MORE than a month after the November 3 presidential election, United States President Donald Trump led a rally in Valdosta, Georgia, in support of two Republican senators facing a runoff election on January 5, 2021, against two Democratic opponents. No one received a majority of votes last November 3, hence the need for a deciding run-off election.
If the two Republicans win, their party will control the US Senate. If the two Democats win, it will be a 50-50 Senate, with Vice President Kamala Harris, as Senate presiding officer, casting any tie-breaking vote. The Georgia run-off election will therefore determine how the US Senate will be deciding on many congressional issues in the new administration of incoming President Joseph Biden of the Democratic Party.
But Trump used the Georgia rally not so much to support the two Senate Republican candidates for senator as to reiterate his claim that he really won the presidential election and that the polls showing Biden’s victory were rigged.
In all previous US elections, losing candidates were quick to acknowledge defeat even if there are yet no official election results, only reports of state tallies for Electoral College votes made by the American press. This is why there is great concern over Trump’s continuing refusal to concede. There is fear that his insistence that he was cheated, although he has not come up with any proof, may endanger American democracy.
News reports also noted that few people in the Trump Georgia rally wore face masks or followed social-distancing rules. With more 15 million COVID-19 infections and over 290,000 deaths, the US today leads the world in COVID cases, due in part to Trump and his most loyal followers refusing to wear face masks. That rally in Georgia could lead to even more infections and deaths weeks from today.
The latest notable COVID-19 victim in the US has been Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Guiliani. Like his boss, he had not been wearing face masks. And like him, many of the thousands who were at Trump’s Georgia rally last Saturday, may soon be joining the ranks of infected Americans.
For so many reasons – interest in US as leader of the free world, concern over Trump’s refusal to admit election defeat, the mounting COVID-19 cases and deaths in the US – the world, including us in the Philippines, continue to follow the continuing drama in American life and politics.