Jill Stein

Vice President Kamala Harris is spending millions on new ads against Green Party candidate Jill Stein in swing state Wisconsin, warning potential supporters that a vote for Stein is a vote for Trump. The advertisement also attempts to smear Stein by asserting that she has links to KKK leader David Duke and Russian president Vladimir Putin. “You can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep,” a voiceover says. “Stein isn’t sorry about swinging the 2016 election to Trump.” The ad was paid for by the Democratic National Committee but approved by the Harris campaign.Why would Harris be using air-time to attack Stein just two weeks out from the election? There are a couple of theories.

President Donald Trump triumphantly returned to Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday — exactly twelve weeks after an attempted assassin shot Trump in the ear, killed a rally attendee, Corey Comperatore, and injured several others.Trump previously promised he would go back to finish his rally in Butler, and he did indeed show up at the same spot where he was very nearly killed, kicking off the event with an acknowledgment that the last time he was there, his speech was cut short. “As I was saying...” Trump said to cheers and laughter. He referenced the famous illegal immigration chart that likely saved his life, as he turned his head to look at it at the exact moment the shooter fired, ensuring the bullet grazed his ear and did not go through his head. “I love that chart.

For years, Republicans have claimed that theirs is the party of free speech. They have correctly amplified instances of the intolerant left cracking down on conservative speech, particularly on campuses, often under the bogus guise of combating "hate speech," racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia and other scourges they grossly exaggerate. Many of us on the right have mocked safe-space-craving Gen Z and millennial students and their expansive needs to feel “safe” by insulating them from speech that hurts their feelings. But now Republicans are conflating legitimate criticisms of Israel with antisemitism and essentially embracing the left’s victim culture in calling for safe spaces — if not by name — for pro-Israel Jews on college campuses.

In the closing months of the 2022 midterms North Carolina residents began receiving text messages and phone calls from unfamiliar numbers, a ritual all too familiar to a swing-state voter. The benevolent voice on the line had seen the recipient’s name on a petition to allow the Green Party on the ballot and wanted to ensure the signature was on the up and up. With validity confirmed the anonymous caller would reveal himself to be a Green Party representative. “If the Green Party is on the ballot, it’ll take votes away from Democrats, giving Republicans a huge advantage. It will help them win North Carolina in 2022 and 2024. There’s far too much at stake to let this happen. Are you interested in asking to have your name removed from this petition or leave it as is?

Within the last year, election officials and judges in a few key swing states reduced the Green party’s erstwhile ballot access to write-in only. They likely intended to reduce the Greens’ vote share to the benefit of Joe Biden and the Democratic party.Voters in Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin might have noticed the unusual absence of the Green party’s presidential ticket from their 2020 ballots. Democrat-controlled courts and Democratic election officials denied Green presidential candidate Howie Hawkins and his VP pick Angela Walker a place on those states’ ballots.

A healthy democracy requires free speech and free assembly, tolerance for different views, and peaceful transfers of power among contending parties. It requires honest elections, where losers do more than concede. They acknowledge the legitimacy of the outcome, as Al Gore did in a highly-contested 2000 president contest. These fundamental pillars of liberal self-government are now being challenged across Europe and the United States. It is crucial to recognize the challenge, call out the worst violations, and push back. Vitriolic, white-hot rhetoric now paints political opponents not as loyal opponents but as traitors, determined to overthrow not only specific leaders but the democratic system itself.