By Al From
Next week, we will celebrate the 248th anniversary of American democracy.
Our decision on November 5 could very well determine whether we make it to 249 or 250.
The stakes in the 2024 presidential election are that high. This will be our most important election since the Civil War. Democracy will be on the ballot. That’s because former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, poses an existential threat to the future of American democracy. President Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has made the preservation of democracy the central cause of his campaign.
Trump has called for terminating the constitution, promised to be a dictator on day one, and vowed retribution against his political opponents.
A vibrant democracy must be a nation of laws, not of men. We’ve had unscrupulous politicians throughout our history. Still, until now, we’ve always been able to stop the rise of “cunning, ambitious, unprincipled men” who, George Washington warned in his farewell address, would “usurp for themselves the reins of government.”
Trump is the kind of man Washington warned us about. He has been convicted of 34 felonies by a jury of his peers. He has been found liable in a court of law for sexual assault and business fraud. He’s under federal indictment for leading an insurrection to overthrow the 2020 election, which he lost, and for stealing state secrets that compromise our national security.
For all of us who cherish our freedom and American democracy, regardless of political party or ideology, our first and only priority in the 2024 election must be to defeat Donald Trump. Trump’s lies-filled performance in last night’s debate did not change that imperative. It underscored it. In the words of former Representative Liz Cheney, we must ensure that “Trump never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office.”
It’s no secret that Trump and Biden are both very unpopular and that many anti-Trump voters do not like Biden. While they’d never vote for Trump, some, particularly after Biden’s underwhelming performance last night, may be tempted to vote for a third-party candidate or not vote at all. That’s dangerous. If they do, they’ll split or diminish the anti-Trump vote, and the result may very well be Trump’s re-election.
Despite last night’s debate, unless Joe Biden pulls a Lyndon Baines Johnson and pulls out of the presidential race, he will be the Democratic nominee. That means the only way to ensure Trump’s defeat is for every anti-Trump voter to vote for Joe Biden.
Here’s why.
Even a wounded Trump will be formidable in 2024. His electoral history tells us that when Trump is on the ballot, he will get his votes, come hell or high water. His supporters are rock-solid, and he draws them to the polls.
Anti-Trump voters are just as passionate, and fortunately, there are more of them than there are Trump supporters. As long as the anti-Trump voters are unified behind a single candidate, Trump can’t win. But their passion is against Trump, not for a particular opponent. If they satisfy their anti-Trump passion by voting for a third-party candidate or by staying home, the odds of Trump winning expand exponentially.
Like the last two elections, the 2024 election will be very close and likely decided by outcomes in five swing states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. In 2016, Trump won all five. In 2020, all five flipped to Biden.
In both years, the margins were razor-thin. In 2016, Trump’s margin of victory in three of those five states was less than one percentage point. In 2020, Biden also won three of the five by less than one percent. In both elections, Trump won the exact same 48.8 percent of the vote in the five swing states. In 2016, that was enough for him to win. In 2020 it was not.
Trump won in 2016 because just enough anti-Trumpers voted third party — three times as many as in 2020 — to put him over the top in the swing states.
We’re talking about a relative handful of votes making the difference. In 2020, if 45,000 anti-Trumpers who voted for Biden in Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin had voted third party or not voted, Trump would be sitting in the White House today. That’s 45,000 out of 158 million votes cast nationally — less than three one-hundredths of one percent of the national vote.
The bottom line is this: If you don’t want Trump to be elected president, you need to vote for Joe Biden. Voting third party or not voting are not options. The risk is too high.
If even a tiny percentage of the anti-Trump voters in the swing states vote third party or don’t vote, those states will likely flip back to Trump, he will win the presidency, and our democracy will be in danger. That is a risk anti-Trumpers cannot afford to take.
Al From is the founder of the Democratic Leadership Council and author of “The New Democrats and the Return to Power.” He joins his Republican commentator and friend, Craig Fuller, on the Spy’s From and Fuller video podcast every week.
