What the U.S. can learn from Mexico about distrust in elections

Former President Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance aren’t the only Republicans who refuse to say outright that President Joe Biden won the 2020 election. Some resort to artful dodges, like Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, who recently wouldn’t say that Trump lost, only that “Biden was elected.” Others refuse to discuss the Capitol riot, saying it should not be an issue in the 2024 election. Former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said on X that “Voters are long over January 6th” and chided moderators for bringing the issue up during the vice presidential debate.
It is true that most voters will prioritize other issues. But a candidate’s willingness to concede defeat does matter to many swing voters, and the 32 members of Congress (including six Republicans) who recently publicly pledged to accept the 2024 election results regardless of who wins.
Led by GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska and Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, both moderates in competitive races, the pledge states quite simply that, once “all legal means to challenge election results in the courts have been exhausted,” the signers promise to acknowledge the winner as a legitimate president, attend the inauguration in person, urge calm and oppose anyone who favors violence.
GOP Rep. Mike Lawler, a freshman from New York who represents a swing district, added in a press release, “As the leader of the free world, we must continue to lead by example at home by respecting the will of the people.”
This is a good and necessary step since it has become article of faith for too many on the right that the 2020 election was stolen, in spite of the fact that a panel of Republican-appointed judges and retired Republican elected officials, including Judge Thomas B. Griffith, studied the question for a year and came to the conclusion that “There is no evidence of fraud to change the outcome in a single precinct, let alone in a state.”
This is a position they share with scores of other judges, many appointed by Trump, the Republican governors of Georgia and Arizona, countless members of Trump’s own Cabinet and even Trump’s his own vice president, Mike Pence.
Yet too many don’t fully understand how dangerous refusing to accept losses can be. Professor Troy Smith recently wrote about this for Deseret, saying, “Globally and historically, transfers of power have usually been violent affairs. The statistical mean is not peaceful, and reversion to the mean is always a lurking threat.” He’s correct, and he gives an excellent explanation of the domestic near-misses — Jefferson/Adams, Kennedy/Nixon, Bush/Gore — that America has overcome.
But those who pay attention to international affairs, particularly in authoritarian or poorly functioning countries, are more attuned to the many countries where they have seen much worse play out. It is commonplace for despots and would-be despots to delegitimize an election they lose and claim to win anyway. The consequences are not always direct, but they are almost always corrosive. Such a situation is playing out in Mexico with former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and his protege, President Claudia Sheinbaum.
López Obrador, a hardline left-winger, lost his first two bids for president, in 2006 and 2012. His loss in 2006 was razor close — he lost by about 0.6% — while he lost in 2012 by more, about 6%. In both situations, he simply refused to accept the results. After losing the election in 2006, he held an unconstitutional “inauguration” ceremony and declared himself the “legitimate president,” a claim recognized by no other country or institution in Mexico. The loss in 2012 didn’t change his tune. He again claimed election fraud and refused to accept the results. His refusal to acknowledge the loss didn’t make him president. It did, however, have the effect of keeping his supporters behind him after multiple losses, and he got a third try.
In 2018, López Obrador finally won, relatively easily due to internal problems and badly divided opposition. His term in office went precisely as you might expect. He sought to give the executive more authority over elections, multiple times, attempting to undo reforms in the late 1990s that had kept Mexico a functionally one-party state for the majority of the 20th century. He was rebuffed by Mexico’s Supreme Court, also multiple times.
But people, and movements, who don’t accept election results rarely stop when a constitution obstructs them. They simply change tactics. Undaunted by multiple defeats, López Obrador simply attacked the Supreme Court as illegitimate and passed a constitutional reform requiring judges to be elected. In the meantime, he has bullied and threatened those who criticize him as “enemies of the people.” He has now turned over the reigns to Sheinbaum, looking to extend his party’s corrosive influence on existing institutions. All this has spooked financial markets: the peso fell below the level of a strong currency last month.
A not-dissimilar situation has played out in Venezuela where the slow erosion of its electoral institutions have led to economic and the once prosperous nation becoming what is now considered a failed state. The U.S. is not approaching Venezuela-like problems, nor even the serious problems now confronting Mexico. But some see us as inching in that direction.
Recently Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland and several other Democrats have taken a “wait and see” approach to whether they would object to Trump winning the election. That’s a problem. And a handful of Democrats have taken similar stances repeatedly in the past when Republicans win, but to no real consequence, as they had no cover from the top. To his credit, former Vice President Al Gore squashed Democratic objections to his own loss in 2000.
But in context, the declaration by Raskin and his colleagues is troubling. Raskin points to various shenanigans, such as the Trump campaign’s attempts to change the rules of the electoral college in Nebraska. But this particular effort failed due to state Sen. Mike McDonnell, a Democrat-turned-Republican, deciding not to go along. But even if McDonnell had played along, the potential for a downward spiral is clear.
Men like Bacon, Gottheimer, Lawler and their associates, and people like McDonnell, are doing the hard-but-unglamorous work to try to maintain a well functioning system, not alter it for short-term gain. Mexico, Venezuela and dozens of other countries have faced far more serious problems than the U.S. has due to their failure to do so. Let’s heed their warning and stop the spiral before it gets worse.
Cliff Smith is a lawyer and a former congressional staffer. He lives in Washington, D.C., where he works on national security related issues. His views are his own.