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In Joe Biden’s address to the nation last night, he ended with wording that is not generally heard from American presidents. Traditionally, he ended by thanking the American military and saying “God bless America.” But then he added: “… and God bless all those who guard our democracy.”
It reminded me of how close it came to American democracy collapsing this fall.
Biden’s speech was a resounding tribute to infantrymen in the American electoral process. The volunteers who worked at polling stations and counted the votes, the local bureaucrats who protected the electoral process, the state-level Republicans who opposed Trump’s attempt to jeopardize the vote count. Not least, he expressed his gratitude to the independent federal courts that repeatedly dismissed the baseless allegations of voter fraud by Trump and his lawyers.
Joe Biden delivered a speech after Monday’s Electoral College vote.
Photo: Roberto Schmidt / AFP
Biden is absolutely right that democracy survived this fall. But now it is moving slowly after the presidential elections. Trump has violated democratic norms that will take a long time to restore. An overwhelming majority of Republicans in Congress have backed Trump’s increasingly ridiculous proposals on voter fraud and legal battles against the election result since November.
In Biden’s address to the nation, he described Trump’s fight for a legitimate election result as an open war against democracy.
“We’ve never seen anything more extreme,” Biden said, noticeably upset.
Biden exclaimed the winner of the presidential elections already on November 7. Since then, Biden appears to have continued to win the presidential election on a daily basis, as Trump’s attempt to reverse the election outcome has been marked by one humiliating setback after another.
After Monday’s Electoral College vote, Joe Biden is now also formally the winner of the presidential election, although it is not until January that he is sworn in as president.
As expected, Biden eventually received 306 electoral votes. In Biden’s speech last night, he began by reminding Donald Trump that this was precisely the margin of victory that Trump himself described as a “landslide victory” four years ago. In this year’s election, Biden also won by a margin of just over seven million votes nationally. Biden’s 51.4 percent of the vote, compared to Trump’s 46.9 percent, is the biggest victory against a sitting president since 1932.
Still it doesn’t feel as a resounding victory for American democracy. Rather, the fall drama has become a reminder of how incredibly fragile many of America’s institutions of democracy are. If the election result had been a little more even and Trump’s lawyers had been a little more skilled, it is not certain that Biden’s victory would have been accepted.
– If we didn’t know before, we know now. What beats deep in every American heart is this: democracy. The right to have one’s voice heard. For your vote to be counted. In order to elect the leader of this country, Biden said in tonight’s speech.
But in Arizona, the formal electoral vote on Monday was forced to take place in a secret location because they received many threats of violence from supporters of Donald Trump. In Michigan, strong local politicians have been forced to hire bodyguards after armed Trump supporters surrounded their homes.
It is a reminder that far from all American hearts are beating for democracy.
