TL;DR:
There is 80-85% chance that the US will experience a major politico-legal crisis after the November elections. It will last at least until mid-2021.
My confidence in this assessment is about 85-90%.
Trump’s tweet about delaying elections is a somewhat strong (3.5/5) signal for it.
Such a crisis could take the form of
Contested election
Chaotic transition
Delegitimized Presidency
You should think about what such a prolonged political crisis in the US would mean for yourself, your business, or broader geopolitical developments and adjust your exposure accordingly.
What happens if Donald Trump refuses to leave office? That obviously is in the minds of many in the past several months and the tweet from POTUS below added fuel to the speculations.
Well I am not an American nor do I currently live in the US so why am I writing on American elections? Two reasons; first to paraphrase Trotsky, you may not be interested in American politics but American politics is interested in you. Frankly, there is no election in the world that matters more for geopolitics than the US elections. America might be a hegemon in decline but nevertheless, what happens inside the US reverberates across the globe. Of course it matters even more when you border the US, like we do in Canada.
Second, it is a good example of coming to terms with uncertainty and the consequences of what most would have considered a very very unlikely event even a year or two ago. It also has a short time horizon. We’ll soon find out!
But I think whether Trump would refuse to leave is the wrong question to ask. It assumes a particular outcome (Trump losing the election) and specific action (refusing to leave). What is more interesting and more pertinent in terms what to do is to ask the following question:
Will the United States plunge into a politico-legal crisis after the November 2020 elections?
My answer is: YES there is 80-85% chance that the US will experience such a crisis and my confidence in this assessment is about 85-90%. Trump’s tweet above is a somewhat strong signal in this direction.
Shape of Things to Come
Let me explain. There are at least three general ways in which such a crisis occurs.
1-) A contested election. Although this is generally discussed in the media as Trump not accepting defeat it is also easy to imagine a scenario where Biden wins the popular vote but narrowly loses the Electoral College. A recent wargame/table-top exercise that included several former senior politicians and policymakers gamed such a scenario (John Podesta playing Biden), along with more popular scenarios where Donald Trump refuses to accept the results, contest them in key battle states, state legislatures side with one candidate over the other etc.
The bottomline is that this can and probably will go on for weeks if not months, creating deadlock and paralysis in the machinery and institutions of government while a pandemic rages on, polarizing the society further, putting additional strain on America’s democratic traditions and institutions. Low level political violence is very likely (e.g. rival protestors clashing in the streets, resulting in a small number of serious injuries or deaths) and there is a very small but greater than zero chance that different law enforcement agencies taking different sides.
2-) Wreaking havoc during transition. Even if there is a clear victory for Biden and Trump’s attempts to contest the election do not bear fruit, Trump will use the transition period to do as much damage as possible before leaving office on January 20th, 2021. This can include military action abroad, hallowing out federal institutions, ramming through various policies via executive orders so and so forth.
Why do I think that will be the case? My expectation is based on what we know about Trump’s personality (e.g. he is very thin-skinned, HATES being humiliated, never accepts responsibility for failure etc.) and the political incentives to do so (e.g. bogging down the new administration with so many problems/fires to put out that it will have less bandwidth to go after Trump and Co. after the election). Also having studied authoritarian leaders over the years, I believe - mixing lyrics/metaphors a bit here - they rarely go gently into the night but rage, rage against the machine (that put them out of power). I am fairly confident (p>75%) that if Trump is forced to concede, this will be the path he will choose. How much damage he can do requires a different analysis if things move in that direction and we’ll cross that bridge when and if it happens.
3-) Illegitimate President. A surprise Trump victory and a reluctant Biden concession after a short period of contesting the results will not mean that the Democratic base (particularly its more far-left wing) will accept the results as well. Remember those “Not my President” placards and marches after Trump was elected? Think about them but much bigger this time around, coming at the heels of BLM protests and the ensuing riots in some cities. Mass demonstrations challenging the legitimacy of Trump’s presidency, most likely by bringing up the popular vote vs electoral college, claims of voter suppression, and demand that he resigns. Trump will react very harshly for this attempted ‘colored revolution’ on American soil and send in the federal law enforcement or perhaps even the US military, arguing that this is an insurrection. In fact I am highly confident (p>90%) that such demonstrations will take place in the case of Trump’s reelection.
In short, a crisis after the November elections is overdetermined. There are multiple routes to get there and a lot of stars need to align just right for it not to happen. Trump’s tweet quoted above is a somewhat strong signal (3.5/5, where 1 is almost all noise and 5 is strong, unambiguous signal) about this upcoming crisis.
