflict between the executive and legislative branches needs an urgent fix and is ripe for a deal: the regulation of executive branch vacancies. Many presidential administrations — the Trump administration more aggressively than others — have circumvented the Senate confirmation process for top executive branch appointments by making unilateral temporary appointments.These tactics exploited loopholes in federal vacancies law. Compounding this problem is that the number of Senate-confirmed executive branch positions has grown (it is now around 1,200), and the Senate in recent decades has become more aggressive in using holds and filibusters to block or delay confirmation. Congress should significantly reduce the number of executive positions requiring confirmation in exchange for substantially narrowed presidential discretion to make temporary appointments.The strength of a presidency is measured by its capacity for effective executive leadership. Mr. Trump’s record of feckless leadership was closely related to his unrelenting efforts to defy or destroy constraining institutions. The reforms proposed here would enhance the institutional constraints that legitimate the president’s vast powers.They would thus serve the twin aims of ensuring that the “energy in the executive” that Alexander Hamilton defined as “a leading character in the definition of good government” is nonetheless embedded, as the historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. rightly insisted, in a “system of accountability that checks the abuse of executive power.”Bob Bauer, a senior adviser for the Biden campaign and a professor of practice and distinguished scholar in residence at New York University School of Law, and Jack Goldsmith (@jacklgoldsmith), a law professor at Harvard, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a former assistant attorney general in the George W. Bush administration, are the authors of “After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More
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'An evil family': Sacklers condemned as they refuse to apologize for role in opioid crisis
House committee is investigating Purdue Pharma and billionaire family’s role in epidemic that has killed almost 500,000 AmericansTwo members of the billionaire Sackler family that owns Purdue Pharma, the US pharmaceutical manufacturer of the prescription painkiller OxyContin, refused to apologize for their role in the opioids crisis that has killed almost half a million Americans, during a hearing in Washington on Thursday. Continue reading… More
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US Congress closes in on $900bn Covid aid bill as Friday deadline looms
Bill will include $600 to $700 stimulus checks and extended unemployment benefits US congressional negotiators on Wednesday were “closing in on” a $900bn Covid-19 aid bill that will include $600 to $700 stimulus checks and extended unemployment benefits, as a Friday deadline loomed, lawmakers and aides said.Top members of the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives and Republican-controlled Senate sounded more positive than they have in months on a fresh response to a crisis that has killed more than 304,000 Americans and thrown millions out of work. Continue reading… More
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Biden says deal close on new coronavirus relief bill as he hails latest pick for diverse cabinet – live
Key events
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2.42pm EST14:42
Texas AG files antitrust lawsuit against Google1.35pm EST13:35
Early afternoon summary1.11pm EST13:11
Kamala Harris urges faith in coronavirus vaccine12.47pm EST12:47
Biden said signs of agreement on new coronavirus economic relief bill “encouraging”12.14pm EST12:14
Biden introduces Buttigieg as his nominee for transportation secretary11.42am EST11:42
Harris impatient over stimulus bill – says “people are suffering”10.52am EST10:52
Secretary of State Pompeo to isolate over contact with Covid-positive personLive feed
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The availability of intensive care unit beds in the San Francisco Bay Area fell below 15% on Tuesday, the threshold that triggers a regional stay-at-home order.
Much of the Bay Area had preemptively enacted the stay-at-home order earlier in the month, but three counties did not. They will now have to enact the stricter rules by midnight Thursday.
At 12.9%, ICU bed availability in the Bay Area is still better than in Southern California (0.5%), the San Joaquin Valley (0%) and greater Sacramento (14.1%). The only region that will not be under stay-at-home orders as of Friday will be rural Northern California, where just 1.7% of the state’s approximately 40m people live, according to the state’s health department.
The remaining 39.4m Californians are barred from holding private gatherings of any size and required to wear a mask. Almost all of California is also under a curfew requiring residents to stay home between 10pm and 5am.4.04pm EST16:04
A major winter storm heading for the eastern seaboard could delay shipments of the coronavirus vaccine, Alexandra Villarreal reports for the Guardian US:
Treacherous weather could bury parts of the eastern US in snow, ice or flooding and cause power outages, hazardous travel conditions, or even tornadoes on Wednesday and Thursday, according to the National Weather Service, threatening all forms of transportation being used by the vaccine manufacturing facilities, centered in Michigan, as they fly and truck vials around the country.
