In the final days of his desperate, dishonest campaign to upend last month’s election, President Donald Trump tossed off a particularly audacious and offensive challenge aimed at those he somehow thinks can change the outcome.
“Let’s see if they have the courage to do what everybody in this country knows is right,”
he said.
With time running out, his blatant hope was to intimidate and bait state legislatures or the Supreme Court into overturning a vote of the people, by legislative or judicial fiat.
Trump’s perverse definition of “courage” and “right,” of course, amounts to a willingness to bend truth to his will and prize his continuation in office over American democracy.
Yet against this madness, we have witnessed many acts of genuine courage. Of people of both parties bravely doing right.
The uphill road that awaits Donald Trump
Secretaries of state and election authorities in the contested states, Republicans and Democrats, have weathered death threats and vows of political retribution simply for doing their jobs and counting, recounting and certifying the vote. They have shown enormous courage and deserve our gratitude and respect.
Thousands of everyday Americans worked around the clock – in the midst of a pandemic and sometimes with the din of howling mobs in the background – to count and recount the votes. These patriotic Americans showed inspiring courage.
So, too, did the governors who loyally campaigned for Trump but refused to bow to his threats and intimidation after the election.
Yes, they were simply doing what the law required and democracy demands by certifying the vote in their states. But these officials acted knowing that in the hothouse of Trump’s Republican Party, doing their duty now could cost them their jobs in primaries later.
Dozens of judges – some appointed by Trump – have summarily dismissed his ferocious, groundless assault on the election results. They have shown gratifying fidelity to the law.
Trump has made clear from the very start of his presidency that he believed that every branch, every person in government, should be beholden to him before the law and their oaths of office.
