In case you missed the news, Joe Biden was elected president of the United States. With almost all ballots counted, Biden has over 75 million votes and Trump some 71 million. The Electoral College isn’t even close.

But Trump still has not conceded and some leading Republicans say he shouldn’t.

Senator Lindsey Graham warned on Sunday that Trump shouldn’t concede because “if Republicans don’t challenge and change the U.S. election system, there will never be another Republican president elected again.”

In other words, despite zero evidence of voter fraud, the GOP should attack the outcome of the election because a Democrat was elected president.  

The nation was already divided when Trump became president. But Trump exploited our divisions to gain and try to keep power. He didn’t just pour salt into our wounds. He planted grenades in them.

And now he and his enablers appear willing to pull the pins.

Elections usually end with losing candidates congratulating winners and graciously accepting defeat. They thereby demonstrate their commitment to the democratic system over the particular outcome they fought to achieve.

Apparently there will be no graciousness from Trump and his allies, and no concession from Trump.

They don’t want America to heal. Evidently, they are not committed to the democratic system. They’d prefer continuous warfare because that’s the only way they think they can win.

It’s a nearly treasonous act: Destroy public trust in the system in order to retain power.

Although Americans have strongly disagreed over what we want the government to do, we have agreed to be bound by the outcomes of our elections. This meta-agreement has required enough trust for us to regard the views and interests of those we disagree with as equally worthy of consideration as our own.

But Trump and his allies have continuously sacrificed that trust for partisan ends. And it looks like they won’t stop until they’ve destroyed whatever trust remains.

Trump will be president for another ten weeks. He is already mounting legal challenges and demanding recounts, maneuvers that could prevent states from meeting the legal deadline of December 8 for choosing electors.

If this continues, America could find itself in a situation similar to what it faced in 1876 when claims about ballot fraud forced a special electoral commission to decide the winner.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump, Graham, and Trump’s other Republican allies refuse to attend Biden’s inauguration. Maybe Trump stages a giant rally for himself instead, and Lindsey Graham introduces him as the “real” president. Trump sends firestorms of aggrieved messages to his followers – questioning Biden’s legitimacy as president and urging that they refuse to recognize his presidency.

This is followed by months of Trump rallies and tweets containing even more outlandish charges: plots against him and America by Biden, Nancy Pelosi, “deep-state” bureaucrats, “socialists,” immigrants, Muslims, or any other of his standard foes.

It could go on like this for years. Trump thereby keeps the nation’s attention focused on himself, remains the center of controversy and divisiveness, and makes it harder for Biden to heal the nation. Meanwhile, Lindsey Graham and his ilk keep millions of Republican voters in a state of perpetual fury leading up to the midterm elections of 2022 and the presidential election in 2024.

Now is the time for other Republican leaders to exercise true leadership and ask the nation to unify behind Biden.

Former President George W. Bush made a start. At the same time Graham was warning Trump not to concede, Bush phoned Biden to congratulate him, saying the race was “fundamentally fair” and “its outcome is clear.” In a subsequent statement Bush added, “I know Joe Biden to be a good man, who has won the opportunity to lead and unify our country.”

Kudos to Bush.

The media (including Twitter, Facebook, and even Fox News) can also help. They have already begun to call out Trump’s lies in real time and cut off his press conferences, practices that should have started years ago. They should continue to tag his lies and those of his allies, and ignore their baseless claims.

It would be a fitting end to a reality-TV president who has tried to turn America into a reality warzone.

Thanking You

The only good thing Trump has done is to awaken many of us to injustices that have plagued our country for centuries. 

Over the past four years, we’ve taken to the streets to raise our voices – from protecting the sovereignty of Indigenous land and water, to demanding an end to systemic racism and police brutality, to fighting back against nonstop attacks on reproductive freedom, and so much more.

This unprecedented wave of activism has made one thing clear: The American people are fired up.

And now we are taking that momentum to the ballot box. We are voting not only for ourselves and our family’s future, but for our community, for those whose votes have been suppressed, and for the survival of American democracy itself. 

We’ve made millions of phone calls, sent thousands of letters, and knocked on who knows how many doors. We’ve mobilized our families, friends, and neighbors to head to the polls. 

We are a multi-racial, multi-class coalition that’s come together in unprecedented solidarity to send this racist, narcissistic man packing.

You’ve been in or around politics for more than 50 years. How are you feeling about Tuesday’s election? 