It is set to be a record storm for December. Meanwhile the first Covid-19 vaccinations got underway at nursing homes, where the virus has killed more than 110,000 people in the US. Elderly and infirm people in long-term care have been among the most vulnerable and residents in nursing homes in Florida and Virginia have been among the first people being inoculated in the US this week.Read the full report here:
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An investigation into allegations that managers at a Tyson Foods pork processing plant in Waterloo, Iowa, placed bets on how many of their workers would contract Covid-19 “found sufficient evidence” to fire seven managers on Wednesday, the Des Moines Register reports.
The allegations of the betting pool emerged in a wrongful death lawsuit filed in November by the family of Isidro Fernandez, a Tyson Foods employee who died in April after contracting the coronavirus.
More than 1,000 workers out of about 2,800 tested positive for Covid-19 before the plant closed down in early May to implement new safety measures. At least six employees died during the pandemic.
Tyson Foods enlisted the former US attorney general Eric Holder to investigate the allegations of a “cash buy-in, winner-take-all betting pool” among managers and supervisors.
“We can tell you that Mr Holder and his team looked specifically at the gaming allegations and found sufficient evidence for us to terminate those involved,” a company spokesman, Gary Mickelson, told the Des Moines Register.Sarah Beckman
(@SarahBeckman3)
INBOX: @TysonFoods fires 7 plant management employees at its Waterloo location after an investigation of claims they bet on how many employees would test positive for #Covid_19. Full statement here: pic.twitter.com/meOf3geqheDecember 16, 2020
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Hello everyone, this is Julia Carrie Wong in Oakland, California, picking up the liveblog for the next few hours.
A bit of catharsis for the end of the year: the mayor of Atlantic City plans to auction off the chance to blow up the former Trump Plaza casino as a fundraiser for the local Boys & Girls Club, the AP reports.
The former casino opened in 1984 and closed in 2014, one of three casinos that Donald Trump owned in the New Jersey resort town, alongside the Taj Mahal and the Trump Marina. The building has stood vacant for years and become a public safety hazard. It is slated for implosion on 29 January.
“Some of Atlantic City’s iconic moments happened there, but on his way out, Donald Trump openly mocked Atlantic City, saying he made a lot of money and then got out,” mayor Marty Small told the AP. “I wanted to use the demolition of this place to raise money for charity.”
Details of the auction will be announced at a press conference tomorrow, according to the Press of Atlantic City. If you have $1m and a burning desire to press a button and make something that used to belong to Trump go boom, you can tune in here at 11am EST Thursday.Press of AC
(@ThePressofAC)
Want to press the button and implode Trump Plaza? Atlantic City may offer that chance https://t.co/Zaw9kIhzFXDecember 16, 2020
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at 3.37pm EST3.04pm EST15:04
A top Trump appointee in the health and human services department urged top health officials in July to take on a “herd immunity” approach to combating the Covid-19 pandemic, saying in emails describing young Americans: “we want them infected.
Paul Alexander, a former aide to the health department official Michael Caputo and a known “herd immunity” advocate, wrote in an email to Caputo that “there is no other way, we need to establish herd, and it only comes about allowing the non-high risk groups expose themselves to the virus. PERIOD.”
The emails were released as part of a House investigation, led by Democratic Representative James Clyburn, into the White House’s attempts to interfere with the work of career scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Infant, kids, teens, young people, young adults, middle aged with no conditions, etc have zero to little risk … so we use them to develop herd … we want them infected,” Alexander wrote in an email.
Politico reported that Alexander had the support of the White House when making his recommendations, though Trump officials have denied that they wanted to embrace the herd immunity strategy.Updated
at 3.11pm EST2.42pm EST14:42
Texas AG files antitrust lawsuit against Google
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton just announced his office is filing an antitrust lawsuit against Google for its “anti-competitive conduct, exclusionary practices and deceptive misrepresentation” around advertising, Paxton said in a video announcing the lawsuit.
