“A leading historian of U.S. democracy issues an urgent warning”

Greg Sargent:

Which raises a question: In a future presidential election, if Republicans control both chambers of Congress and similar objections are brought against a victorious Democrat’s electors, mightn’t they succeed in invalidating them?

“It’s become a lot easier to envision that in the last month,” Alexander Keyssar, the leading historian of U.S. democracy, told me. “I find this to be very worrisome — very disturbing.”

This is striking from a cautious academic like Harvard’s Keyssar. His great new book recounting the story of the electoral college, and his history of the contested right to vote in America, are models of meticulous scholarship. The latter recounts the worst democratic breakdowns in our history.

Now Keyssar thinks we’re seeing the portents of another serious breakdown. By seeking to invalidate Biden’s electors, Keyssar warned, Republicans have showed a “willingness” to “go down this path,” making this more likely to “happen again in different circumstances.”

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