I’m more frightened for my country than I’ve ever been. Another four years of Donald Trump would be devastating. Nonetheless, I suspect Biden will win.

But in 2016, the polls …. 

Polling is better now, and Biden’s lead is larger than Hillary Clinton’s was.  

What about the Electoral College? 

He’s also leading in the so-called “swing” states that gave Trump an Electoral College victory in 2016.

Will Trump contest the election? 

Yes. He’ll claim fraudulent mail-in ballots in any swing state with a Republican governor or legislature. He’ll tell them not to certify Biden electors until fraudulent ballots are weeded out.

What’s his goal? 

To deny Biden a majority of electors and throw the decision into the House of Representatives, where Republicans are likely to have a majority of state delegations.

Will it work? 

No, because technically Biden only needs a majority of electors already appointed. Even if disputed ones are excluded, I expect he’ll still get a majority.

What about late ballots? Trump has demanded all ballots be counted by midnight Election Day.  

It’s not up to him. It’s up to individual state legislatures and state courts. Most will count ballots as long they’re postmarked no later than Election Day.

Will these issues end up in the Supreme Court? 

Some may, but the justices know they have to appear impartial. Last week they turned down a request to extend the deadline for receiving mail-in ballots in Wisconsin but allowed extensions to remain in place in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

But the Supreme Court decided the 2000 election for George W. Bush. 

The last thing Chief Justice Roberts wants is another Bush v. Gore. With 6 Republican appointees now on the court, he knows the legitimacy of the court hangs in the balance.

Trump has called for 50,000 partisans to monitor polls while people vote, naming these recruits the “Army for Trump.“ Do you expect violence or intimidation? 

Not enough to affect the outcome.

Assume you’re right and Biden wins. Will Trump concede? 

I doubt it. He can’t stand to lose. He’ll continue to claim the election was stolen from him.

Will the Democrats retake the Senate? 

Too close to call.

If not, can Biden get anything done? 

Biden was a senator for 36 years and has worked with many of the current Republicans. He believes he can coax them into working with him.

Is he right?

I fear he’s overly optimistic. The GOP isn’t what it used to be. It’s now answerable to a much more conservative, Trumpian base.

If Republicans keep the Senate, what can we expect from a Biden administration? 

Reversals of Trump executive orders and regulations – which will restore environmental and labor protections and strengthen the Affordable Care Act. Biden will also fill the executive branch with competent people, who will make a big difference. And he’ll end Trump’s isolationist, go-it-alone foreign policy.

And if Democrats retake the Senate? 

Keep your expectations low. Both Clinton and Obama had Democratic congresses for their first two years yet spent all their political capital cleaning up economic messes their Republican predecessors left behind. Biden will inherit an even bigger economic mess plus a pandemic. With luck, he’ll enact a big stimulus package, reverse the Trump Republican tax cuts for the wealthy, and distribute and administer a Covid vaccine. All important, but nothing earth-shattering.

If Biden wins, he’ll be the oldest man to ever be president. Will this be a problem for him in governing? 

I don’t see why. He’s healthy. But I doubt he’ll seek a second term, which will affect how he governs.

What do you mean? 

He’s going to be a transitional rather than a transformational president. He won’t change the underlying structure of power in society. He won’t lead a movement. He says he’ll be a “bridge” to the next generation of leaders, by which I think he means that he’ll try to stabilize the country, maybe heal some of the nation’s wounds, so that he can turn the keys over to the visionaries and movement builders of the future.

Will Trump just fade into the sunset? 

Hardly. He and Fox News will continue to be the most powerful forces in the GOP, at least for the next four years.

And what happens if your whole premise is wrong and Donald Trump wins a second term? 

America and the rest of the world are seriously imperiled. I prefer not to think about it.

Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation as the ninth justice on the U.S. Supreme Court is a travesty of democracy.

The vote on Barrett’s confirmation occurred just eight days before Election Day. By contrast, the Senate didn’t even hold a hearing on Barack Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, who Obama nominated almost a year before the end of his term. Majority leader Mitch McConnell argued at the time that any vote should wait “until we have a new president.”

Barrett was nominated by a president who lost the popular vote by nearly 3 million ballots, and who was impeached by the House of Representatives. With Barrett now on the court, five of the nine justices have been appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.

The Republican senators who voted for her represent 15 million fewer Americans than their Democratic colleagues.

