The 2020 Election Fueled a Crisis of Democracy. Voters Fear a Repeat in 2024
Americans are worried there will be another electoral crisis in 2024 because the aftermath of 2020 continues to reverberate through the nation’s politics. Many Republicans refuse to acknowledge Joe Biden’s 2020 victory, saying they have lost faith in the electoral system. They also have doubts that 2024 will deliver a legitimate winner, while Democrats worry that Republicans will contest an outcome that doesn’t go their way.
This week’s indictment of Donald Trump ensures that divisions over 2020 will become a central element of the next presidential contest. The Republican then-president was accused of violating the law by working with others to organize fraudulent slates of electors to the Electoral College in several states and to impede the work of Congress in certifying the vote. That happened on Jan.
6, 2021, when a mob of Trump supporters attacked the Capitol. Trump pleaded not guilty to four charges at a hearing in a federal courthouse in Washington on Thursday. Close to 70% of Republicans believe that President Biden didn’t legitimately win the election, several polls show, despite multiple federal and state investigations, as well as court decisions, finding no evidence of fraud extensive enough to have changed the result.
Democrats are nearly uniform in believing Biden won fair and square. “I’m totally prepared for a dishonest election in 2024," said Sharon Erickson, a 69-year-old Republican in the central Minnesota city of Willmar. She maintains, as many Republicans do, that Democrats changed voting machines in their favor, though there is no evidence of that.
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