Media Contact
The results of the November 2020 elections are schedule to be certified by Congress this week, as allies of President Trump seek to delegitimize the election and the president was revealed to have pressured Georgia’s Secretary of State to “find more votes” for him.
Mabel Berezin
Professor of Sociology at Cornell University
Mabel Berezin, professor of sociology at Cornell University and an expert on international populism and fascism, weighs in on the threats to democracy presented by President Trump and his allies this week.
Berezin says:
“Democratic procedure will most likely hold this week, but the spirit of democracy is damaged.
“First, in a phone call on Saturday to Georgia’s Secretary of State the president showed that the language of threat came more naturally to him than the language of democratic governance ever did—he asked to have votes ‘found’ or else. That is a threat.
“Second, twelve U.S. Senators jumped on the president’s bandwagon to hold up the certification of electoral votes—showing that bold faced opportunism (Hawley and Cruz are looking to 2024) took precedence to what at least those two should have learned about the Constitution at law school.
“Third, the president has called a rally of his supporters to begin at 9 a.m. on Jan. 6 to ‘Stop the Steal’—billed as the ‘biggest event in Washington DC history’, assuring some form of public violence before the day is over.”