Barrett now joins 5 other reactionary justices who together will be able to declare laws unconstitutional, for perhaps a generation.

Barrett’s confirmation was the culmination of years in which a shrinking and increasingly conservative, rural, and white segment of the U.S. population has been imposing its will on the rest of America. They’ve been bankrolled by big business, seeking lower taxes and fewer regulations.

In the event Joe Biden becomes president on January 20 and both houses of Congress come under control of the Democrats, they can reverse this trend. It may be the last chance – both for the Democrats and, more importantly, for American democracy.

How?

For starters, increase the size of the Supreme Court. The Constitution says nothing about the number of justices. The court changed size seven times in its first 80 years, from as few as five justices under John Adams to ten under Abraham Lincoln.

Biden says if elected he’ll create a bipartisan commission to study a possible court overhaul “because it’s getting out of whack.” That’s fine, but he’ll need to move quickly. The window of opportunity could close by the 2022 midterm elections.

Second, abolish the Senate filibuster. Under current rules, 60 votes are needed to enact legislation in that chamber. This means that if Democrats win a bare majority there, Republicans could block any new legislation Biden hopes to pass.

The filibuster could be ended with a rule change requiring a mere 51 votes. There’s growing support among Democrats for doing this if they gain that many seats. During the campaign, Biden acknowledged that the filibuster has become a negative force in government.

The filibuster is not in the Constitution, either.

The most ambitious structural reform would be to rebalance the Senate itself, as well as the Electoral College. For decades, rural states have been emptying as the U.S. population has shifted to vast megalopolises. The result is a growing disparity in representation.

For example, both California, with a population of 40 million, and Wyoming, whose population is 579,000, get two senators. If population trends continue, by 2040 some 40 percent of Americans will live in just five states, and half of America will be represented by 18 Senators, the other half by 82.

This distortion also skews the Electoral College, because each state’s number of electors equals its total of senators and representatives. Hence, the recent presidents who have lost the popular vote.  

This growing imbalance can be remedied by creating more states representing a larger majority of Americans. At the least, statehood should be granted to Washington, D.C.

The Constitution is also silent on the number of states.

Those who recoil from structural reforms such as the three I’ve outlined warn that Republicans will retaliate when they return to power.

That’s rubbish. Republicans have already altered the ground rules. In 2016, they failed to win a majority of votes cast for the House, Senate, or the presidency, yet secured control over all three.

Amy Coney Barrett’s ascent is the latest illustration of how grotesque the Republican power grab has become, and how it continues to entrench itself ever more deeply. If not reversed soon, it will be impossible to remedy.

What’s at stake is not partisan politics. It’s representative government. If Democrats get the opportunity, they must redress this growing imbalance – for the sake of democracy.  

Barring a miracle, Amy Coney Barrett will be confirmed on Monday as the ninth justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. 

This is a travesty of democracy.

The vote on Barrett’s confirmation will occur just eight days before Election Day. By contrast, the Senate didn’t even hold a hearing on Barack Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, who Obama nominated almost a year before the end of his term. Majority leader Mitch McConnell argued at the time that any vote should wait “until we have a new president.”

Barrett was nominated by a president who lost the popular vote by nearly 3 million ballots, and who was impeached by the House of Representatives. When Barrett joins the court, five of the nine justices will have been appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.

The Republican senators who will vote for her represent 15 million fewer Americans than their Democratic colleagues.

Once on the high court, Barrett will join 5 other reactionaries who together will be able to declare laws unconstitutional, for perhaps a generation.

Barrett’s confirmation is the culmination of years in which a shrinking and increasingly conservative, rural, and white segment of the U.S. population has been imposing its will on the rest of America. They’ve been bankrolled by big business, seeking lower taxes and fewer regulations.

In the event Joe Biden becomes president on January 20 and both houses of Congress come under control of the Democrats, they can reverse this power grab. It may be the last chance – both for the Democrats and, more importantly, for American democracy.

How?

For starters, increase the size of the Supreme Court. The Constitution says nothing about the number of justices. The court changed size seven times in its first 80 years, from as few as five justices under John Adams to ten under Abraham Lincoln.

Biden says if elected he’ll create a bipartisan commission to study a possible court overhaul “because it’s getting out of whack.” That’s fine, but he’ll need to move quickly. The window of opportunity could close by the 2022 midterm elections.

