Biden won. Trump has been defeated. We love to see it, folks.
I’m so relieved. At the same time, though, I don’t think America is completely out of the woods just yet. Trump has stacked the courts in his favor. He has sycophants at his side who may yet help him cheat the American people out of their president-elect. Republicans have proven time and time again, after all, that they are corrupt and hate democracy.
Voter suppression was not new to this election, and will continue until the Democrats get control of both the House and Senate and then actually do something about it. That will be difficult, of course, since the voter suppression that needs to be addressed is the thing keeping Republicans in power. As Trump himself admitted, Republicans would never win another election again if voting was easy.
That is important to keep in mind, because voter suppression primarily affects people of color and, if it wasn’t for them, we’d be crying in despair right now instead of relief. It is thanks in large part to communities of color that states like Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and Arizona went blue to begin with.
So while I’m thrilled Trump lost, I’m also deeply disgusted by how many Americans voted for him. In the key states that went blue, the margins were thinner than Trump’s hairline. If we’ve learned nothing else from this election, it’s that there is something deeply wrong with 25% of the American population. This election should be a wake-up call.
Too many Americans naively assumed that many Trump voters were “tricked” into voting for him in 2016, and that Biden would surely win 2020 in a landslide. As we’ve seen over the past few days, however, that’s not the case. More Trump supporters showed up in 2020 than in 2016 to proudly display their support for a racist, wannabe-dictator with a penchant for rape.
As Maya Angelou said, “when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
I am worried that my fellow Americans think everything is over now, and we can return to “normalcy.” For one, it’s going to take more than four years to undo the damage Trump has done; especially if Republicans retain control of the Senate, which they will unless Georgia turns things around in their runoff election this January.
Even more importantly, though…what is “normalcy,” exactly? Police murdered Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, and countless other Black Americans while Obama was in office. Occupy Wall Street happened during the Obama Administration. Innocent civilians in the Middle East were killed by drones during the Obama Administration. The Obama years certainly seemed better than the Trump years, but once you strip away the veneer of civility, you see that there were still many problems.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I don’t want to go back to the way things were. I want things to be better. I want American society to, you know, progress.
Realistically, Democrats probably won’t win the runoff election in Georgia, which means Republicans will retain control of the Senate. Democrats get another shot in 2022…but, statistically speaking, Republicans turn out in much higher numbers for midterm elections. Then we have 2024 and, if you thought Trump was bad, wait until the Republican Party nominee is someone just as bad, but with charm and enough sense to not tweet every dumb idea that pops into his head.
Finally, while Trump may have lost, the fact that Marjorie Taylor Greene, a QAnon conspiracy theorist, won her election, should be a clear sign that the Trump era of politics isn’t over. It may have only just begun.
So, please, my fellow Americans; don’t “go back to brunch” now that Biden has won. Celebrate and enjoy the win, of course! We deserve to enjoy something after the past four hellish years. Just remember, there’s still a lot more work to be done; so, be ready to roll your sleeves back up after the (socially distanced) parties have died down.