Texas Attorney General
(@TXAG)
#BREAKING: Texas takes the lead once more! Today, we’re filing a lawsuit against #Google for anticompetitive conduct.This internet Goliath used its power to manipulate the market, destroy competition, and harm YOU, the consumer. Stay tuned… pic.twitter.com/fdEVEWQb0eDecember 16, 2020
“Google repeatedly used its monopolistic power to control pricing, engage in market collusions to rig options in a tremendous violation of justice,” he said. “These actions harm every person in America.”
Paxton said other states have joined the lawsuit, though it is unclear how many states have joined.
The Texas attorney general is just coming off of the lawsuit he filed against four states, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, for allegedly mishandling the election, an 11th-hour, baseless attempt to help Donald Trump keep the White House after his loss to Joe Biden. The Supreme Court quickly threw out the lawsuit last week.Updated
at 2.51pm EST2.23pm EST14:23
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi released a statement this afternoon affirming her support in Joe Biden selecting US Representative Deb Haaland of New Mexico to lead the Interior Department.
Previous reports have said Pelosi and her second-in-command, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, warned the Biden-Harris team against picking another sitting Congressional Democrat as Haaland was rumored to be Biden’s top pick for interior secretary.
“Congresswoman Deb Haaland is one of the most respected and one of the best Members of Congress I have served with,” Pelosi said in a statement. “Congresswoman Haaland knows the territory, and if she is the President-elect’s choice for Interior Secretary, then he will have made an excellent choice.Heather Caygle
(@heatherscope)
Here’s full statement: pic.twitter.com/9yYegtabPyDecember 16, 2020
Haaland, who is a member of the Laguna Pueblo people, was one of the first two Native American women elected to Congress, along with Sharice Davids, who was also elected in 2018. The interior department is responsible for preserving federal lands and resources and is home to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which works with the country’s recognized Native American tribes.
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at 2.24pm EST1.59pm EST13:59
A top Trump appointee repeatedly urged top health officials to adopt a “herd immunity” approach to Covid-19 and allow millions of Americans to be infected by the virus, according to a new report by Politico today, which cited internal emails obtained by the House Oversight committee and shared with the news outlet.
Politico reports that:“There is no other way, we need to establish herd, and it only comes about allowing the non-high risk groups expose themselves to the virus. PERIOD,” then-science adviser Paul Alexander wrote on July 4 to his boss, Health and Human Services assistant secretary for public affairs Michael Caputo, and six other senior officials.
“Infants, kids, teens, young people, young adults, middle aged with no conditions etc. have zero to little risk….so we use them to develop herd…we want them infected…” Alexander added.
“[I]t may be that it will be best if we open up and flood the zone and let the kids and young folk get infected” in order to get “natural immunity…natural exposure,” Alexander wrote on July 24 to Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn, Caputo and eight other senior officials. Caputo subsequently asked Alexander to research the idea, according to emails obtained by the House Oversight Committee’s select subcommittee on coronavirus.
Senior Trump officials have repeatedly denied that herd immunity — a concept advocated by some conservatives as a tactic to control Covid-19 by deliberately exposing less vulnerable populations in hopes of re-opening the economy — was under consideration or shaped the White House’s approach to the pandemic. “Herd immunity is not the strategy of the U.S. government with regard to coronavirus,” HHS Secretary Alex Azar testified in a House Oversight hearing on October 2.
In his emails, Alexander also spent months attacking government scientists and pushing to shape official statements to be more favorable to Donald Trump.You can read more here.
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Early afternoon summary
It’s been a lively morning in US political news as we await agreement on a deal for a new round of coronavirus economic relief legislation on Capitol Hill. Stay tuned!
Here’s what’s occurred so far today:
Joe Biden said it seems coronavirus stimulus negotiators are “very, very close” to reaching a deal and that the new coronavirus economic relief package looks “encouraging”. He added that the bill would be a “down payment” to “what’s going to have to be done” when he enters office in January.
