The following are letters sent January 2nd and 3rd, 2021, to a staffer for Senator Dan Sullivan of Alaska, regarding the Congressional Certification of the Electoral College vote for President, to be held Wednesday, January 6th.
First Letter:
I congratulate Senator Sullivan on his re-election. This was not the outcome I, and the majority of my friends had hoped for. I put considerable time and money into trying to prevent this result. But I value democracy and respect the results of Senator Sullivan's election.* He is my representative in the Senate, as well as for those who supported him in the election, so I'm writing to you again about my concerns. If you are reading this on Monday, the certification vote will be in only two days. Thank you for your time.
In four days, Congress will vote to certify results of the electoral college vote to declare Joe Biden the next President. In the two months since the general election, there has been an unprecedented challenge to the validity of that election by the incumbent and others working on his behalf. The arguments to overturn the results of the election have ranged from trivial procedural points to absurd conspiracy theories.
American democracy is under attack. In 2016, Mitt Romney stated that Russia is without question our number one geopolitical foe. Other commentators, notably Garry Kasparov and Masha Gessen, have stated that Vladimir Putin sees democracy as an existential threat to Russian authoritarianism, and therefore Putin is conducting a cold war against the institution of democracy around the world. Putin’s goal is to undermine trust in the institution of democracy, to weaken and disrupt democratic nations.
The threat from Russian anti-democratic disinformation is made clear in many reports, including a Senate minority staff report and a US State Department report referenced below.
“For years, Vladimir Putin's government has engaged in a relentless assault to undermine democracy and the rule of law in Europe and the United States. Mr. Putin's Kremlin employs an asymmetric arsenal that includes military invasions, cyberattacks, disinformation, support for fringe political groups, and the weaponization of energy resources, organized crime, and corruption” (2018, Senate Minority Staff Report, COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS)
“Russia’s disinformation and propaganda ecosystem is the collection of official, proxy, and unattributed communication channels and platforms that Russia uses to create and amplify false narratives….The Kremlin bears direct responsibility for cultivating these tactics and platforms as part of its approach to using information as a weapon.” (2020, State Department GEC Special Report)
The idea that the 2020 Presidential election was flawed, fraudulent, or rigged is exactly such a false narrative. Republican election officials in key states declared the results completely valid, and have run recounts and audits of processes and votes to make that determination. About sixty court cases challenging the election have been summarily dismissed as completely lacking merit. The Executive Committee of the Election Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council, and the members of the Election Infrastructure Sector Coordinating Council issued an official statement that “The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history.”
Nevertheless, as of today, 140 Republican Representatives and 12 Senators stated that they intend to vote against certification of the election. The only real basis for this revolt against the election is simply that the Republican candidate lost. The phrase Republicans are using in this effort is the hypocritical, Orwellian slogan, “Stop the Steal.”
The main argument of the current assault on the election is that procedural changes, made without the authority of state legislatures, to accommodate voting during the pandemic, were illegitimate. Senator Cruz of Texas is leading the effort to invalidate the election in the Senate. Ironically, the procedural change in Texas to close all but one early-voting site per county was also made without the authority of the state legislature. If the logic of the complaint holds, then Senator Cruz’ election was also invalid, and he should not be seated to vote on January 6th! In any event, there is no argument that these votes were not honestly cast for Joe Biden – the intent is simply to disenfranchise Biden voters.
For generations, we have fought wars to make the world safe for democracy, spilling American blood and treasure. Promoting democracy overseas has been a major policy goal since the Reagan administration. And yet here we are, with three-quarters of the Republicans in the House and one-quarter of the Republicans in the Senate seeking to undermine democracy in our own government.
In the weeks following the election, I was disappointed in Senator Sullivan’s slow recognition of the Biden win, because that slow recognition gave encouragement to Trumpists looking to find some way to cheat.
