Opinion: The Stolen Election as Metaphor – David Stringer, Publisher

Ballots will soon go out for the 2022 midterm election. In many ways this year’s election has become a referendum on the 2020 Presidential election. According to polls, a large majority of Republican voters do not believe President Trump actually lost the election. Some Independents and even a few Democrats doubt the integrity of the election that drove Donald Trump from office.

Two years into the Biden administration, Donald Trump continues to dominate American politics as no other former president in history.  Huge crowds still flock to his rallies and the media hangs on his every word. Lawsuits, criminal investigations, courtroom setbacks—nothing seems to dim his celebrity status.

Belief in the Stolen Election has become an article of faith in Republican politics. Apostacy leads to political death.  In Arizona’s August primary, even a nod from the Governor and the most lavishly financed campaign in the history of the state could not save the campaign of Karrin Robson,  who would not acknowledge that the 2020 election was stolen.  Instead, victory went to an underfinanced  political  neophyte,  Kari Lake,  whose belief  in the Stolen Election earned her Donald  Trump’s endorsement.  That’s all it took.  She won going away. The same can be said for  Mark Finchem,  Abe Hamadeh, and Blake Masters, all of whom defeated better known and better financed opponents.

My own loyalty to Donald Trump runs deep. I was a Trump supporter before it was cool. In 2015  I was a Trump delegate to the National Convention of the Federation of Republican Assemblies in Nashville. Trump was the only presidential candidate who showed up. Ted Cruz sent his dad.  But the convention endorsed Cruz anyway.

In January of  2016,  I was invited to organize the Yavapai County Trump for President Committee.  We held our first meeting in the breakfast room of my hotel,  the old Comfort Inn on White Spar Road.  I was running for the State Legislature at the time. We selected Brenda  Dickinson,  now on the Prescott Valley Town Council,  to head the Trump Committee.  Former Arizona Treasurer,  Jeff DeWitt, who headed  the state Trump organization, said we were the most successful Trump committee in the State.  Brenda got an award.

Trump was hands down the best President I can remember.  The knocks  on Trump— his bombastic, over the top public personality,  his alleged sexual indiscretions and womanizing, his sharp business practices—none of those things cut any ice with me.  He was the first President in my lifetime, that understood that immigration–both legal and illegal immigration—is a threat to the Historic American Nation– and tried to do something  about it. His removal from office has been a disaster for our country.  I’m not sure the damage can be undone.

But what about the Stolen Election? President Trump and successful Republican candidates all over the country say it happened. Election fraud, ballot harvesting, unreliable voting machines,  dishonest election officials, and so on.

As a trial lawyer I spent a career in courtrooms examining evidence.  I have an appreciation for the facts and what can be proven. I’ve looked at the evidence of fraud as closely and honestly as I know how. I’ve tried to go the extra mile. On Prescott eNews we featured dozens of Dr. Lyle Rapacki’s  Arizona Today interviews with the key players in the Arizona audit– Doug Logan, Sen  Sonny Borrelli,  Rep Mark Finchem, and many others  involved in the investigation of election fraud. I’ve reviewed the court decisions. I’ve seen  2000 Mules twice.  In short, I’m a Trump supporter completely open to evidence of a Stolen Election. But I don’t see it.

Some election irregularities have been proven. There have been some guilty pleas.  Investigations have shown that there have been multiple ballots sent to the same address, ballots mailed to people who have moved or are deceased.  But Donald Trump lost Arizona by 10,000 votes. Election fraud on that scale simply hasn’t been proven.

But what has been proven is that there was the opportunity for fraud on a much bigger scale. Ballot harvesting, lack of signature verification on ballots, poor ballot security, the possibility that people not eligible to vote might have found a way to vote—those kind of things could have occurred.  Our lax election procedures created that risk. That’s not the same as proof that they actually did occur.  But the risk or possibility that they could have occurred is a legitimate concern.

Voters have a right to expect an election system that works. We shouldn’t be left guessing. What we have learned about the 2020 election is that  there is a need for a higher level of ballot security and a deeper level of scrutiny into our election procedures. To doubt the outcome of the 2020  election in Arizona does not make one a Tin Hat conspiracy theorist.

But for me the question of the Stolen Election has little to do with election fraud. It has everything do to with a much deeper betrayal of our standards of civic discourse by the elites who control our civic culture—a biased media and entertainment industry, “woke” cultural and educational institutions, and an entrenched, ‘Deep State’ bureaucracy. The Stolen Election is best understood as a metaphor for a culture and a country  that have  been hijacked.

The Historic American Nation—the founding European peoples, their culture and their posterity–have been  betrayed by elites who do not share their ancestry, history, religion, or values.  America is increasingly governed by people who are not us, who hold us in contempt and want to replace us. Trump spoke for us. The hatred of the elites for Trump, their contempt and mockery and determination to destroy him reflects their hatred for us.

The Stolen Election is a metaphor for the deceit and fakery that eats away at the political life of our country. To understand that the 2020 election was stolen, we don’t have to prove that illegal ballots were cast or Dominion voting machines were hooked up to the internet. The Stolen Election is a metaphor for the betrayal of our people and our culture. We are a nation betrayed. We don’t need to prove it in a court  of law. The evidence is all around us.