E

vent 
horizon 
(noun): 

the point in space where 
gravity is so great, not 

even light can escape. Meaningful 
differences 
still 
exist 
beyond 

the event horizon, but due to a 
massive gravitational pull, an 
outside observer can’t 
differentiate 
between 

any 
objects 
after 

that point.

I recently watched 

a rough cut of a 
documentary 
about 

Michigan 
football 

that contains a scene 
of a group of students 
protesting 
Trump’s 

election. They hold 
signs declaring Trump 
a racist. A man approaches them 
and asks them to name Trump’s 
sins. The first sin that comes out 
of a protester’s mouth is Trump’s 
utterance of “bad hombres.” 
The protesters go on to point 
out Trump’s derisive comments 
about Mexicans, and the man 
retorts that Trump doesn’t want 
to ban Mexicans, but wants to 
crackdown on “illegals.”

This scene demonstrates that 

Trump has reached his own 
event horizon. He has become 
such a toxic figure that liberals 
don’t differentiate between his 
“less terrible” offenses and his 
egregious 
ones. 
Additionally, 

liberals have come to associate 
his 
singularly 
destructive 

personality so closely with his 
policies that those policies are 
no longer given due, critical 
examination. I don’t mean this as 
a criticism of these protesters, in 
particular; if someone put me on 
the spot, I would also likely have 
trouble coming up with specific 
examples of Trump’s racism. 
Rather, I blame liberal discourse, 
which has ineffectively separated 
the bad and the ugly.

Consider The New York Times’ 

collection 
of 
insults 
Trump 

has hurled on Twitter since he 
announced his presidential bid. 
Its 
presentation 
is 
brutalist, 

and displays columns of insults 
with no aesthetic goal other 
than to inspire shock and awe. 
The 
complete 
collection 
is 

77 pages printed out. There’s 
certainly value in having such 
a resource, and I don’t want 

to argue that we shouldn’t pay 
attention to Trump’s Twitter 
account. His online presence has 
allowed him to circumvent the 
press and agenda-set without 
traditional journalistic scrutiny. 
We can’t understand Trump’s 

character or goals as 
a politician without 
understanding 
his 

Twitter.

But the list elides 

his greater offenses. 
His imitation of a 
disabled 
New 
York 

Times reporter, his 
assertion that John 
McCain isn’t a war 
hero because he was 
captured, his brags 

about grabbing girls by the pussy 
and his lie that Arabs celebrated 
the destruction of the World Trade 
Center — these are indefensible. 
His claim that Judge Gonzalo 
Curiel couldn’t fairly adjudicate 
a case against Trump due to 
Curiel’s Mexican heritage drew 
condemnation across the political 
spectrum. Republican Speaker of 
the House Paul Ryan went as far 
as to say, “Claiming a person can’t 
do their job because of their race is 
sort of like the textbook definition 
of a racist comment.”

By allowing statements like 

these to lose saliency, liberal 
discourse has enabled people 
to 
forget 
Trump’s 
highlight 

reel. