While Republicans are busy obstructing governance on the national level, Republican-controlled legislatures at the state level have been very busy reconstructing election laws to not only make it harder for potential Democratic voters to cast ballots, but, far more frightening, to make it easier to overturn legitimate election results if not to their liking.

At least eight states have passed laws that have either diminished their secretaries of states’ authority to declare election outcomes and/or have shifted critical aspects of the election outcome process to partisan actors. Included in this list of states are Florida, Georgia, Arizona and Texas, all states that potentially could have closely contested results in the next presidential election.

With these changes in place, it is entirely within the realm of possibility that in any of these states won by the Democratic candidate, the Republican-controlled legislatures will attempt to override the counted vote by claiming it to be fraudulent or irregular, overturn the results, and claim the Republican candidate a winner. They will, in fact, be legally able to steal the election for the Republican candidate. This should scare all of us, and it is not hyperbolic to call this what it is: the beginning of the end of our democracy.

Doug Zlatin
Falmouth

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