How to ensure trust in elections

Republicans have a new mantra to “count all legal votes.” But that slogan is a Trojan horse since it is an honorable claim with one dangerous hidden message that the 2020 election was rigged against President Trump. The allegations are false, however, the irony is that they reveal the truth about the American electoral system. Because all votes are cast and counted in dozens of different ways, many citizens have concerns and feel uncertain about whether appropriate standards are used in the process.

It is time for the United States to join most other advanced democracies and create an independent national agency to conduct federal elections. The principle of “one person and one vote” must come with the principle of “one election and one system.” We must count all legal votes and also ensure the definition of legal votes is the same in all districts.

Having free and fair elections is not enough. It is important for citizens to attest that elections are indeed free and fair. This is how trust is fostered. Citizens could see the integrity of elections when the rules are the same across the board. If one action is legal here but illegal there as it is in the current system, it is easier to spread false allegations of fraud.

Sean Hannity claimed that Representative Ilhan Omar told residents they do not have to register to vote in Minnesota. Hannity buried the fact that Minnesota allows citizens to register at polling stations on the day of the election like Omar clarified. With a unified process familiar to all people, the likes of Hannity would have fewer chances to deceive us.

Monitoring election violations is difficult when what counts as a violation varies. Imagine the New York Giants and the Philadelphia Eagles trying to play an otherwise normal football game under a hundred different sets of rules. The calls are made by different types of referees based on where a given action takes place. That is not the way to play a football game. That is also not the way to run a national election in a democracy.

Federalism is not the reason to maintain the current system. Canada and Australia have independent national agencies that conduct elections. In fact, one can even make the case that the process in the United States is antithetical to the principles of federalism, since local authorities stay in charge of a business that belongs to the country as a whole.

Republicans demand integrity in the process. Senator Kelly Loeffler has said that the country must have fair elections and count all legal votes. She called for transparency and trust. Democrats have to hold them to their words. Everyone should also commit to the creation of a national agency that would conduct federal elections with a unified procedure which ensures trust that all citizens will have a fair chance. It would be harder for the losers to falsely cry wolf under such a system.

Claudio Lopez Guerra is an associate professor with political science and philosophy for the University of Richmond in Virginia and is the author of “Democracy and Disenfranchisement: The Morality of Electoral Exclusion.”