Opinion: Why does the Winner of the American Election Matter to Us?

People across Canada care deeply about the results of next month's American Presidential election. This story is the second half of a two part series that began yesterday. You can read Part One, the introduction to this story, here.

For additional reading and sources, all underlined and highlighted phrases and statistics can be clicked or tapped to learn more about them.

Why does the Winner of the American Election Matter to Us?

With only two choices of major parties in America, it’s easy to design a one vs. another battleground. And if the way parties are portrayed opposite each other fuels the fire, what started it?

It begins with Donald Trump, America’s sitting President. Something changed when his original campaign began over five years ago (yes, it really was that long ago). Because the division isn’t about parties - we in Canada also have starkly different opinions. The division is about an attitude.

And just as MPP Stephen Crawford described in part one, that attitude is the problem. Trump’s attitude is one based in fear because that’s how he exploits people who are (or who he thinks are) weaker than him.

The root problem with Donald Trump is that he is an evil, dangerous person and a pathological liar. His policies have corrupted the integrity of American democracy and repeatedly threatened the lives of his own citizens.

Is this an extreme statement? I don’t think so. Let’s take a short moment to look at his track record.

#1 - He’s racist. Besides a catalogued 40-year history of public racism, one of the more memorable instances was his public slander of Rep. Ilhan Omar and her being born in Somalia, Africa.

#2 - He’s xenophobic. His policies against immigration and the treatment of legal residents of the USA and refugees is repugnant. Remember when he ordered children be permanently separated from their parents? And that’s all without mentioning his expensive and ineffective border wall with Mexico.

#3 - He's sexist. Skeptical? Here's a verified list of 61 vile things he's said about women over the years and how he views them. This is in addition to how he speaks about and treats his daughter, wife, and his regular behaviour he once described on an Access Hollywood bus.

#4 - He’s homophobic. Opposing the Equality Act and Undermining and/or criminalizing LGBTQ+ military service is just scratching the surface. Thankfully, there are other reporters who know this topic better than I do.

#5 - He’s an advocate for domestic terrorism. This is a big one. Not only has he failed to denounce white supremacy for more than three years, he’s also publicly rallied Nazi organizations like the Proud Boys and just last week commended a group of men who were arrested for their thwarted kidnapping plot of one of his political rivals. (But Gretchen Whitmer, target of that crime, had an incredible and humbling response.)

#6 - He’s almost certainly a guilty criminal. Beyond the extortion he’s guilty of from denying funds to Democrat-run states until after the election because Trump wouldn’t fund a secondary COVID-19 relief bill last week, he’s also guilty of conflicts on interest in office. A strong example is his false claims of the drug Regeneron, of which Trump is an investor, is a Coronavirus "cure". (And let's not forget Donald Trump was impeached, with the House of Representatives charging him on two counts.)

And this is just the beginning. None of this touches on his hypocrisy or how he contradicts himself. Maclean’s magazine did an in-depth look into all the unethical and corrosive things Trump has done since 2015. You can read it here if you still aren’t convinced of what Trump’s character truly is.

You know what I personally find remarkable? We knew Trump was like this even before he was a nominee for the presidency. Sixteen-time Emmy winner John Oliver famously did an in-depth research piece on his popular show Last Week Tonight in February 2016. (There is no shortage of programs that have investigated Trump, but Oliver provides an effective introduction.)

It’s crazy that one individual has manipulated the power of America's institutions to do whatever he says. If America can go down this road, the peers of my age are asking: "What's preventing that gradual change from happening in Canada too?"

Donald Trump isn’t really a politician. Politicians understand both systems and reasons why policies should be implemented to benefit the people they represent. They do this by finding accurate facts, data, science and research to understand problems and propose solutions. Democracy, then, is the process of streamlining how we agree on the best way of doing this and whose judgement we trust with it.

But Trump doesn’t do this. The primary characteristic that qualifies you to do any of what I’ve described above is being a good listener. Watch any clip of Donald Trump on television or online. He doesn’t listen because he’s too proud to do so. Instead of being a politician, he’s abused America’s systems and its global standing to benefit him, his business, and his bank account.