Second, abolish the Senate filibuster. Under current rules, 60 votes are needed to enact legislation in that chamber. This means that if Democrats win a bare majority there, Republicans could block any new legislation Biden hopes to pass.

The filibuster could be ended with a rule change requiring a mere 51 votes. There’s growing support among Democrats for doing this if they gain that many seats. During the campaign, Biden acknowledged that the filibuster has become a negative force in government.

The filibuster is not in the Constitution, either.

The most ambitious structural reform would be to rebalance the Senate, and thereby the Electoral College. 

For decades, rural states have been emptying as the U.S. population has shifted to vast megalopolises. The result is a growing disparity in representation, especially of nonwhite voters.

For example, both California, with a population of 40 million, and Wyoming, whose population is 579,000, get two senators. If population trends continue, by 2040 some 40 percent of Americans will live in just five states, and half of America will be represented by 18 Senators, the other half by 82.

This distortion also skews the Electoral College, because each state’s number of electors equals its total of senators and representatives. Hence, the recent presidents who have lost the popular vote.  

This growing imbalance can be remedied by creating more states representing a larger majority of Americans. At the least, statehood should be granted to Washington, D.C. And given that 1 out of 8 Americans now lives in California – whose economy, if it were a separate country, would be the ninth largest in the world – why not split it into a North and South California?

The Constitution is also silent on the number of states.

Those who recoil from structural reforms such as the three I’ve outlined warn that Republicans will retaliate when they return to power.

That’s rubbish. Republicans have already altered the ground rules. In 2016, they failed to win a majority of votes cast for the House, Senate, or the presidency, yet secured control over all three.

Barrett’s ascent is the latest illustration of how grotesque the Republican power grab has become, and how it continues to entrench itself ever more deeply. If not reversed soon, it will be impossible to remedy.

What’s at stake is not partisan politics. It is representative government. If Democrats get the opportunity, they must redress this growing imbalance – for the sake of democracy.  

Biden was more passionate and forceful than he’s been in any debate so far – including in the primary debates. But Trump’s lies and bizarre outbursts were no less toxic. 

Here are the 4 biggest takeaways.

1. Trump tried to run the same campaign he did in 2016 – but it doesn’t work as an incumbent.

Trump accused Joe Biden of being a “typical politician.” He promised, again, that he would release his tax returns “as soon as possible.” He claimed that he would replace Obamacare with something “much better.” And he rehashed some of his favorite racist tropes, like calling some immigrants “low IQ.” 

Sound familiar? It should — he said exactly the same things in 2016. But then he was an outsider. Now that he’s been president for almost 4 years, we can see right through them. 

He’s had an entire term to release his tax returns and replace Obamacare – and he’s failed to do either. He’s filled his administration with lobbyists, corporate insiders, and his own family members — the exact opposite of draining the swamp. And he’s proven himself to be the very worst kind of lying, conman politician he used to rail against. 

They were the same old attacks, but they fell flat.

2. Trump’s conspiracy theories were beyond comprehension.

$3.5 million from Russia? Hunter Biden’s laptop? Spying on Trump’s campaign? 

We all know Trump has a penchant for conspiracy theo ries, but last night he took them to an incoherent low. The conspiracies he conjured up were indecipherable, even to the most ardent Fox News viewer. 

He’s slipping in the polls, his campaign’s cash is evaporating, and he can’t run on COVID or the economy or anything else that matters to the American people. So he’s latching on to more and more bizarre lies. Swing voters have no idea what he’s talking about when he rambles on about Hunter Biden’s laptop and the mayor of Moscow. They have more important problems on their minds, which Trump has failed to address – or has worsened.

3. Biden put a human face to the harm Trump has inflicted on our country.

Throughout the night, Biden refused to sink to Trump’s childish lows. Biden highlighted the human suffering that Trump’s failed coronavirus response has caused. 

He looked directly into the camera and spoke to the American people, talking about our staggering death toll of 220,000; about how firefighters, nurses, teachers, and first responders were going to lose their jobs because Trump was more concerned about playing politics than helping the country; letting them know he understands the grief so many are going through right now. 

And he promised to be a president for all Americans – not just those who voted for him. After four years of Trump’s divisiveness, malignant narcissism, and abject cruelty, Biden’s message of unity and healing could not be more of a contrast – and more welcome.

