The Rise of Political Violence
Did you go out and vote? The midterm elections for the year 2022 took place on November 8th. For the past couple months we have watched politicians on both sides go out to promote themselves or their side of the political spectrum. The midterm election usually goes in favor of the party that didn’t win the presidency in the previous election. This election, we did not see this. Everyone was expecting a “Red Wave” but instead democrats gained a seat in the Senate and republicans took over the House. The republicans, especially ones nominated by Trump, are problematic.
According to Amy Gardner of the Washington Post, nearly 300 republicans who sought office this November deny or have questioned the results of the 2020 election (Gardner, 2022). To this day we still have republicans denying that Joe Biden won the 2020 election against Donald Trump. These election deniers go on the news and talk about “irregularities” in voting when they are down or expected to lose. Certain republicans refuse to accept any outcome in which they lose. For example, during an interview with Dana Bush on CNN, Bush asked Arizona republican candidate Kari Lake, “Will you accept the results of your election in November,”. Lake responded with “I’m going to win the election and I will accept that result,”.
Republicans like Lake, enforce that our elections are not safe and secure. They enforce the idea that democrats cheat and steal elections. These lies and the spread of misinformation, only get republican voters riled up. This includes the MAGA crowd and other white supremacist groups. We saw how violent they could be on January 6th during the insurrection. Though now we are seeing political violence escalate during the midterm season.
The social issue of political violence can be defined as violence that is perpetrated in order to achieve political goals. A recent example of a threat of violence is from Robert Sptizer of The Conversation where he writes how a couple in Mesa, Arizona, was dropping off their ballots on Oct. 21, 2022 when they saw two people carrying guns and dressed in tactical gear. They were hanging out near the Maricopa County drop box. Another example is when the Arizona Alliance for Retired Americans and Voto Latino spoke about multiple occasions where “armed and masked individuals” associated with the group Clean Elections USA had gathered at drop boxes in the county.
These groups are gathering around ballot drop boxes because of the lies they were fed. They do not trust mail in voting and want to make sure that there are no irregularities. This has resulted in multiple incidents of armed people near ballot drop boxes intimidating voters. If I pulled up to my local ballot box and someone was wearing tactical gear, masked, and held a weapon I would immediately turn around and try to avoid confrontation. This voter intimidation by the right is a form of coercion.
A more clear example of political violence is the attack on Paul Pelosi last month. In the middle of the night, David DePape woke up Paul Pelosi because he was looking for the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. DePape was on a mission to take out political
leaders. With him, he had zip ties and a hammer. Paul Pelosi was able to call the police but was still struck unconscious by DePape. He was fueled to commit violence by conspiracy theories from the right. Even after the attack, major right wingers continued to question the legitimacy of the attack. But how do we make it stop?
People get passionate when they receive information from their political leaders and other sources of news. As mentioned earlier, this midterm election is filled with election deniers who lie to their base. These republicans build distrust in our election system which leads to voter intimidation at the ballot box. We need to hold these people accountable for spreading misinformation. If you spread conspiracy theories and lies, there needs to be consequences. We got to see this with Alex Jones. According to the Associated Press, “Jurors ordered conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on Wednesday to pay nearly $1 billion to Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims’ relatives and an FBI agent, who said he turned their loss and trauma into years of torment by promoting the lie that the rampage was a hoax,”. Alex Jones on his show InfoWars was constantly questioning the validity of the Sandy Hook shooting. Thankfully recently he had a trial and is now being held accountable for his actions. During the trail he did continue to lie but the judge wasn’t having any of it. Now Alex Jones argues he doesn’t have the money. This shows that your lies and the political violence you cause does catch up to you at some point.
Though I do not think we have situations like this happen enough. Powerful organizations like Fox News and The Daily Wire continue to get support from businesses and are funded well. In social media environments, there needs to be more awareness and people restricted. There is the argument that freedom of speech is being trampled on but speech should not cause harm. An example of this was when Trump was banned from Twitter due to all the lies he spread. Getting major leaders off platforms that influence a large population is also helpful to the fight against political violence.
The most important thing you can do is be aware. It is imperative to view your sources of information and make sure they are factual. This isn’t always easy but there are credible sources out there that won’t feed you lies and conspiracy theories. I hope you voted, no matter what side you are on, all voices need to be heard. We need to promote people we can trust, especially during this highly violent time. With the right people in office, more people will be held accountable for political violence.