Biden and his vice-president elect, Kamala Harris, presented Pete Buttigieg as the incoming administration’s nominee to become transportation secretary. Biden described Buttigieg, who ran for the party nomination eventually won by Biden, was a policy wonk with a big heart and would be the first openly-gay cabinet member in US history to be confirmed (assuming that happens) by the Senate.
Outgoing secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, is in quarantine after coming into contact with someone who tested positive for coronavirus. Pompeo’s most recent test showed he was negative for Covid-19.
After months of roller coaster negotiations, it looks as though a new, compromise coronavirus economic relief bill is close to agreement on Capitol Hill.1.11pm EST13:11
Kamala Harris urges faith in coronavirus vaccine
Kamala Harris, the Democratic Senator from California and now US vice-president elect, earlier today urged Americans to wear masks and take the coronavirus vaccine when it becomes available to them.
In more from her interview with ABC’s Good Morning America, Harris also spoke about one of Joe Biden’s earliest statements as the transition from the Trump administration to the Biden administration began, that he would ask all Americans to wear a face mask for the first 100 days of the Biden-Harris White House.
“The hundred days of the mask, he is urging, like, there is no punishment, they don’t have to, but he is saying as a leader, ‘please everybody, work with me here, for the first 100 days, let’s everybody wear a mask’ and see the outcomes there,” Harris said.
She added: “Because of course the scientists and the public health officials tell us there will be really great outcomes if people wear a mask when they’re in public.” More - in US Politics
'Truth and healing’: Jamaal Bowman's prescription to overcome vaccine skepticism in Black America
An emerging leader of the progressive wing of the Democratic party has argued that politicians must act as role models as part of a concerted effort to combat skepticism of the Covid-19 vaccine, particularly among some Black Americans.Congressman-elect Jamaal Bowman, the progressive New York Democrat who defeated longtime incumbent congressman and outgoing House foreign affairs committee chairman Eliot Engel, voiced his concerns in a short but expansive interview with the Guardian. Those concerns coincide with reports of suspicion in the Black community over taking coronavirus vaccines when available.“It’s a major concern, it’s very real, and it communicates the lack of trust that African Americans feel towards American institutions over all,” Bowman said.On Friday, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave emergency approval for a vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech to be rolled out across the country. The first Covid-19 vaccinations were administered to American health workers this week. The first person to receive the shot outside clinical trials was intensive care nurse Sandra Lindsay, a black woman who said she hoped she would help “inspire people who look like me, who are skeptical in general about taking vaccines”.Since his surprise victory over Engel in the primary for New York’s 16th congressional district, Bowman has emerged as a politically ideological colleague of congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and other young progressive members of the Democratic caucus in the House of Representatives.There hasn’t been the truth, the reconciliation, the healing that needs to take place to deal with our history and legacy of racism“There’s no trust because there hasn’t been the truth, the reconciliation, the healing that needs to take place to deal with our history and legacy of racism and how it continues to persist,” Bowman said of vaccine hesitancy in the Black community. “If we went through a process of truth, healing and restitution we’d begin to bridge the gap between the harms that happened in our communities and that continue to happen and the trust that is needed. So no, it’s very real.”Asked if there was some kind of surrogate who could maybe alleviate that skepticism – Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris perhaps or former president Barack Obama – Bowman said “all of the above”.“Well it’s not just Kamala Harris, it’s Jamaal Bowman, it’s [congresswoman] Ayanna Pressley, it’s [congresswoman-elect] Cori Bush, it’s president-elect Joe Biden,” Bowman said. “It’s all of the above. But again we have to understand that this lack of trust is generationally embedded because Black people continue to get the short end of the stick when it comes to being uninsured and underinsured.”The heightened expression of concern by Bowman underscores the difficulty various US political leaders see in distributing a vaccine and vanquishing the virus, as other countries have already done or are in the process of.Bowman, for much of his time as a congressman-elect, has been talking about his plans for tackling inequality and systemic racism in the country. He is a supporter of the “defund the police” movement, and has openly called out former president Barack Obama on his analysis of the electoral