4. Trump’s lies were more outrageous than ever.

Trump claimed he was “the least racist person in the room,” and that he’d done more for Black Americans than any president since Abraham Lincoln. He also downplayed the devastating toll of coronavirus, and even declared that he knew “more about wind” than Biden. 

It was the performance of a desperate con man whose ignorance and racism have been on full display for far too long.

Look, the choice couldn’t be clearer. But we can’t be complacent. We know that Trump will do anything to hold on to power, and there’s no telling what he’ll do as he gets more unhinged. 

So please: Organize. Volunteer. Make a plan to vote. Mobilize your neighbors. We can’t afford anything less than a blowout victory for Joe Biden and Democrats all the way down the ballot.

Just 11 days to go. Let’s make every second count.

How to Stop Trump from Stealing the Election

That means less-populous Republican-dominated states like Alaska (with one House member, who’s a Republican) would have the same clout as large Democratic states like California (with 53 House members, 45 of whom are Democrats). 

So if the decision goes to the House, Trump has the advantage right now: 26 of state congressional delegations in the House are now controlled by Republicans, and 22 by Democrats (two — Pennsylvania and Michigan — are essentially tied).

But he won’t necessarily keep that advantage after the election. If the decision goes to the House, it would be made by lawmakers elected in November, who will be sworn in on January 3 – three days before they’ll convene to decide the winner of the election.

Which is why House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is focusing on races that could tip the balance of state delegations – not just in Pennsylvania and Michigan but any others within reach. “It’s sad we have to plan this way,” she wrote recently, “but it’s what we must do to ensure the election is not stolen.”

The targets are Alaska (where replacing the one House member, now a Republican, with a Democrat, would result in a vote for Biden), Montana (ditto), Pennsylvania (now tied, so flipping one would be enough), Florida (now 14 Republicans and 13 Democrats, but 3 Republicans are retiring) and Michigan (where Republicans now have 6 members and Democrats 7).

Congress has decided contested elections only three times in U.S. history, in 1801, 1825, and 1877. But we might face another because Donald Trump will stop at nothing to retain his power.

That’s why it’s even more critical for you to vote. Make this a blowout victory for Joe Biden and Democrats down the ballot, and stop Trump from stealing this election.

Trump and many Republicans insist that the decisions whether to wear a mask, go to a bar or gym, or work or attend school during a pandemic should be personal. Government should play no role.

Yet they also insist that what a woman does with her own body or whether same-sex couples can marry should be decided by government.

It’s a tortured, topsy-turvy view of what’s public and what’s private. Yet it’s remarkably prevalent as the pandemic resurges and as the Senate considers Trump’s pick for the Supreme Court.

By contrast, Joe Biden has wisely declared he would do “whatever it takes” to stop the pandemic, including mandating masks and locking down the entire economy if scientists recommend it. “I would shut it down; I would listen to the scientists,” he said.

And Biden wants to protect both abortion and same-sex marriage from government intrusion. In 2012 he memorably declared his support of the latter before even Barack Obama did so.

Trump’s opposite approaches, discouraging masks and other Covid restrictions while seeking government intrusion into the most intimate decisions anyone makes, have become the de facto centerpieces of his campaign.

At his “town hall” on Thursday night, Trump falsely claimed that most people who wear masks contract the virus.

He also criticized governors for ordering lockdowns, adding that Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer “wants to be a dictator.“ (He was speaking just one week after state and federal authorities announced they had thwarted an alleged plot to kidnap and possibly kill Whitmer.)

Attorney General William Barr – once again contesting Trump for the most wacky analogy – has called state lockdown orders the “greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history” since slavery.

Yet at the very same time Trump and his fellow-travelers defend peoples’ freedom to infect others or become infected with Covid-19, they’re inviting government to intrude into the most intimate aspects of personal life.

Trump has promised that the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, establishing a federal right to abortion, will be reversed “because I am putting pro-life justices on the court.”

Much of controversy over Trump’s nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court hinges on her putative willingness to repeal Roe.

While an appeals court judge, Barrett ruled in favor of a law requiring doctors to inform the parents of any minor seeking an abortion, without exceptions, and also joined a dissenting opinion suggesting that an Indiana state law requiring burial or cremation of fetal remains was constitutional.

A Justice Barrett might also provide the deciding vote for reversing Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 Supreme Court decision protecting same-sex marriage. Only three members of the majority in that case remain on the Court.

