Today, in theory, will conclude the 2024 presidential election, one of the most bizarre in American political history. From inner-party coups to assassination attempts, Kamala’s Brat summer social media trend to Trump’s courting of comedian podcasts, the campaign cycle has been saturated with the unconventional. It has, of course, also seen its expected share of shallow, political, rhetorical rhetoric and general economic illiteracy, which are the cornerstones of modern democracy.
The general superficial nature of mainstream political discourse, though, should not distract us from recognizing foundational truths about the state of modern American politics. No matter the outcome, the legitimacy of American democracy is broken.
In 2020, this was in full display, as was the response from Donald Trump and his supporters. Fueled by the unprecedented changes to the election under the shadow of covid, President Trump refused to concede the election. Polls showed the majority of his supporters agreed with him, and from that seed of distrust grew renewed concerns over illegal voters, manipulable voting machines, and rising awareness over the security of vote-by-mail ballots. To this day, large portions of the country continue to believe the Biden administration was illegitimate.
How would Democrats have reacted in the face of a similarly close race resulting in a Trump victory last election? While the counterfactual is impossible to consider in practice, hints were already publicly available before election day 2020. In Biden campaign war games, John Podesta, a long-time Democrat operative, outlined a strategy quite similar to the one Trump embarked on. As reported at the time, this included Democrat-swing state governors being pressured into promoting friendly alternative electors to vote in the electoral college under the guise of reversing Republican “voter suppression” efforts. Unlike the Republican response in 2020, this appeal would have been strengthened by blue-state secession threats should Trump have been inaugurated.
Would Joe Biden have followed through with this strategy if this alternative timeline had played out? We will never know. Nor can we know the potential effectiveness of this strategy, though it is likely such efforts would have been treated quite differently than Trump’s response.
Still, as we look forward, what is clear here is that the willingness for either side to accept, without question, the basic machinery of American politics has broken down significantly. The centralization of power within Washington, which consistently elevates the stakes of national politics, coupled with significant ideological shifts (particularly on the left), and the perceived danger Trump represents to American political institutions, regardless of his demonstrated ability to follow through after 2016, has created a dynamic where the incentives to concede power for the alleged “national good” have all but broken down.
Each side is motivated by a spirit of self-preservation, not politics.
This explains the response from the professional political class to Trump’s election. The intelligence agencies immediately worked to undermine his credibility with the promotion of a false narrative of Trump-Russia collusion. Selected members of Trump’s team saw themselves caught up in investigations. Military and foreign policy leadership would deliberately conceal information and ignore orders handed down from the elected Commander-in-Chief.
The result is a unique era of political chaos and hysteria. But from this disruption of political norms becomes the exposure of the underlying unsustainability of the American regime.
Bipartisan recklessness on spending, amplified with covid-era fiscal insanity, has manifested itself in ways that political propaganda is proving increasingly difficult to conceal. America’s interest rate payments have passed a trillion dollars, becoming one of the major line items for any future budget. The Fed’s recent significant interest rate cut actually resulted in higher treasury yields, in large part due to growing concerns about America’s long-term fiscal viability.
Internationally, America’s explicit weaponization of money and banking has created new challenges as well. The Biden administration’s over-reliance on financial warfare towards Russia has elevated international interest in the BRICs and other non-US-controlled financial networks. The cracking of American global dominance will create additional stresses to traditional Washington foreign policy, particularly if a Harris-led administration doubles down on neoliberal and neoconservative figures in key strategic positions, such as her flirting with the idea of a Liz Cheney cabinet position.
These hard realities create new challenges beyond the traditional calculations of political will, and partisan legislative makeup is inevitable, no matter the election’s outcome.
The greater challenge to the regime will be domestic. A Trump victory will be a severe refutation of the regime’s reliable public opinion-molding institutions of the corporate press and traditional court intellectuals. A Kamala victory could represent the last gasp of these same forces, as public faith in the media and academia has slipped down to near Congressional-distrust.
Replacing traditional media outlets is the rise of podcasts, social media, and other alternative forms of communication, all of which have become key aspects of political campaigns. With this decentralization of news consumption comes greater polarization in national narratives, making it harder for the regime to construct its own preferred lines.
This further stresses any of the traditional means by which Washington has consolidated public support behind its leadership. Will Trump supporters accept the governance of an administration that has, over the course of the past four years, accused them of supporting a modern form of Nazism? Will Harris voters accept a president that they view as a domestic fascist threat?
We know the answer because we’ve seen the reality play out over the past eight years. Only those who reside in the isolated corridors of Washington or New York can still cling to the delusional fantasy that a defeat of Trump will return the Republican Party to the control of the Bushes and the Romneys.
If we accept that traditional Washington politics is mortally wounded, what can replace it? Covid provided a look at what extremely polarized state responses to a national crisis can look like. Hopefully growing distrust of the federal government will lead to more of these outcomes. Trump’s first term was dotted with significant pushback from blue states on a number of issues.
Who takes the White House is likely to have a significant impact on the federal response. Democrats have already signaled that their response to the fracturing political environment will likely be an escalation in censorship efforts on alternative platforms, particularly Elon Musk’s X. Similar attacks have already been ongoing with leftwing regimes in Europe and Brazil. Additionally, methods like the de-banking of opposing political interests, and various forms of legal persecution can be expected, based on the last two Democrat administrations.
No matter the specifics, it is likely a Harris victory will see escalation from DC in trying to tighten their control over fraying political trust.
The direction a Trump administration takes opens other possibilities. Trump has signaled increased willingness to marshal federal forces for matters such as immigration enforcement and political unrest. What is more interesting is whether or not a broader administrative strategy will be dedicated to pushing power away from the deep state and into the hands of state and local government, such as the campaign rhetoric over abolishing the Department of Education. Alternatively, there are some on the right who cling to the hope of transforming federal control into making the Washington bureaucracy an active tool for their own preferred brands of intervention.
That strategy will only fuel the very problems that have created the political environment that has allowed for populist politics to thrive.
In any case, the 2024 election will provide few solutions to the underlying pressures eroding American political norms. Regardless of the outcome, half the country will feel like they live under an occupational government. In doing so, the public is becoming more aware of the true nature of the state.