liabilities of supporting the proposals.Advocates for the “defund the police” movement have argued broadly that there needs to be a serious reallocation of money and resources to police forces. But conservative critics have used the proposals’ name to mislead voters to think advocates literally want to take all funding away from police forces, which has led some moderate Democrats to distance themselves from the slogan.Obama, in an interview with Snapchat’s Peter Hamby, said: “If you believe, as I do, that we should be able to reform the criminal justice system so that it’s not biased and treats everybody fairly, I guess you can use a snappy slogan like ‘Defund The Police,’ but, you know, you lost a big audience the minute you say it, which makes it a lot less likely that you’re actually going to get the changes you want done.”Similarly, earlier this month in a meeting with civil rights leaders, echoed Obama’s criticizing, blaming the Defund the Police slogan for Democratic down ballot losses.In a rare move for a soon-to-be congressman of the same party as the popular Obama, Bowman sent out a fundraising email saying he was “disappointed” in the 44th president’s comments.“The problem isn’t America’s discomfort with snappy slogans. The real problem is America’s comfort with Black death,” Bowman wrote in the fundraising email. Similarly, he said that even referring to it as something other than “Defund the Police” is wrongheaded.I don’t hear the real conversation around why the hell doesn’t America feel uncomfortable with Black death“Well that’s the problem right? We are always acquiescing to the center, to right, and to Republicans on what we should say and how we should say it. My problem is white comfort with Black death,” Bowman said. “I am personally tired of white comfort with black death. So when I hear president-elect Biden say that, when I hear [congressman] Connor Lamb say that I don’t – even former president Obama – I don’t hear the real conversation around why the hell doesn’t America feel uncomfortable with Black death.”Bowman has been more active in shaping his place on Capitol Hill than most Democratic congressional nominees or congressmen-elect. Bowman’s district leans so heavily Democratic that whoever wins the primary is the all but certain favorite to win the general election. After he won the primary Bowman endorsed and sent out fundraising emails for like-minded candidates around the country.Bowman has already been thinking about where he would like to have a legislative impact. He’s hoping to get a spot on the House education and labor committee and a spot on the House committee on transportation and infrastructure. He has aligned himself with Ocasio-Cortez and is likely to be an addition to the set of young firebrand progressive lawmakers nicknamed “The Squad”.Ocasio-Cortez, the most famous member of the Squad, recently said she didn’t see an overarching vision in the series of cabinet appointments Biden has made so far. Bowman concurred.“Well I think president-elect Biden’s goal is diversity and I see some racial diversity. I see some gender diversity. I see some ideological diversity and I think president-elect Biden will lead to the best answers and the best solutions for our country,” Bowman said, going on to directly address Ocasio-Cortez’s remarks. “I don’t fully disagree with that.” More
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Trump Didn’t Break Our Democracy. But Did He Fatally Weaken It?
AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyTrump Didn’t Break Our Democracy. But Did He Fatally Weaken It?The election provides a clear example of resilience to authoritarian pressure. But it doesn’t mean our democracy is unbreakable.Susan D. Hyde and Dr. Hyde is a political scientist at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Saunders is a political scientist in the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown.Dec. 15, 2020, 7:04 p.m. ETCredit…Doug Mills/The New York TimesAfter the Electoral College vote on Monday affirming his election, Joe Biden declared that “nothing, not even a pandemic or an abuse of power, can extinguish” the “flame of democracy.” Mr. Biden’s speech and the vote capped a series of victories for democratic institutions, including the Supreme Court’s dismissal of a Texas lawsuit that sought to overturn the election results — just the latest turn in the extended refusal of President Trump and his Republican enablers to accept the outcome.Political scientists like us are trying to assess the damage from Mr. Trump’s baseless, inept and ultimately doomed attacks on democracy. Do the sharp rebukes from our courts and other institutions mean that democracy “survived,” and we can simply move on? Or does all the talk about what “saved” American democracy really show that it’s in deep trouble?After all, that Texas lawsuit had the public support of more than half of the Republican House members. And it looks like even Vladimir Putin beat Mitch McConnell to congratulate Mr. Biden.The problem is we’ve been treating Mr. Trump’s attacks on democracy as if they are a pass-fail test. We should instead think of democracy as both damaged and resilient, like