Trump Challenges Crack in the Election System - Jyotsana Agrawal
Updated: Nov 23, 2021
The race of being the President of the USA is on peek amidst the fatal pandemic. It's believed that the President of the US is the most powerful person. His actions affect the lives of many.
Unlike the Indian election process, the US has its election process. The President and the Vice-President are voted by electors through a process called, The Electoral College. The qualifications for becoming a President of the US are-
Should be a natural citizen of the US
Should be at least 35 years
Should be a resident of the country for 14 years.
From a year before only the campaign for the election begins with the two main political parties, i.e., The Democrats and the Republicans. They visit states for support and fundraising for their campaign. Initially, the participants of both teams participate in televised debates and put forth and argue about their policies and issues against each other.
The various steps involved in the process of elections are-
Primacy and caucuses-
Who doesn't want to be the President of the US? So, candidates from the party campaign all over the states to get into account the favor of their party members. Each state has its leaders of both the parties and these leaders in some states are known as "caucuses". There are many people with their ideology and policies, and these people with similar ideologies belong to the same party. Members of the party vote and discuss among themselves and select the best candidate out of them and the best one will represent the people at the upcoming convention and election. This is voted in the primaries.
National conventions-
Here, the parties conduct conventions of their own and select the final presidential candidate. In this event the selected final nominee from the democrats and the republican chooses their running ate, i.e., the Vice- president of US.
General Elections-
People all over the country vote for a group of people who are members of the electoral. The electoral college is a system in which representatives from each of the 50 states in number proportional to the state's population vote and selects their leaders. Each of the 50 states gets a certain number of electors. And these electoral in turn select the President and the Vice- President of US.
But there is a myth or say reality about the electoral college that it has always given one-sided presidential results. To put it simply, if Republicans win the support of a majority of electors from a state, then all the votes are taken into account by the Republican Candidate. But the states namely, Maine and Nebraska are an exception to the system.
Trump’s era
The US is on the second number in the world to emit greenhouse gas. Scientists and others have already said that if Trump is back to the President's chair, then it would be next to impossible to maintain a temperature in check. He dissatisfied scientists by stepping back from the Paris climate accord. The agreement pledged with around 200 countries to keep the global temperature rises well under 2 degrees Celsius. Joe Biden stated that he would agree to the agreement if he wins the election.
Mr. Trump has signed a pact with its rival country China. The agreement says that China will buy $200 billion worth of American goods and services by 2021. This pact will bring somewhat damaged and the world's largest economy together. The President aimed at being tough on China throughout his Presidentship but this deal appears to impose more than 2 years of negotiations and escalating threats on the country. This deal supports the types of free trade agreements that the US supports. This deal will keep up the level of tariffs and will force the other country, i.e., China to buy products worth $200 Billion. This pact is a win-win situation, where America can open industries like Biotechnology, Beef, poultry, etc.
Trump wants to build a strong wall between his country and Mexico to prevent the entry of illegal immigrants. He says in an interview that people say that barrier is immoral. Trump questions these people why do they build walls, gates, and wired fences around their houses? Trump believes that many illegal immigrants are there in his country who has entered the country unofficially and is taking advantage of the freedoms and privileges granted. They are not even paying the taxes and contributing nothing to society. He gave many examples where building walls on the borders have proved to be very beneficial and has benefitted the country from the entrance of illegal immigrants.
2020 Elections
Trump’s agenda
He is a successful businessman and possesses a great strategical mind. He has so many networks and can easily fulfill all the mentioned aims.
To build a wall along the US- Mexico border.
Rejecting the Affordable Care Act.
To balance a country's budget by 2026
To deport illegal immigrants to their country
To fill the vacancy at the courts.
He has already threatened that he won't allow any Muslim refugees in the US.
He wants to build a wall to prevent people from crossing it illegally.
JOE BIDEN
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr is a Democratic party’s nominee for the Presidential election for the year 2020. He was the Vice- President for two terms in the regime of Barack Obama. He is a law degree holder.
Agenda 2020
To ensure that all citizens are treated equally.
To help the middle class
To provide affordable health care to everyone
To restore the country’s leadership outside
To support tribal nations
The two mates Biden- Harris noticed the inequality among tribal nations. They decided to strengthen the tribal population and help them so that they can govern their communities and can take up their own decisions. Biden will ensure that tribal consultations adopt best practices consistent with principles reflected in the RESPECT Act, including requiring substantive engagement with tribes, ensuring that consultation policies are consistent across federal agencies, and encouraging independent agencies to establish them as well.
As per the survey of the National Indian Child Welfare Association, it is found that Indian families are being investigated at a higher rate and their children are also kept 4 times more in foster care than the white family’s children. Biden promised to implement the Act which is a law which protects native family and which involves tribal children also.
Online Voting
The USA is a country that has followed constitutional democracy for more than 200 years. So obviously it has an obligation upon, to sow all the countries of the world how democracy works.
There were many questions raised about the electoral process of the US. This is a fact which all should accept that online voting will provide fast and transparent results. Moreover, it can also increase the number of voters. Countries like Estonia is the best example of voting online system. The country has accepted and followed the system since 2005. In the US country of West Virginia, Delaware only voting online is acceptable and generally, there are almost no cases of fraud and hacks. The citizens would be able to see the cunts in hours and it won’t take a day or so. Through the online voting method, big technologies would be able to show up their roles. The capacity, efforts are so unique that will keep the country's democracy functioning. Also, it will allow both the parties and also the observers a real-time audit.
There are many disadvantages to this. Online voting would lead to fraud or has a threat of hackers from countries like Russia or Chinese cybercriminals can disrupt the whole voting process. People do online shopping or transactions or socialize. But doing an election is a kind of irreversible process, unlike banking transactions. The political and legal aspect makes it irreversible.
Repeating the process of election and the will of people will threaten the stability of the government. It is simple and best to follow the process of the secret ballot because re-counting of votes can occur here in case of any doubt or mishap. But through online voting, recounting is impossible. Voters will use their phones or computers for voting purposes. The internet they use over devices contains malware and codes. Hackers can easily become billionaires by renting out their army of malicious computers to citizens who want to plant vote tampering malware.
Trump’s Arguments-
Mails on the ballot are very dangerous, there's tremendous fraud involved- Donald Trump.
Trump objected to a case in Virginia in which 500,000 applications made were found to be false. Later the authorities rectified the mistake and corrected the same. The Virginia voter Information worked hard to make sure that no voter face any kind of inconvenience.
In another tweet of trump, he pointed out that in Ohio, 50,000 ballots were wrong as well as fraud. The election board of Ohio ensured the same and safeguarded that no one voted twice. Also, the information by Trump was found to be false.
In New York, 100,000 ballots were sent with wrong names and addresses.
Around half of the states of the USA are ready to accept the votes sent by post that arrive even after November 3(the final day). There has been an increase in the number of people who asked for postal votes and then suddenly switched to polling booths instead. So there might be several cases of voting counted as twice.
Trump’s effort to back down the 2020 elections have failed. After November 3, there were no tanks or any civil unrest or interference by the judiciary. Now, Trump’s era has come to an end. Now no more Republicans would dare not replicate any of the ideas of Mr. Trump if he/she does not want to lose a close election.
References-
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/06/08/online-voting-304013
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/us-presidential-elections/donald-trump-vs-joe-biden
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/07/election-pollsters-2020-reckoning.html
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/26/21257648/joe-biden-climate-economy-tax-plans
https://www.npr.org/2020/11/09/932190347/bidens-first-100-days-here-s-what-to-expect
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election
https://th.usembassy.gov/summary-of-the-u-s-presidential-election-process/