Many Americans following the news are aghast as Russia continues to attack Ukraine from the south, north and east with massive force of over 150,000 soldiers, tanks, planes, bombs and missiles. Meanwhile, 58% of Russians reportedly approve of the invasion of Ukraine as they believe the state media’s lies that Russia is only conducting “a special military operation” in Ukraine to “liberate” Ukrainians and “denazify” the country.
At the same time, Russia is effectively closing their citizens’ ears to the truth from other sources by imposing prison sentences of up to 15 years for those spreading “fake news” that goes against the Russian government’s narrative on the war. Does the complaint about “fake news” when a narrative is challenged by the media sound familiar? It should.
Attacking with a massive military force is one way of taking over a country and expunging democracy. But it’s not the only way. Donald Trump and his enablers tried to engineer a coup to stay in power even though he was told by several of his senior advisors that there was no evidence of fraud on the scale necessary to have changed the election’s result.
Like Putin, Trump and his enablers have relentlessly sowed disinformation about the supposedly “stolen” election, so that now, despite indisputable evidence that Biden won the election fairly and by a large margin, only 20% of Republicans believe that Biden legitimately won.
That’s the power of disinformation. Power, not truth or democracy, is all that matters to autocrats like Putin and demagogues like Trump. But democracy matters not only to Ukrainians, but as the free world’s support of Ukraine shows, it matters to us.
Carefully follow the January 6 Committee’s report that will be presented in the next few months. It will detail how Trump and his allies knew he lost, but nevertheless schemed to defraud the public and convince them that he hadn’t. But don’t simply believe me or CNN or CNBC. And certainly, don’t believe Fox News or other far right media, which as enablers of the “Big Lie” about the election, will probably present a skewed narrative. Listen yourself, read the commission’s documents, and grapple with the facts that the commission presents.
Don’t let Trump and his enablers manipulate you, as Putin’s state media is successfully manipulating over half of Russia’s citizens. Ukrainians are laying down their bodies to protect their country and their democracy. But in the United States, most don’t have to die or physically fight to defend their democracy. However, as Americans, we must protect our country by seeking the truth. It’s our civic duty to protect our country by trying to actually understand the evidence of what happened in the months leading up to the January 6 insurrection.
While the fundamental facts of January 6 are known, the committee says the extraordinary trove of material they have collected — 35,000 pages of records so far, including texts, emails and phone records from people close to Trump — is fleshing out additional critical details of the worst attack on the Capitol in two centuries.
So far, our justice department has indicted only some of those who stormed our Capitol, threatened our legislators, and sought to disrupt the certification of our election. Hopefully, the committee will fill in the blanks about the preparations before the attack, the financing behind the January 6 rally that preceded it and the extensive White House campaign to overturn the 2020 election. They are also investigating what President Trump was doing as his supporters fought their way into the Capitol. The committee should also articulate the process by which so many citizens were duped into believing the election was stolen and how the more militant citizens were persuaded to attack our Capitol. Let’s listen carefully to what they have uncovered.
Unfortunately, if we are truly serious about defending our democracy from those who are waging a war on it, implementing lessons learned from the January 6 insurrection is just the first step. Currently, in many Republican states, nonpartisan control of the electoral process is being overturned. In addition, voting rights are under attack from many directions.
Voting rights legislation must cut back on voter suppression, end gerrymandering, curb dark money in politics, and combat corruption. Congress has considered three separate voting rights bills: For the People Act, John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and The Freedom to Vote Act. Unfortunately, these bills have all died in the Senate as not one of them have attracted a single Republican senator’s support.
While it’s difficult to fully come to grips with the reality that our great American experiment in democracy of 230 years almost died on January 6, 2021, in fact, it did. We need to insist that legislators who are shown to have abetted this heinous attack be disqualified from ever holding public office again. Weaknesses in our electoral process gained from the study of the January 6 insurrection must be identified and steps taken to make it more robust.
Ominously, future elections may be stolen or rendered illegitimate if we fail to counter Republican states’ partisan changes to their electoral processes as well as their hollowing out of voters’ rights. We must emulate the Ukrainians and fight passionately and doggedly for our democracy. If we don’t, I fear, our nation will soon cease to be one.
Justin F. Thulin, M.D., is a dermatologist practicing in Salt Lake City.
Justin F. Thulin, M.D., is a retired physician who lives in Salt Lake City.
