Yes, U.S. elections are rigged but not the way Trump means it

Republican presidential nominee and proto-fascist Donald Trump has been making headlines this week with assertions that the U.S. electoral process is “rigged” – even going so far as to claim that the only way he could possibly lose the battleground state of Pennsylvania to Hillary Clinton is if widespread cheating takes place there.

“The only way we can lose, in my opinion, I really mean this, Pennsylvania, is if cheating goes on. I really believe it,” he said last Friday during a rally in Altoona, Pa. “That’s the way we can lose the state, and we have to call up law enforcement and we have to have the sheriffs and the police chiefs and everybody watching.”

Now, Trump is recruiting so-called “election observers” to help monitor the vote across the country, launching a new page on his campaign’s website calling on supporters to “Help Me Stop Crooked Hillary From Rigging This Election!” Although details of the program are unclear, some are raising concerns about potential Election Day confrontations between voters and overzealous Trump backers – and pointing out the general absurdity of the type of election-rigging that Trump is hinting at.

In a piece for The Guardian, Jimmy Camp, a former Republican operative and a founding member of the Young Republican Federation of California, notes that rigging an election on the national level would require such a degree of coordination as to render it virtually impossible. To effectively swing a presidential election, this is what would the Clinton campaign would have to do, according to Camp:

• Bring on a national voter fraud coordinator. (Perhaps the Clinton Foundation could pay for the program?)
• Hire a statewide voter fraud coordinator that answered to the national voter fraud coordinator in Colorado, Florida, Iowa, North Carolina, Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
• Enlist a county voter fraud coordinator in each of the targeted states.

Each county coordinator in the targeted state would place ads on Craigslist recruiting supporters who were willing to commit a felony and vote multiple times.

While this sort of widespread coordination is virtually impossible to reach in order to impact a national election in a system as decentralized as the U.S. electoral process – described by one expert as “decentralized to the point of being dysfunctional” – there are in fact very serious concerns about the fairness of elections in the United States. These concerns, however, are likely not what Trump has in mind when he complains about a “rigged process.”

First of all, the most effective – and notorious – method of rigging electoral outcomes in the United States has nothing to do with presidential elections. The highly politicized process of congressional redistricting, which often leads to the controversial practice known as gerrymandering, is how the Republican and Democratic parties ensure that congressional districts are drawn in a way to protect incumbents and thwart genuine competition.

International election observers deployed by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe to monitor U.S. adherence to election-related commitments have long pointed to the prevalence of gerrymandered congressional districts as one of the major hindrances to holding democratic elections in the United States.

The OSCE’s final report on the 2010 midterm elections, for example, noted that due to gerrymandering, “There is a broad perception that a significant number of congressional districts are non-competitive as the outcome of the election could be predicted with a high degree of probability. In these mid-term elections, one senator and 27 candidates for members of the House were elected unopposed.”

The OSCE reiterated a recommendation contained in the final report on the 2006 midterm elections: “With a view to ensuring genuine electoral competition in congressional districts, consideration could be given to introducing procedures for drawing district boundaries that will be based on criteria other than voters’ voting histories and perceived future voting intentions.”

In a publication issued in 2013, the OSCE further criticized the American system of drawing congressional districts. “Electoral constituencies should be drawn in a manner that preserves equality among voters,” noted the OSCE, adding that “the manner in which constituencies are drawn should not circumvent the principle of equal suffrage.”

When it comes to presidential elections, there is also some concern over what could be called election-rigging, particularly by unfairly restricting ballot access and erecting unrealistic barriers to inclusion in televised debates, but this is not something that should concern Trump or Clinton.

While the two big parties are guaranteed ballot access in all 50 states, smaller parties must meet rigorous requirements to even be listed on the ballots, requirements that vary considerably from state to state. Democrats and Republicans also benefit from taxpayer subsidies in the form of public funds to hold party conventions and private primary elections, which in many cases exclude independents from voting.