Furthermore, such a crisis, whatever shape it takes, will continue until at least mid-2021. This happens to overlap with Peter Turchin’s expectations of socio-political instability peaking around 2020 in the United States. His reasoning is different than mine and I plan to write about his cliodynamics model in the future but for now you can check out his forecast for 2020 from the link above.
Pre-Mortem
Let’s assume my forecast turns out to be wrong. There was no major crisis. There were a few disgruntled tweets by Trump in case of a Biden victory or some angry demonstrations by few radical activists in case of Trump’s reelection but that was it. No major crisis and a proper transition, albeit a bumpy one. Why I missed it? Here is a non-exhaustive list:
I ignored the base-rate. Elections in 2000 was the one end up in court in recent memory but otherwise there is not much in 20th century in the United States. Even taking into account 19th century (1824, 1876, and 1888 presidential elections for instance) or looking at other controversial elections in other places it does not look like such politico-legal crises happen often in democracies. So I might have overstated the probability, seduced by the peculiarities of the current state of affairs.
I have underestimated the resilience of American legal and political institutions and the willingness of local, state, and federal officials to act in order to preserve the integrity and reputation of American democracy.
I overestimated Trump’s willingness to engage in a high-risk gamble to remain in power at any cost.
I overestimate Democratic Party’s or radical activists’ ability and willingness to organize to delegitimize a Trump victory.
I overestimated the degree of polarization in American society and underestimated the desire to move beyond contentious politics.
I overestimated GOP politicians’ disposition to tow the Trump line if he decides to go all-in.
I overestimated radical groups’ (both on the right and left) ability and willingness to engage in political violence.
I wrongly assumed most Federal law enforcement agencies will follow Trump’s orders in case of increased political violence.
I wrongly assumed Republican state legislators will go along with Trump’s plans to keep him in power.
I wrongly assumed that Trump and Co. have access to and have the ability to use levers of power to cause great mischief and wreak havoc during transition.
I underestimated the possibility of an overwhelming, landslide, no doubt whatsoever Biden victory that will preclude any realistic legal challenge.
I radically overestimated the support for Trump among the Republicans. His handling of COVID-19 pandemic and the economic situation lead to a radical diminishing of his core base and so no one rallied around him when he contested the elections or when he try to derail the transition.
Like I said this is a non-exhaustive list and I am sure I am missing other reasons why I might be wrong. So let me know in what other ways I might wrong in the comments below.
A pandemic is raging, massive unemployment is on the horizon, economy is tanking, and the United States is heading to a deep and prolonged politico-legal crisis after the November elections. What should you do? Well, I do not know your individual circumstances so I cannot comment on the specific actions you might take. But I can say is this: you should think about what such a prolonged political crisis in the US would mean for yourself, your business, or broader geopolitical developments and adjust your exposure accordingly. I think both the probability and the impact of such a crisis is high and you should be ready for it.
I am planning write on what such a crisis would mean for global geopolitics in a future issue. But for now please let me know what you think in the comments below and share this post with others. As always your support, comments, and suggestions are very much appreciated!
best regards,
Balkan
I’ve been enjoying your newsletter so far! Thanks for writing it! A couple thoughts:
- Immediately after the 2016 election, many pundits on the left were making dire predictions about Trump becoming a literal dictator. While I agree he’s a terrible president, the worst predictions haven’t come true. I think base rate neglect explains why these predictions went wrong. I see echos of this type of thinking in the idea that the presidency will be delegitimized or that the US is likely to experience a color revolution. Do you think there’s good reason to be more confident this time around?
- I think of the three possibilities you sketch, “wreaking havoc” is the one I have the hardest time wrapping my head around. What would Trump’s motivation be for this, and what sorts of things would he do? My sense of Trump is that he’s all bark and no bite (well, maybe some bite) in the sense that the biggest damage he’s done is polarize the nation through divisive rhetoric. When it comes to actually making changes, he’s relative weak, which makes me think he wouldn’t be inclined to wreak havoc. What do you think?
You wrote this piece prior to the publication of Trump's remarks disparaging the service and sacrifice of US service members in The Atlantic (linked below). There is a non-trivial bureaucratic inertia in government, generally, but it has been a major component of military and protective services in particular. Talk with any member of the US military and you will invariably encounter all kinds of stories about paperwork and red tape. The point I am making is that one must consider the role of bureaucracy in obeying the letter of the law rather than the dictates of partisanship. The article in The Atlantic now present military and Secret Service leadership not only with the justification for following the law rather than Trump's orders, but also the motivation if Trump tries to illegally retain power. I would not expect them to tip their hand ahead of the election, but by the time Trump's term is up, I would expect that they will have expressed their intention to remove him from office should he be observed to have lost the election when the Electoral College votes are counted. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/09/trump-americans-who-died-at-war-are-losers-and-suckers/615997/