Muddy democracy

Donald Trump descends from Air Force One.Evan Vucci / AP

Donald Trump has crossed all lines of respect for the rules of the game in a democracy, the electoral system of the country he presides over and the proper decorum of the institution he represents, by questioning the cleanliness a few weeks before the presidential election. of the process and not clarifying whether, in case of being defeated, he intends to make a quiet - read normal - handover of power to his hypothetical successor.

Trump broke into American politics a little more than four years ago by being nominated for the presidential candidate by the Republican Party.

His strategy was based on inflammatory statements, insults to anyone who criticized him or put themselves in his crosshairs - the case of the Mexican immigrants whom he called "rapists" in 2015 - and repeated and public contempt for the Government and the Federal administration to whose presidency he aspired.

Far from being tempered, this attitude has not changed in the White House.

This has caused, apart from disappointments in some dismissed collaborators, diplomatic clashes with various countries and organizations or the general stupor at situations as inconceivable as the president sometimes ruthlessly targeting important federal institutions, as was the case with the FBI.

Trump has now gone much further and cast doubt on the democratic process itself.

However, it is not the first time this has happened.

He already used this strategy when in 2016 the polls gave him a loser to the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton.

But then he won and did not criticize the system again.

Moreover, as president he was tenacious in the dismissal and denigration of those high officials who were investigating whether a possible Russian interference had adulterated the electoral campaign.

Four years later, the polls once again place him behind the Democratic nomination, now embodied in Joe Biden.

However, the big difference is that now it is the president who says that he does not trust aspects of the system such as voting by mail and that to the question of what the transition will be like if he loses he answers with a "we'll see."

He has soon forgotten the exemplary handover that he received from the Democratic administration of Barack Obama or the equally exemplary that Republican George W. Bush made to his Democratic successor.

The last thing that a polarized country like few times in its history, plagued by the pandemic and with serious social tension in the streets, needs is for those who occupy the highest magistracy to once again give proof of not understanding the dignity of their position and muddy the civic act that defines a democracy: the fair election of its leaders.