There is also a massive funding advantage enjoyed by the Democrats and Republicans, who raised over a billion dollars each in the last presidential election. Compare that to just under a million dollars raised by the Green Party in 2012 and 2.5 million raised by the Libertarian Party.

Considering these disparities, the playing field is obviously tilted in this scenario and the deck stacked against upstart parties seeking to challenge the status quo of the two-party system.

Whether or not this should be considered a “rigged election,” this unfair process is likely a violation of the election commitments laid out in the OSCE Copenhagen Document, which the United States signed in 1990.

This agreement requires OSCE member states to hold “free elections that will be held at reasonable intervals by secret ballot or by equivalent free voting procedure, under conditions which ensure in practice the free expression of the opinion of the electors in the choice of their representatives.”

Further, OSCE countries must

respect the right of citizens to seek political or public office, individually or as representatives of political parties or organizations, without discrimination;

respect the right of individuals and groups to establish, in full freedom, their own political parties or other political organizations and provide such political parties and organizations with the necessary legal guarantees to enable them to compete  with each other on a basis of equal treatment before the law and by the authorities;

By hindering the ability of independent parties to compete, the U.S. is failing to live up to these international standards, which is particularly the case considering the lack of media access that “third parties” tend to receive.

To help their electoral chances and to help ensure that American voters are provided genuine choices in Election 2016, the two biggest third parties in the U.S. – the Libertarian Party and the Green Party – sued the Commission on Presidential Debates to permit their inclusion in debates against Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Although the case was dismissed by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, notably the court did not rule on the merits of the case but rather on the legal standing of the plaintiffs. According to the ruling, issued earlier this month:

The Libertarian and Green Parties and their political candidates sought, and failed to receive, invitations to privately-sponsored presidential debates in 2012. They now seek invitations to this year’s presidential debates, claiming that the rules that bar their participation violate antitrust law. However, because Plaintiffs have no standing and because antitrust laws govern commercial markets and not political activity, those claims fail as a matter of well-established law. Plaintiffs also allege violations of the First Amendment, but those claims must be dismissed because the First Amendment guarantees freedom from government infringement and Defendants here are private parties. Finally, Plaintiffs fail to allege facts that could support a claim for intentional interference with prospective business advantage.

Subsequently, the Green Party has launched a petition to “open the debates.”

The petition to the Commission on Presidential Debates reads, in part:

We, the undersigned, demand that the Presidential debates include all Presidential candidates who have qualified for enough state ballots to be a choice for a majority of voters.

Polls show that 50% of Americans do not identify as either Democrat or Republican. This means that the Presidential debates as currently managed are locking out the diverse voices and views of half of all Americans….

The need for “more voices and choices” can be met by including all candidates who are on the ballots for a majority of voters, a number that has typically ranged from 4 to 6 candidates in total.

Voters have a right to hear directly from their possible choices for the highest office in the land. These choices should reflect the diversity of American political opinion, and not be restricted to two candidates nominated by establishment parties awash in corporate donations and billionaire support.

While so far the Commission on Presidential Debates seems to be sticking to its guns in excluding the Libertarian and Green Parties from the debates, there do seem to be some openings so far this year for improved media coverage of third parties. While in the past, the media has studiously ignored presidential candidates considered outside the mainstream, this year – with a fascist lunatic heading the GOP ticket and a brazenly corrupt influence peddler heading the Democratic Party ticket – there seems to be a bit more cordiality being shown by the media to alternative voices.

CNN, for example, has hosted two “town hall” events featuring the Libertarian and Green presidential nominees, which can be viewed below.

The struggle continues however for a level playing field for all U.S. political parties.

To sign the petition demanding open four-way televised debates between the Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians and Greens – and to help unrig the electoral process in the United States – click here.

See below for an interview with Green Party presidential nominee in which she discusses the actual rigging of elections that takes place in the United States: