Rosenzweig: Donald Trump has assaulted our democracy

Note: this piece was originally published in USA Today, and was written by Checks & Balances member Paul Rosenzweig. 

Georgia has certified President Trump’s electoral loss. His Giuliani-led effort to overturn the results in Pennsylvania was rejected by a federal judge as an “unhinged” “Frankenstein monster.”  And in Michigan and Arizona, Trump’s efforts to overturn the election have met defeat, after defeat, after defeat. Yet the president’s efforts to forestall the inevitable continue almost unabated. As recently as this weekend he called on the courts and state legislatures to award him the victory he had not earned at the ballot box.

In many ways his actions have come to resemble little more than the petulant sulking of six-year old child, who hasn’t gotten his way. But more insidiously, the president’s acts reflect an ongoing effort to delegitimize Biden’s victory and, in the end, call into question the validity of our democratic system.

These efforts began earlier this year when concerned cybersecurity professionals identified something that they thought was a threat to the integrity of the soon-to-be-conducted Presidential election. It wasn’t an actual threat to the election systems themselves. Rather it was an effort to call into question the integrity of the election by creating a false narrative that election results were at risk. By telling the lie that our voting infrastructure was unsafe one could create the reality of distrust in the system — Americans would think the election was illegitimate even though it was safe and secure.

Continue reading at USA Today.