Blue wave? Red wall? No wave? By tonight (Tuesday), somebody on television will be standing in front of a map, poking at a county in Pennsylvania and explaining what it all means. By tomorrow, somebody who lost will be explaining why his or her loss shouldn’t count.
For a preview, look at Brazil. Last month, Flávio Bolsonaro lost the Oct. 25 presidential runoff to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva by more than 4 million votes. He was also under Supreme Court investigation for corruption, money laundering and tax evasion, and under orders to surrender his passports.
He left anyway and landed in Miami three days after the election, announcing, “I am the president-elect,” and blaming the “criminals” who stole Brazil’s election. Donald Trump weighed in as well, calling it “another rigged election.” He offered no evidence.
Two days after Brazil voted, Israel held its election. Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc lost its parliamentary majority after a record turnout among Arab voters. Likud declared the election stolen by Arab parties.
The head of Israel’s elections committee said that even if the allegations prove true, they wouldn’t undermine the results. Netanyahu has suggested it would be treason for his rival to form a government with Arab parties.
Notice what the word is doing in each case. No one ever offers proof that the result was wrong, because proof isn’t the point.
For Bolsonaro, “rigged” turns a man who fled after being ordered to surrender his passports into a president in exile. For Netanyahu, it turns the coalition that could replace him into a betrayal.
Rigged has replaced conceding, and it isn’t just poor sportsmanship. It’s the first step toward overriding the voters: Declare the count illegitimate, and whatever you do next becomes “defending democracy.”
Then there’s our own president. Roll Call’s Factbase went through Donald Trump’s public remarks and social media posts going back to 1988. By July 15 of this year, it had tallied over 2,900 instances of Trump claiming or suggesting that elections were unfair or rigged.
The tally includes reposts and counts 457 times he claimed before the 2024 election that it would be unfair to him. When he won, the count was suddenly fine. When he lost in 2020, it ended with a riot at the Capitol.
He’s still saying it. Two days ago in Dubuque, Iowa, he said of Minnesota, “They’re crooked with their vote counting.”
He called Maine corrupt, waved off California, and told the crowd once again that 2020 was rigged. All this before the polls had even closed.
A kid who loses a game and says the other side cheated needs an adult to pull him aside. In politics, grown men who know better go on television and doubt-splain that the claims raise interesting questions.
Repeat that often enough and voters learn to trust a ballot count only when their side comes out ahead.
I’m 70. I remember when losing meant picking up the phone. Al Gore lost the presidency by a Supreme Court decision and 537 votes in Florida, then went on television and conceded. John McCain stood in front of a booing crowd in 2008 and called Barack Obama his president.
I imagine those were miserable moments. That was part of their value. They required a person to say out loud that the voters had the right to pick somebody else.
So what happens if Democrats take the Senate? The Justice Department says it’s deploying about 1,000 monitors and observers in all 50 states today, roughly triple the last midterm, and it’s still pursuing legal efforts in several states over how ballots are handled and counted.
If it finds evidence that somebody broke the law, put it on the record and let it be tested under bright light. If not, accept the vote and spare us the worn-out “rigged” show.
And if Republicans hold the Senate? Democrats owe voters the same thing. I can dislike a result all the way down to my socks and still know it’s the result.
Close races deserve careful counts and recounts where the law provides for them. County election workers deserve time to finish. Some people like to mock California for how long it takes to count. I’ve waited longer for a plumber than some people are willing to wait for a county to count its ballots.
Tonight, I’ll watch the returns and probably make Carrie listen to more of my opinions than she bargained for. Some races will go my way. Some won’t. When the ballots are counted and the lawful challenges are settled, whoever won gets to go to work. Whoever lost should pick up the phone and graciously concede.
If that’s too much to ask of a person who wants to run the country, we were lucky they lost.
Gary Horton is chairman of the College of the Canyons Foundation board. His “Full Speed to Port!” has appeared in The Signal since 2006. The opinions expressed in his column do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Signal or its editorial board.