If an effective democracy is a governed state having influence into how their society runs, then Donald Trump has bastardized the way politics are run in the United States. It matters to us because our own politicians at all levels and from all parties unanimously agree our existence and lifestyles are intertwined with the States. Whatever is possible in America is possible in Canada.

Could America's results really impact Canada?

Of course they could. What gives further credibility to this fear is the threat already exists.

Let’s look at one example made famous two weeks ago in the interruption-filled televised presidential debate. When Trump was asked to condemn and denounce white supremacy, he instead told the Nazi organization “Proud Boys” to “stand back and stand by.”

But one Twitter user last week researched connections between this group to Canada, and it wasn’t distant. Gavin McInnes, Proud Boys co-founder, is an alumnus of Canada’s radical right Rebel News. Rebel’s co-founder, Hamish Marschall, was Andrew Scheer’s campaign manger in last year’s Canadian federal election.

And these connections aren’t hard to find, either. It took ten minutes and three sources for me to verify them.

This vocalized encouragement is the kind of thing that Trump’s supporters interpret as permission to do despicable, inhuman things. Some baseline examples may include:

The lack of dignity and decorum Trump shows has the ability to spread just as easily as COVID-19. He’s never punished or denounced by a higher authority for the vulgar, untruthful garbage he says.

If you need an example of how undignified he is, take a look at clips of his public speaking from the first debate against Joe Biden on September 29, 2020. Daniel Dale (a Canadian reporter who now works for CNN) fact-checks Trump through highlights of the night with Wolf Blitzer.

Further danger comes from Trump’s efforts to discredit the validity of America’s voting system. There’s a fantastic Netflix mini-series (that’s also available for free on YouTube) talking about Republican voter suppression.

But Trump won’t commit to honouring the election results unless he’s declared the winner. What happens if he refuses to leave the Oval Office, even if he definitely and mathematically loses?

Republicans under Trump no longer compete for votes. Political commentator and author David Frum (a conservative Canadian who once served as Republican President George W. Bush’s speechwriter) wrote this week: “If they [Republicans] lose in 2020, they may accept that this project [voter suppression] has failed. But if Trump wins the Electoral College again in 2020, Republicans will collect the rewards of power without earning them the democratic way. It's a sinister proof of concept. When something works, it survives. It spreads.”

Do you really think Donald Trump cares about who actually wins? This is a defining characteristic of corruption: in his mind, the winner of this election has already been decided.

Better people and better politicians alike can see right through this guise. When asked about his own impressions of Biden and Trump, MPP Crawford wouldn’t say on record his preference. He did, however, stress that the character of a candidate is just as important if not more so than their policies.

“Stability, honesty and integrity are so important,” says Crawford. He also says “We will have to deal with whoever is elected President as a town, province and a country.”

I would add that Trump's rare (and sometimes accidental) being right about any given subject, be it the economy, China, or foreign wars, doesn’t matter. Benito Mussolini was good for the economy and Adolf Hitler built autobahns that still serve Germany well. Yet those aren't the defining qualities of their legacies or their integrity as leaders.

That’s why this election resonates with Canadians. If we really are in a “family” with America, we don't just see the problem but also see the cause. Our town and country are nervously waiting to see if they’ll rid themselves from Trump as president - the cancer that will be the death of integrity that has defined America for nearly 250 years.

We don't care more about America's election - we care about ensuring Donald Trump loses

Now that we know why this election matters to us and that Donald Trump - not politics at its root - is the problem, what are we going to do about it? It means we as locals, both as townspeople locally and as citizens of Canada who believe in the health of democracy, must act to ensure Trump loses.

Thankfully, there are things we can do. A lot of them. And if we do, we can override the fear that intrigued us in the 2020 American election in the first place.

Some would argue we shouldn’t talk about another country’s electoral contest so it doesn’t appear we’re “interfering” with their election. I disagree. If the results impact us, we have a right to discuss it.