a forest after a powerful windstorm.In our research, we argue that though all democracies are imperfect, one of their central virtues is that they are built to be resilient — to bend without breaking, even when elected leaders pull institutions in an authoritarian direction. But just because they’re more flexible doesn’t mean democracies can’t break. Resilience — the ability to adapt and keep functioning under strain — is a resource that needs replenishing, not a guarantee of safe passage.It’s normal for institutions to face challenges from events or from politicians who try to use them for their own purposes. When institutions survive a stress test, they may come out stronger or weaker. Ambiguous laws can be clarified to withstand abuse; regulations can be updated; and public officials gain experience in how to prevent or defend against future tests. But it can take time for the strengthening to occur.The 2020 election provides a clear example of democratic resilience to authoritarian pressure. Election officials and judges fielding legal challenges had to adapt not only to the enormous logistical challenges of the pandemic but also to Mr. Trump’s rhetoric. His attacks — and those from elected officials in his party and from the conservative media — put additional pressure on election officials and poll workers, who faced threats, intimidation efforts and overt pressure to ignore the will of the voters.Yet in most of the more than 10,000 electoral jurisdictions across the country, voters cast ballots without incident and Election Day was peaceful. International election observers praised the election as orderly and organized.Both democracy optimists and pessimists can draw the conclusions they want to see from this example. Optimists can say that our election system faced the 2020 test admirably, and those who run it will be better prepared for future efforts to undermine their work. Pessimists can say that Mr. Trump’s attacks will leave lasting scars. Next time, election officials might give in to political pressure. Or the damage might be invisible, like a tree’s weakened root system, deterring people from running for office or working at the polls.Right now, there’s no way to know if the damage will be permanent. But we do know that democracies are better able to recover from such assaults because they allow for routine, peaceful replacement of leaders or parties. Dictators are more likely to be replaced through rebellion, military coup or civil war than through constitutional processes like elections and impeachment.This is what democracy optimists get right. Mr. Trump’s abuse of foreign policy got him impeached. His spectacular failure to govern during a pandemic got him voted out of office.But eventually, if stretched too far, democratic institutions will reach a limit. There may not be a dramatic break, like a coup, but democracy will be twisted and warped and cannot return to its original shape.Take the example of Nicaragua. President Daniel Ortega, after losing several elections, conspired to change the voting rules such that he was able to win the presidency in 2006 with just 38 percent of the vote. He has since moved Nicaragua further toward authoritarianism.Here at home, Mr. Trump’s refusal to accept his defeat is his most blatant threat to democracy. He has generated worrisome precedents and undermined shared assumptions about what happens after an incumbent loses. His bizarre legal strategy has failed, but he has turned the base of the Republican Party and many congressional Republicans against valuing democracy for its own sake. And those values are the ultimate source of democratic resilience.But has Mr. Trump stretched democratic institutions beyond recognition, or, provided that they survive their near-term vulnerability, could U.S. democratic institutions grow back stronger?There are already many reform proposals that could help rebuild democratic resilience. Many are focused on what can be reformed: institutions and the rules that govern them. For example, the nonpartisan Election Reformers Network’s proposal to reduce conflicts of interest among secretaries of state, based on successful models in other countries, and other proposals to rectify Mr. Trump’s attacks on checks and balances across the government.But a healthy, resilient democracy also requires sufficient citizen support for democracy across the political spectrum. And that, in turn, depends on both parties embracing a commitment to democratic principles — a tall order given the Republican Party’s recent behavior.The trouble for those wanting to put this period behind them is that it’s hard to assess whether the damage is lasting until it’s too late. Our democracy has survived for now, but we don’t yet know whether some crucial democratic institutions bent so far that faced with the next test, they’ll break.Susan D. Hyde (@dshyde) is a professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley. Elizabeth N. Saunders (@ProfSaunders) is an associate professor in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More
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Defying Trump, McConnell Seeks to Squelch Bid to Overturn the Election