Barrett says her views are rooted in the “text” of the Constitution. That’s a worrisome omen given that earlier this month Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito opined that the right to same-sex marriage “is found nowhere in the text” of the Constitution.

What’s public, what’s private, and where should government intervene? The question suffuses the impending election and much else in modern American life.

It is nonsensical to argue, as do Trump and his allies, that government cannot mandate masks or close businesses during a pandemic but can prevent women from having abortions and same-sex couples from marrying.

The underlying issue is the common good, what we owe each other as members of the same society. During wartime, we expect government to intrude on our daily lives for the common good: drafting us into armies, converting our workplaces and businesses, demanding we sacrifice normal pleasures and conveniences.  During a pandemic as grave as this one we should expect no less intrusion, in order that we not expose each other to the risk of contracting the virus.

But we have no right to impose on each other our moral or religious views about when life begins or the nature and meaning of marriage. The common good requires instead that we honor such profoundly personal decisions.

Public or private? We owe it to each other to understand the distinction.

“I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters,“ Trump boasted in 2016.

Trump’s 5^th Avenue principle is being tested as never before. So far, more than 214,000 Americans have died from Covid-19, one of the world’s highest death rates – due in part to Trump initially downplaying its dangers, then refusing responsibility for it, promoting quack remedies for it, muzzling government experts on it, pushing states to reopen despite it, and discouraging people from wearing masks.

Yet some 40 percent of Americans have stuck by him nonetheless. They’ve remained loyal even after he turned the White House into a hotspot for the virus, even after he caught it himself, and even after asserting just days ago that it’s less lethal than the flu. A recent nonpartisan study concluded that Trump’s blatant disinformation has been the largest driver of COVID misinformation in the world.

They’ve stuck by him even as more than 11 million Americans have lost their jobs, 40 million risk eviction from their homes, 14 million have lost health insurance, and almost one out of five Americans with kids at home cannot afford to adequately feed their children.

They’ve stuck by him even though more Americans have sought unemployment benefits this year than voted for him in 2016, even after Trump cut off talks on economic relief, even though he’s pushing the Supreme Court to repeal the Affordable Care Act, causing 20 million more to lose health insurance.  

Trump is in effect standing in the middle of 5^th Avenue, killing Americans.

Yet here we are, just a few weeks before the election, and his supporters still haven’t budged. The latest polls show him with 40% to 43% of voters, while Joe Biden has a bare majority.

The most egregious test of Trump’s 5^th Avenue principle is still to come, when he tries to kill off American democracy. He’s counting on his supporters to keep him in power even after he loses the popular vote.

He’s ready to claim that mail-in ballots, made necessary by the pandemic, are rife with “fraud like you’ve never seen,” as he asserted during his debate with Biden – although it’s been shown that Americans are more likely to be struck by lightning than commit voter fraud.

He’ll likely allege fraudulent election results in any Republican-led state which he loses by a small margin – such as Arizona, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin.

Then he’ll rely on the House of Representatives to put him over the top.

“We are going to be counting ballots for the next two years,” Trump warned at a recent Pennsylvania rally, noting “we have the advantage if we go back to Congress. I think it’s 26 to 22 or something because it’s counted one vote per state.”

He was referring to the 12^th Amendment to the Constitution, which provides that if state electors deadlock or can’t agree on a president, the decision goes to the House. There, each of the nation’s 50 states get one vote.

That means small Republican-dominated states like Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming (each with one House member, who’s a Republican) would have the same clout as large Democratic states like California (with 52 House members, 44 of whom are Democrats).

Trump does have the advantage right now: 26 state congressional delegations in the House are now controlled by Republicans, and 22 by Democrats. Two — Pennsylvania and Michigan — are essentially tied.

But he won’t necessarily retain that advantage. The decision would be made by lawmakers elected in November, who will be sworn in on January 3 – three days before they’ll convene to decide the winner of the election.

Which is why House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is focusing on races that could tip the balance of state delegations – not just in Pennsylvania and Michigan but any others within reach.

“It’s sad we have to have to plan this way,” she wrote in a letter to her colleagues last week, “but it’s what we must do to ensure the election is not stolen.”

Trump’s 5^th Avenue principle has kept him in power despite deprivation and death that would have doomed the presidencies of anyone else. But as a former New Yorker he should know that 5^th Avenue ends at the Harlem River at 142nd Street, and the end is near.