‘Get your meds ready’: Conservative warns that unless Biden enjoys a ‘blowout’ victory, a ‘democratic crisis far worse than 2000’ is almost certain

Joe Biden supporters — from centrist Democrats to liberals and progressives to Never Trump conservatives — have been warning that unless the former vice president and presumptive 2020 Democratic presidential nominee enjoys a landslide victory in November, President Donald Trump is almost certain to contest the election results. Never Trumper Amanda Carpenter, former communications director for Sen. Ted Cruz and now a CNN contributor, makes that argument in a July 17 article for the conservative website The Bulwark — and warns that the 2020 vote count could make the chaos that followed the 2000 election pale in comparison.

“If you thought the 36-day national agony over ‘hanging chads’ in the 2000 presidential election was bad,” Carpenter warns, “imagine what President Trump might do if the 2020 election is too close to call on Election Night. He’s already preparing the script for a remake of the 2000 election with his own authoritarian twist.”

Trump, in recent months, has been railing against mail-in voting — insisting that it encourages voter fraud on a grand scale. Never mind the fact that for many years, the Republican Party encouraged absentee ballots — while registered Democrats were more likely to vote in person. In a July 10 tweet, Trump claimed that “mail-in ballot fraud” is a “formula for rigging an election.” But Carpenter points out that regardless of what Trump is saying, many Americans are likely to favor voting by mail this year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

“He’s right about one thing: election results are likely to be delayed this year,” Carpenter writes. “Coronavirus concerns have prompted states to expand mail-in voting options, and millions of Americans have taken up the offer. Those ballots take much longer to count than in-person votes. When the 2000 election became ‘too close to call,’ everything came down to a trio of Florida counties where lawyers wrangled over butterfly ballots, miscounts, undervotes, overvotes, hanging chad, swinging chad, tri chad, dimpled chad, and pregnant chad, too. This time, President Trump is already questioning ballots three months before a single vote is cast.”

Carpenter adds, “So, go on and get your anti-anxiety meds ready because the stage is set for a democratic crisis far worse than what we lived through in 2000. This time around, Trump has every lever of the federal government at his disposal…. This time around, the Proud Boys and Antifa will be warring in the streets. Do you feel the walls closing in yet? Good. All the better to prepare.”

Carpenter’s comment about animosity between the Proud Boys and Antifa isn’t an exaggeration. In 2019 at Philadelphia’s Independence Mall, Antifa were among the counterdemonstrators opposing a Proud Boys rally — and tension was high. The Philly police were the only thing separating the Proud Boys and their opponents.

“The 2020 stage is a tinderbox compared to 2000,” Carpenter writes. “As of today, over 138,000 Americans have died from COVID-19. The commander-in-chief Republican candidate is egging on his base in speeches and tweets depicting his opponents as radical left mobsters hell-bent on destroying the country. Pro-gun activists have swarmed state capitols to protest pandemic lockdowns. Mass protests and violence have broken out in cities across America in the wake of the killing of George Floyd. To top it all off, President Trump deployed soldiers to gas peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square. And for what? A freaking photo-op.”

Carpenter notes that Trump “is already questioning the results from Pennsylvania, another state where the number of mail-in ballots skyrocketed and Trump won by a slim 44,292 vote margin, 48-47%, in 2016. During the Keystone State’s primary, Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf expanded vote-by-mail options to allow no-excuse absentee voting. As a result, 1.5 million people voted by mail last month. That’s 17 times the number of voters — about 84,000 — who voted absentee in 2016.”

The Never Trumper ends her Bulwark article by hoping that Biden enjoys a landslide “blowout” victory in November — one that would discourage Trump and his supporters from contesting the election results.

“The 2020 election is our country’s last, best hope to stop President Trump,” Carpenter emphasizes. “Still, there are no guarantees if he contests the outcome. Those who wish to defeat Trump need to make it a blowout. This election can’t be too close to call.”