Ignore Donald Trump. Count the votes.
I
t has never been more important for Michigan's Republican elected leaders to stand up for the democratic process and the rule of law.
Shortly after 2 a.m. Wednesday, with the election undecided but with his rival leading both the popular vote and the Electoral College tally, the president of the United States claimed victory in his bid for re-election, declared the continuing effort to count lawfully cast ballots a fraud, and vowed to seek confirmation of those absurd claims in the United State Supreme Court.
It was if a football team trailing by a field goal had walked off the field with five minutes remaining on the clock and insisted that the result, the officiating, and time itself were illusory.
Even Republican talking heads who typically defend their party's president
hastened to underline the absurdity of the president's claims. Former GOP Sen. Rick Santorum pointed out that the votes still outstanding were legitimate, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie warned that the president's assertion of unsubstantiated legal claims was undercutting any legitimate legal challenge that might be made in the future.
These were welcome injections of sanity, but they are not enough. Elected Republicans must join their party's retired elders in defending the legitimacy of the process.
Six hours after Trump made his baseless claims, local and state election officials, methodical tabulators, and vigilant election monitors from both major parties were persisting in their heroic efforts to get our state's election results right. The president's self-serving falsehoods are an attack on their integrity, and Michigan's Republican congressional delegation, state legislative leaders and party spokespeople must not indulge his dangerous campaign to sow doubt about their motives or work product.
The president's public allegation that the electoral verdict the world is waiting for is fraudulent on its face is not another casual aspersion of Joe Biden's character; it's a frontal attack on America's threadbare confidence that the process will ultimately yield a legitimate victor.
Donald Trump could yet emerge as that victor, but until the last vote is counted, his pretensions to victory are sheer fantasy, and Republican elected leaders who hope to retain their own credibility when the smoke clears must not indulge them another minute.