Democracy, like free enterprise, requires truth and integrity to function. Both fail when people cheat. Unfortunately, many Republicans are once again showing that they lack integrity. I have to ask, what in the hell are they doing? These Republicans are undermining Americans’ trust in our democracy, which is the number one foreign policy goal of our number one geopolitical enemy. This seems to me to be pretty close to sedition and treason. Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski have been almost alone among Republican Senators in criticizing the effort to overturn the legitimate election of Joe Biden. In this context, silence is complicity. I ask Senator Sullivan to stand up for the principles of democracy, denounce the effort to overturn the election, and show faith and trust in our democratic institutions. And to congratulate Joe Biden, commit to working with the President-elect on improving lives for Americans, and to strengthen our trust in democracy.
References:
* The opening lines of this letter are a parody of an official statement by Senator Sullivan, regarding the election of President Biden. Sullivan's original statement, unfortunately, has now been removed from Twitter.
PUTIN'S ASYMMETRIC ASSAULT ON DEMOCRACY IN RUSSIA AND EUROPE: IMPLICATIONS FOR U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY
“For years, Vladimir Putin's government has engaged in a relentless assault to undermine democracy and the rule of law in Europe and the United States. Mr. Putin's Kremlin employs an asymmetric arsenal that includes military invasions, cyberattacks, disinformation, support for fringe political groups, and the weaponization of energy resources, organized crime, and corruption. The Kremlin has refined the use of these tools over time and these attacks have intensified in scale and complexity across Europe. If the United States fails to work with urgency to address this complex and growing threat, the regime in Moscow will become further emboldened. It will continue to develop and refine its arsenal to use on democracies around the world, including against U.S. elections in 2018 and 2020.”
“Mr. Putin has thus made it a priority of his regime to attack the democracies of Europe and the United States.”
GEC Special Report: August 2020, Pillars of Russia’s Disinformation and Propaganda Ecosystem
“[T]his report draws on publicly available reporting to provide an overview of Russia’s disinformation and propaganda ecosystem. Russia’s disinformation and propaganda ecosystem is the collection of official, proxy, and unattributed communication channels and platforms that Russia uses to create and amplify false narratives. The ecosystem consists of five main pillars: official government communications, state-funded global messaging, cultivation of proxy sources, weaponization of social media, and cyber-enabled disinformation. The Kremlin bears direct responsibility for cultivating these tactics and platforms as part of its approach to using information as a weapon. It invests massively in its propaganda channels, its intelligence services and its proxies to conduct malicious cyber activity to support their disinformation efforts, and it leverages outlets that masquerade as news sites or research institutions to spread these false and misleading narratives.”
“A thriving counter-disinformation community comprised of governments, civil society, academia, the press, the private sector, and citizens around the world who refuse to tolerate these tactics is pushing back.”
Combating disinformation and foreign interference in democracies: Lessons from Europe, 2019
WEAPONS OF MASS DISTRACTION: Foreign State-Sponsored Disinformation in the Digital Age, 2019
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Second Letter:
Second Letter:
Please note that I wrote yesterday's letter before the news broke about Trump's phone call to the Georgia State Attorney General, using a combination of threats and flattery to convince Raffensperger to create false election results.
This news reinforces what I had to say in that letter. The efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the election are clearly illegal.
Senator Murkowski has spoken out against this violation of democracy. We are in serious banana-republic territory with the Congressional challenge to the electoral college, and Senator Sullivan's silence is complicity.
I was an internal technical auditor for a couple of years for the company that once supplied half of the natural gas to South-Central Alaska. We once had a region manager (not in Alaska) who made bullying demands of his engineers to change the numbers, similar to Trump's call to Raffensperger. We fired the region manager, and disciplined the engineers who complied with the manager's demand to change the numbers. By enforcing integrity, we ensured that our customers had enough gas to heat homes and have electricity; our shareholders received truthful accounts of the company's financial condition, and we were protected from lawsuits.
Integrity matters in all things. Cheating is wrong, and it is important to say so, loudly.
I'm waiting for Senator Sullivan and many other Republicans to show some integrity regarding Trump's campaign to overturn the election.
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