A lot of what needs to be done is making sure that the Harris win is large enough that you can’t easily claim that a handful of ballots should be tossed and change the outcome. That means:
- Check your voter registration — part of the Republican strategy has long been invalidating registrations so people can’t vote
- Volunteer — nothing in the world quite like talking to people.
- Donate — money is used for everything from ads to voter turnout operations
- Organize; be prepared to turn out with others in your community to actively object to any effort to ignore your votes
Jan 6 failed because a black cop decided to push the leader of the attacking mob, so that they followed him instead of going through an open door into the Senate chamber. It came that close.
They’ve had practice now.
No Congress-persons were in danger, ever. The only danger was to law enforcement and those rioting. Even if they had truly and utterly taken control of the Capitol building, Congress would have continued on with the counting elsewhere.
I really think you’re overestimating the likelihood of this sort of thing happening. It is not the 18th century and the US is not an undeveloped place with weak institutional systems.
The Republican party has been making a real effort to weaken institutions and things came remarkably close to killing members of congress. They literally had a gallows outside and gave interviews saying how they planned to hang people.
Yes of course they are making those efforts and saying those things. I’m suggesting that they are disorganized and stupid so the likelihood if success is infinitesimally small.
Also the US capitol has been attacked in the past. They have had escape systems in place for ages, especially from during the Cold War. There are so many resiliency and fallback plans. Congress can just pick up and continue in a secure location if they have to.
I think they’ve learned from past disorganization, and are likely to be a lot better next time.
Nobody thought that a mob of people could barge into the Capitol Building, either, and yet it did. Our institutional systems have exploitable flaws, like all do. You have to do the tedious work of bulletproofing your systems based on hypotheticals (“What if somebody did this?”) as well as fixing flaws after exploitation actually occurs.
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is stupid. It’s much, much harder to fix something after it’s broken.
This isn’t an if it ain’t broke moment. I really do think people overestimate what these people are capable of doing. Yea they can spend an afternoon having a temper tantrum but can they really change a government, which would require a sustained attack against a professional military?l
Why would the military be involved in certifying an election?
In protecting from any real attempt to take control through physical means. Forcing Congress to relocate would be egregious but it wouldn’t stop Congress from functioning.