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HISTORY
February 1, 2017
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MONTH
Page 7
O PINION
Democracy Demands Probe on Foreign Influence
Serving as a
check on the
executive
M arC h. M orial
The first few days
Donald Trump’s pres-
idency have seen what
may be the beginning
of the end of the Af-
fordable Care Act, an
average annual hike
of $500 for middle-class home-
owners’ mortgage insurance pre-
miums, a hint at a re-invasion of
Iraq and a shift in the Department
of Justice’s effort to protect voting
rights.
Yet, the overwhelming cloud
that hangs over the Trump Ad-
ministration is the suggestion of
Russian interference in the elec-
tion. Investigators from six dif-
ferent US intelligence and law
enforcement agencies have been
examining possible links between
Russian officials and Trump’s
presidential campaign.
by
This cloud hangs not only over
Trump’s presidency, but over
American democracy itself. Pres-
ervation of the integrity of our
democratic process depends upon
the aggressive pursuit of the
truth – and the full coopera-
tion of President Trump and
his advisors in that pursuit.
Media reports indicate
that investigations into
Trump’s Russian ties began
as far back as last spring –
before the FBI received the
notorious dossier alleging that
Russian operatives held compro-
mising information about Trump,
and that there was a continuing
exchange of information between
the Russian Government and
Trump associates.
Any concrete evidence in sup-
port of these allegations would be
damaging to Trump’s presidency.
And failure to investigate them
would be even more damaging to
the nation itself.
Democracy, while a founding
principle of the United States, has
been a work in progress from the
days when only white, male – and
in some states, Protestant Chris-
tian – property owners were per-
mitted to vote. Gradually, over
two centuries, the franchise was
extended to non-landowners, Na-
tive Americans, women, and peo-
ple of color.
We still are engaged in the
business of expanding and pro-
tecting our democracy, fighting
back racially-motivated voter
suppression laws and contending
with the anti-democratic effects
of the Electoral College. Our goal
must be a full and true democracy,
where every citizen has an equal
opportunity to be heard, without
the corrupting influence of foreign
agents working against American
interests.
If a foreign government in-
terfered to boost one candidate
chances, it’s not merely an affront
to the losing candidate; it’s an af-
front to every single honest, vot-
ing citizen. It’s an affront to Amer-
ican democracy.
Because President Trump was
elevated to office by the anachro-
nistic Electoral College, counter
to the choice of a majority of vot-
ers, he owes the American people
an exceptional level of deference.
He should go to every length to
demonstrate that his own conduct,
at least, was above-board and be-
yond reproach. Any attempt to
stonewall an investigation should
be viewed with the utmost skep-
ticism.
His public statements on Rus-
sia and its President, Vladimir
Putin, have been contradictory at
the very least. In 2013, 2014 and
2015, he said he had a relationship
with Putin, had spoken with him
and had gotten to know him. In
the third Presidential debate, he
said he’d never met him. In the
second debate he said he has no
dealings with Russia and no busi-
nesses there. But his son, Donald
Trump Jr., said in 2008 that “Rus-
sians make up a pretty dispropor-
tionate cross-section of a lot of our
assets.” This confusion should
raise serious questions.
President Trump appears to be
engaged in a campaign of disinfor-
mation about his election – claim-
ing without evidence that he was
denied a popular victory by mil-
lions of illegal votes. His appar-
ent obsession extends to making
repeated false statements about
attendance at his inauguration.
His preoccupation could compli-
cate our intelligence agencies’ at-
tempts to ferret out the truth. It’s
our hope that he will see that any
failure to cooperate or to encour-
age a full investigation would be
crippling to the nation.
During the Inauguration cere-
mony on Jan. 20, much was made
about the “peaceful transfer of
power” that is and should be an
example for the world. But that
peaceful transition depends upon
the strict balance of powers as
outlined in the Constitution. It’s
up to our legislative and judicial
branches to serve as a check on
the executive, beginning with the
investigation into foreign influ-
ence.
Marc H. Morial is president
and chief executive officer of the
National Urban League.
A Plain-As-Day Lie About His Inauguration Crowd
The trouble with Trump’s ‘alternative facts’
P eter C erto
About an hour
after
Donald
Trump was sworn
in, I was having
lunch with my
wife and our five-
month-old. As we picked at our
food outside my office in D.C.’s
Dupont Circle neighborhood,
groups of tourists trickled by in
Trump regalia.
Early the next morning, as I
dumped a pail of diapers in the
trash can out front, I ran into a
much different crowd: throngs of
people wearing pink and carrying
anti-Trump signs, passing through
my neighborhood on their way to
the Women’s March.
It was scarcely 7am, yet already
I’d seen more pink hats than I’d
seen red ones the day before. Sur-
prised — and still in my pajama
pants — I scurried inside.
DC’s Women’s March alone
attracted three times as many
visitors as Trump’s inauguration,
crowd experts quoted by The
New York Times estimate. Ac-
cording to ridership data from the
DC Metro system, only one other
event topped it: Barack Obama’s
inauguration in 2009.
This was obvious to anyone
who lives here, and to anyone
by
who’s seen aerial photos of the
crowd.
Of course, whose crowd is big-
ger matters only a little more than
whose hands are bigger, among
other appendages Trump likes to
size up. But sometimes he can’t
help himself.
At a moment you’d expect a
new president to be busy with oth-
er things, Trump directed his press
short, used its inaugural press con-
ference to tell bald-faced, easily
falsifiable lies — and many Amer-
icans believed them. Aerial pho-
tos, crowd experts, Metro data,
even TV ratings be damned — all
that mattered were the “alternative
facts” of the Trump team.
There’s more at stake here than
a “whose is bigger?” contest —
including for millions of Trump
The Trump administration, in
short, used its inaugural press
conference to tell bald-faced, easily
falsifiable lies...
secretary to announce that his
crowds had been “the largest au-
dience to ever witness an inaugu-
ration, period.” Any media outlet
that told you differently, he said,
was lying.
It was laughably untrue. But it
wasn’t a lie, Trump adviser Kel-
lyanne Conway told NBC. It was
just an an “alternative fact.”
If that doesn’t set your Orwell
alarm off, I don’t know what will.
Yet almost immediately, Trump’s
version of events started circu-
lating through conservative news
sites and social media outlets.
The Trump administration, in
supporters. To see how, let me tell
you something else about Trump’s
first day in office.
Shortly after announcing that
“every decision” will be “made
to benefit American workers and
American families,” Trump re-
treated to the Oval Office to sign
his first directives as president.
The first raised mortgage fees
for working families, including
many who probably supported
Trump. Another began the process
of dismantling a health care law
that’s helped 20 million people get
insurance.
Trump voters in red states could
be especially hard-hit.
From Florida to Pennsylvania,
in fact, over 6 million people get-
ting health insurance subsidies
live in states that Trump won.
Combined with the law’s Medic-
aid expansion and protections for
people with pre-existing condi-
tions, that’s helped deep-red states
like Kentucky and West Virginia
cut their uninsured rates by half.
But here’s the question: If
Trump can tell you your own eyes
are lying about a simple aerial
photograph of his inauguration,
can he also convince you your
mortgage fees didn’t just go up?
Or that you’ll still have health
care after he axes your subsidy
and gives your insurer permission
to drop you?
Talk about “alternative facts.”
If those things slide, what else can
he get away with?
Trump voters are famously
skeptical of Washington. Of all
people, I hope they’d agree that
watching what a politician does
tells you more than hearing what
he says. If they shut their eyes
now, they’re going to get sucker
punched.
Peter Certo is the editorial
manager of the Institute for Policy
Studies and the editor of Other-
Words.org.
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