One War, Two Hands on the Vote

In late February, with American strikes on Iran underway and before Iran had closed the strait or a single pump price had moved, the president began doing the arithmetic out loud.

So you mean if we happen to be in a war with somebody, no more elections. I wonder what the fake news would say to that. — Donald Trump

^[1] The same week, two of his lawyers — Jerome Corsi and Peter Ticktin, carrying the claim that China rigged the 2020 count — were pushing an emergency executive order to force voter ID on every state.

There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not! — Donald Trump

^[1] Even inside his own party, a critic of the strikes allowed the possibility that the crisis was being manufactured to avoid an election ^[1]. Then the two tracks separated, and each ran on its own clock. Within weeks the price track was moving fast. Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, disrupting a fifth of the world's oil and gas trade ^[2], and the national average hit $3.977 ^[3]. Washington authorized the largest release in the reserve's history, nearly half a billion barrels ^[4]. The motor club AAA reported no immediate relief at the pump ^[3]. It was one of many emergency gestures worldwide that spring: reserve sales in Australia and Japan, fuel subsidies in Brazil, Greece and Italy ^[5]. His own Treasury secretary linked the headline inflation to the war ^[6]. Meanwhile Congress was voting on the war itself. The Senate rejected a war-powers resolution in March, then advanced one in May as four Republicans broke ranks ^[7][8]. The administration's reply was that a May 1 ceasefire had already ended the hostilities the law governs, even as the naval blockade and fifty thousand troops stayed in place ^[8]. The hinge came in July. The president scheduled a single primetime address covering Iran and "election integrity": declassified claims of Chinese interference in the 2020 election, set beside newly authorized strikes and a reinstated blockade ^[9]. Senator Mark Warner warned beforehand what was coming.

Tomorrow night, Trump is going to use a primetime address to stoke misleading claims about our elections in order to justify interfering in our midterms. — Mark Warner

^[9] That same month, Peter Ticktin — one of the February lawyers — resurfaced as the author of a seventeen-page draft order to declare a national emergency and seize federal control of the midterms, built on the theory that China, Russia, Iran and Venezuela had tampered with the 2020 vote ^[10]. The president disowned it, and the White House said Ticktin does not shape policy.

Who told you that? No, I've never heard about it. — Donald Trump

^[10] Then the president fired the remaining members of the Election Assistance Commission, and the federal agencies that normally brief state officials on foreign threats skipped the secretaries' annual conference ^[11]. The people who run the count described what they were left with.

We know these foreign actors have been ramping up their desire to sow chaos and put out disinformation, so it’s hard to operate in the gap, not knowing. — Steffanie Sampson

^[11] October is where the two hands met the calendar. On the fifth, at a campaign rally, the president put a price on Iranian strikes reaching Los Angeles and San Diego.

Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. — Donald Trump

^[12] At the same rally he signed an executive order easing tax limits on farm diesel: a pen at a campaign rally. And the White House said the war "should help" Republicans in the November midterms ^[12]. Three days earlier, Ohio had signed a ninety-day gas-tax suspension over Democrats' objections that the timing was political ^[13]; it took effect October 4, prices dropped about ten cents overnight, and it landed in a state with toss-up races and early voting opening that same week ^[13][14]. Nor was October's relief answering a still-rising price. Gas had already fallen to a four-month low of $3.85 on July 3 ^[15], a dip the March release hadn't bought. By October the president was still making a promise about what happens when the war ends.

What’s driving up Gasoline is no longer the Strait of Hormuz, because Record Numbers of Barrels are coming out now on an almost daily basis, but the word, ‘Refineries,’ where Russia’s are being blown up by Ukraine, and where ours are being closed up, in Blue States, like California, by the Dumocrats. — Donald Trump

^[14] Which is why the October gestures look timed to the vote rather than to the price of crude. The same week, he was calling American voting corrupt while urging Republicans to vote early or by mail ^[16]. Asked whether federal agents would be at polling places, the homeland security secretary said they could serve warrants there, and the president refused to rule it out.

I would do anything necessary to make sure the U.S. has honest elections. — Donald Trump

^[17] Four weeks out, the election is still set for November 3, and early voting is already running in 47 states ^[17]. That is the one thing the year's machinery has not moved. What the two hands have verifiably bought is a different ledger: the Justice Department has lost twenty-five lawsuits over voter rolls, and the postal rules that would have ended nationwide mail balloting were blocked in court ^[18]; only 14 percent of voters say the economy improved over the past year ^[6]; and no reserve release has produced pump relief AAA could verify ^[3]. Two hands, each declared in the actors' own words, running toward one date. The record does not show a single plan behind them. Nothing here needs it to.