Republicans everywhere are waging a desperate battle against democracy
We are two years removed from an election in which the Republican nominee became president despite getting 3 million fewer votes than the Democrat, six months removed from a midterm election in which Democrats won sweeping victories at all levels, and 18 months away from the next presidential election. The Republican Party is in a panic — as well it should be, not just because its leader is extremely unpopular, but because its electoral coalition is shrinking as a proportion of the population.
In response, Republicans are waging a scorched-earth campaign against democracy itself.
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This kind of thing has been going on for a while. When Republicans win an election, one of the first things they usually do is change the rules to increase the chances that even if they lose the next election, they will still retain power.
That’s above and beyond all the structural elements of our system that enable minority rule, such as the disproportionate power given to small states in the Senate and the electoral college that has allowed Republicans to become president with fewer votes than their opponents in two of the past five elections.
But all of this is taking on a greater urgency right now. As they look toward 2020, Republicans see an election with the potential to profoundly degrade their power, both in Washington and at the state level. President Trump is extremely unpopular, with approval ratings that have long hovered around 40 percent. Even more threatening, the 2016 election increasingly looks like the last gasp of the monochromatic Republican coalition, its final opportunity to win a national election with almost no nonwhite votes.
The 2018 elections offer Republicans a frightening preview of the future. Newly released census data shows that turnout spiked among young people, rising from 20 percent in the last midterm election in 2014 to 36 percent in 2018 among those under 30. It also rose proportionately more among those with higher educations and those living in metropolitan areas, both of which favor Democrats.
Obviously, the circumstances of every election are different. But all the demographic trends favor Democrats, as the country grows more ethnically diverse, more urban, more educated and less religious with each passing year. That means that every election, Republicans have to do something more than they did the last time in order to win.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/04/26/republicans-everywhere-are-waging-desperate-battle-against-democracy/?utm_term=.8839f6676751
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