There are hundreds of thousands of American citizens who live in Canada. 377,410 of them are dual citizens, and nearly one million people in Canada are either dual citizens of the United States or hold partial US citizenship in addition to another country. And did you know within Canada reside 660,935 eligible voters for this election? That’s more than one quarter of the 2.56 million people eligible to vote abroad.

If that number were distributed proportionally across Canada it would mean 3,437 of those voters would live just in the town of Oakville. That’s thousands of people! It’s likely you as an Oakvillean know someone eligible to vote in this election within two or three degrees of separation.

But this same sentiment holds true for all Canadians. It’s likely you know multiple people who have a voice and a vote in terms of who America’s next president will be. It’s critical to our own political health that you tell them how dangerous, evil and cancerous Donald Trump is.

That's not an unpopular idea among Canadians - more than 80% of our country doesn't want Trump to win. Take out Alberta and according to the other nine provinces that number jumps to more than 87%.

I’ve had this conversation with countless people I know, including my friends who are American, both in America and living here in Canada. I'm a former Florida resident (a key state in the electoral college, America’s presidential voting system) and have spoken with my former neighbours.

Even my own two stepbrothers are dual citizens, and they’re both registered in the state of Arizona - another “battleground” state. I’m proud of both of their decisions to vote against Donald Trump.

These conversations are initially anxious. They are also necessary to Canada’s own democratic health.

If you voted for Donald Trump in 2016 because he was going to “drain the swamp” or “Make America Great Again” or “Run America like a business” - you were tricked. You got conned. It makes sense because Trump has been conning people his whole life.

But if you vote for Trump in 2020, you are declaring that you are on the side of white nationalism, misogynistic suffering, exploitation, criminality and evil. No excuses. He’s shown you exactly who he is and if you embrace that, you are making a mistake.

I’m even going a step further. I am no longer willing to engage in conversations with any blood relative, friend or colleague I know who consciously supports Donald Trump as a leader after my speaking with them, regardless of where they live.

This isn’t a question of politics. It’s a question of whether an amoral man is entitled to the power and influence he has knowingly exploited to steal, murder, lie and hoard.

And the answer is no.

It's not my place to tell someone who to vote for. In this race, however, it is my responsibility and ethical obligation to speak about who not to vote for. Local outlets like Oakville News aren't the only publication speaking about this, either - a similar long-format, researched opinion was published just today in the New York Times.

I found myself in an uncomfortable personal position when Donald Trump was confirmed to have the Coronavirus two weeks ago on Friday, October 2. He’s 74, obese, and conflicting medical reports mean we have no idea how healthy he is or isn’t. And he likely infected dozens of others.

But I hope - as I still hope, because there's nobody outside the White House staff who yet has evidence he's recovered - he does get well. I hope his health improves for two reasons. Primarily, I myself am a man of Christian faith. Jesus himself says in the gospel of Matthew:

You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. (Matthew 5:43-44)

As a compassionate person of the human race, nobody should have to die from the Coronavirus, including people of wickedness like Donald Trump.

Secondly, just as I (uncomfortably) have compassion for Trump, I also have compassion for the families of the 220,000+ Americans who this virus has killed; more than any other country in the world. I have compassion for the millions of families Trump’s laws have persecuted for years. I have compassion for the 65.8 million people who voted against him in 2016 and have to withstand his public bigotry first-hand every day.

These people deserve better than merely seeing Trump meet an ironic end by dying of this virus. He needs to get better so he can be held accountable for the thousands of horrible things he’s done. Then he needs to be removed by the people voting him out.

We as Canadians - collaborative, just, and compassionate - are afraid Trump’s damage could one day happen here. Him winning the 2020 Presidential election dramatically increases the chance that will happen.

That’s why this election matters here and why the result matters to us. Not just to us, to our town, to our country, or to America - it matters for every person on Earth.

Now let’s do something about it.

The Oakville News editorial board has contributed to this article.