#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionliveLatest UpdatesElectoral College ResultsBiden’s CabinetDefense SecretaryAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyDefying Trump, McConnell Seeks to Squelch Bid to Overturn the ElectionSenator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, congratulated President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. and pleaded with Republicans privately not to join an effort by House members to throw out the results.“The Electoral College has spoken. So today, I want to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden,” Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, said on Tuesday.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesDec. 15, 2020, 6:13 p.m. ETBreaking with President Trump’s drive to overturn his election loss, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky on Tuesday congratulated President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. on his victory and began a campaign to keep fellow Republicans from joining a doomed last-ditch effort to reverse the outcome in Congress.Although Mr. McConnell waited until weeks after Mr. Biden was declared the winner to recognize the outcome, his actions were a clear bid by the majority leader, who is the most powerful Republican in Congress, to put an end to his party’s attempts to sow doubt about the election.He was also trying to stave off a messy partisan spectacle on the floor of the House that could divide Republicans at the start of the new Congress, forcing them to choose between showing loyalty to Mr. Trump and protecting the sanctity of the electoral process.“Many of us hoped that the presidential election would yield a different result, but our system of government has processes to determine who will be sworn in on Jan. 20,” Mr. McConnell said in a speech on the Senate floor. “The Electoral College has spoken. So today, I want to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden.”A short time later, on a private call with Senate Republicans, Mr. McConnell and his top deputies pleaded with their colleagues not to join members of the House in objecting to the election results on Jan. 6, when Congress meets to ratify the Electoral College’s decision, according to three people familiar with the conversation, who described it on the condition of anonymity.A small group of House members, led by Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama, plans to use a constitutional process to object to the inclusion of five key battleground states that day. There is almost no chance they will succeed. But if they could persuade at least one senator to join them, they could force a vote on the matter, transforming a typically perfunctory session into a bitter last stand for Mr. Trump.So far, no senator has committed to joining them. In seeking to prevent anyone from doing so, Mr. McConnell argued that a challenge would force senators to go on the record either defying Mr. Trump or rejecting the will of the voters, potentially harming those running for election in 2022. He dispatched his top deputy, Senator John Thune of South Dakota, to lobby lawmakers one by one.The remarks were a decisive shift for Mr. McConnell. They came only after members of his leadership team in the Senate — and even the chamber’s chaplain — began softening the ground by congratulating Mr. Biden on Monday evening and Tuesday morning.Though he never repeated them, Mr. McConnell had allowed Mr. Trump’s false allegations of election fraud and fantastical claims that he had been the true winner to circulate unchecked for more than a month, defending the president’s right to challenge the election outcome in court. Allies insisted privately that he would ultimately honor the results, but did not want to stoke a year-end conflict that could hurt the party’s chances in two Georgia Senate runoffs and imperil must-pass legislation.That calculus changed late Monday, after electors across the country cast their ballots for Mr. Biden, cementing his 306 to 232 Electoral College victory. By Tuesday morning, Mr. McConnell and his leadership team were openly acknowledging the results and creating the political space for other Republicans to begin belatedly recognizing Mr. Biden as the winner.The Senate leader also spoke by phone with Mr. Biden, apparently for the first time since his former Senate colleague won the presidency more than five weeks ago.“I called to thank him for the congratulations, told him although we disagree on a lot of things, there’s things we can work together on,” Mr. Biden told reporters, adding that it was a “good conversation.”Mr. Biden won the Electoral College vote on Monday.