I served as a Santa Cruz County Supervisor for twenty years, from 1975 to 1995, and with my background as a locally-elected official it is obviously no surprise that I have always liked the claim by
Tip O'Neill that "
all politics is local." I not only like that claim, I actually believe that O'Neill was right, and that a lot of our contemporary anxiety about the state of democracy and self-government in the United States comes from the fact that so many of us are only focusing on politics at the "national" level, where an out of control president and an apparently brain dead Congress draw everyone's attention.
Considering my commitment to "progressive" politics, it might surprise some to learn that I am a big fan of "states rights," too. Within the context of our national politics, "state" level political power is how that "all politics is local" phrase gets played out in real life, and how autocratic federal overreach is stymied. The Constitution explicitly sets up the states as independent political powers, capable of resisting any incipient autocracy. We're watching that in live action, and so far the independence of our state level governments has been a bulwark against claims of federal autocracy.
Below, I am providing you with the complete text of an up to the date commentary by
David Remnick, the editor of
The New Yorker. It's pretty short, and I commend it to you. Remnick is alerting readers to the fact that our current president is claiming that the federal government should be in charge of our elections. That is directly contrary to what the Constitution calls for, but no surprise, right? This is the president who has declared that what "
he alone" thinks, and wants, is all that matters.
At the local level (and at the state level, with reference to national politics), it is easier for an individual, or a small group, to have an impact, and make difference in what the government decides to do, and then actually does. When individuals and small groups contemplate governmental and political decision-making at the national level, what happens is that citizens most frequently turn into "observers" of what the government is doing to them (or "for them," as those with national power would obviously prefer to say).
A government "by the people," means that you and I actually decide what the government does. We are "actors," not just "observers." Acting "locally," and at the state level, we the people need to be vigilant, and ensure that our democratic control over the elections that determine what happens, governmentally, is not hijacked by claims that the "national" government should be the government that decides how our elections are run.
oooOOOooo
David Remnick
Donald Trump has made no secret of his desire to assert federal control over elections. From the beginning of his second term, he has issued executive orders attempting to restrict voter registration, impose new regulations on voting machines, and limit voting by mail. (Most of these have been blocked by the courts.) And attempts to seize power over voting have come from every corner of the executive branch: an F.B.I. raid of election offices in Georgia in January, mounting lawsuits against states by the Justice Department, and warnings that armed ICE agents may be sent to the polls this fall.
How big a threat is Trump to the midterms? In this week’s issue, Barton Gellman, whose writing ahead of the 2020 election anticipated key maneuvers that Trump and his allies would pursue to try to overturn that result,
reports on what might happen this year. First, the good news: there is little evidence of a master plan. As a former senior trial attorney in the D.O.J.’s voting section tells Gellman, there has been “no coherent strategy” from the Administration to upend the midterms. “There’s malevolence, but there’s a lot of incompetence,” he added, noting the near legal wipeout that Trump’s lawyers have experienced in courtrooms across the country. “They don’t have a single success.
Gellman writes that even Trump’s marginal influence on voting could have an impact on close races this year. And he reports on the scenarios that some local election officials have been preparing for—all centered on the fear “that the President could do something new and outlandishly lawless on or close to Election Day.” Here’s just one nightmarish, if unlikely, hypothetical: suppose that the F.B.I. shows up at a polling place and seizes ballots or voting machines, citing some suspected irregularity, and breaks the chain of custody and leaves actual results in doubt. But that would take getting a warrant from a judge—as one expert puts it, “extremely unlikely yet disastrous if it happens.”
Much of the hope for the nation’s election integrity this cycle rests on local officials, including Republicans, who have stood up to immense pressure from Trump, and even faced death threats from strangers. Gellman profiles the lieutenant governor of Utah, Deidre Henderson, who is tasked with running the state’s elections, and has fought a lonely, and boldly public, battle for the rule of law. “It sure looks like they’re trying to take over control of elections to make sure only people they want to vote are voting,” Henderson tells Gellman, about the Administration’s actions. “To me, as an American and a Republican, it’s offensive" (emphasis added).
https://links.newyorker.com/e/evib?_t=9a84f632c984499f97f4fb666cbf1db1&_m=638fa25436b74b94b2879a52d21749a0&_e=eYPQwn-SriV4PtJjJouCGyzSOxrSRXsfCeSqDpJ91ZFM5lOua0I8f2nsuIaVSLVRHNofrYU86Z8UVsTF0VELVQ%3D%3D