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York TimesIn normal times, such a call would have drawn little notice. But Mr. Trump’s push to deny his loss has created a charged political moment for Republicans, spotlighting rifts within the party and placing Mr. McConnell in a particularly dicey position.Polls suggest a clear majority of Republicans believe Mr. Trump’s fabrication that the election was fraudulent, and they are likely to follow the president’s words, not those of Mr. McConnell. Meanwhile, many of the president’s allies in the House continue to support his challenges to the results, with more than 60 percent of them signing on last week to a legal brief endorsing the failed effort by Texas to overturn results in key battleground states. The House’s top leaders were mostly silent on the question on Tuesday, and their aides did not respond to questions about Mr. Biden’s victory.Mr. Trump himself showed no signs of backing down, repeating his false allegations on Twitter just after Mr. McConnell spoke: “tremendous evidence pouring in on voter fraud.” Mr. Trump also shared a news article about Mr. Brooks’s efforts, raising the possibility that he could begin pressuring members of the party to join in, stoking an even bigger fight in the weeks ahead.Moving to head off potential backlash, Mr. McConnell told reporters pressing him to rebuke Mr. Trump’s rhetoric that he did not have “any advice” for Mr. Trump. Earlier in the day before congratulating Mr. Biden, he had used his speech on the Senate floor to lavish praise on the president’s record on foreign and domestic policy.The Presidential TransitionLatest UpdatesUpdated Dec. 15, 2020, 6:45 p.m. ETBiden will name Gina McCarthy as the White House’s climate coordinator.Dominion’s C.E.O. defends his firm’s voting machines to Michigan lawmakers, denouncing a ‘reckless disinformation campaign.’Biden will nominate Jennifer Granholm for energy secretary.The blowback was immediate from the party’s outspoken right flank anyway and foreshadowed the return to an old dynamic briefly abated during the Trump years in which Mr. McConnell was a favorite punching bag for conservatives. Mark Levin, the talk radio host and strident supporter of Mr. Tump, declared that Mr. McConnell had been “AWOL” from “challenging the lawless acts of the Biden campaign and Democrats.”“Trump helped you secure your seat, as he did so many Senate and House seats, and you couldn’t even wait until January 6th,” Mr. Levin wrote on Twitter. “You’ve been the GOP ‘leader’ in the Senate for far too long. It’s time for some fresh thinking and new blood.”Nor did Mr. McConnell earn much love from the few voices of Republican dissent that have raised alarms in recent days that Mr. Trump’s defiance of democratic norms — and the acquiescence of much of his party — would do lasting damage both to the G.O.P. and to the country.One of them, Representative Paul Mitchell of Michigan, who is retiring, went as far as to quit the party on Monday in protest. Another, Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, said on Tuesday that merely recognizing Mr. Biden’s victory was not enough for his party.“How many Republicans will say that what the president is saying is simply wrong and dangerous?” Mr. Romney said on CNN. “We need to have people who are strong Trump supporters say that as well, or you are going to continue to have this country divided, which is pretty dangerous.”Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma, a senior Republican committee leader and former head of the party’s campaign arm, argued that fears like Mr. Romney’s were somewhat overwrought, but reflected a general loss of trust by many Americans in the electoral process.“We need to accept our institutions. They worked in 2016,” Mr. Cole said in an interview. “They worked again in 2020.”Elected officials, he said, need to “be honest with your voters.”“You have to recognize when you are not successful, and you move on and accept the election results,” he said. “The American people, I hope, will do that.”In the Senate, at least, that view appeared to be gaining currency.In a statement, Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah and a defender of the president, said that “absent new information that could give rise to a judicial or legislative determination altering the impact of today’s Electoral College votes, Joe Biden will become president of the United States.” An aide said he had no plans to join Mr. Brooks in challenging the results.Another leading contender for that task, Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, seemingly threw cold water on the idea as well. Though Mr. Johnson plans to convene a hearing on Wednesday to give Mr. Trump’s specious arguments of voting fraud an airing in Congress, he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he thought the outcome was legitimate and he did not plan to object to the Electoral College results.Still, other possible contenders remained. One was Tommy Tuberville, the newly elected Alabama Republican. Another possible candidate, those watching the process said, was Senator Kelly Loeffler of Georgia, one of the two Republicans competing in January runoffs that will determine which party controls the Senate next year. Those races will play out the day before the joint session to ratify the presidential election results convenes in Washington.Ms. Loeffler’s office did not respond to a question about Mr. Biden on Tuesday, but on Twitter, she suggested she was not ready to accept the result.“I will never stop fighting for @realDonaldTrump because he has never stopped fighting for us!” she wrote.Luke Broadwater More
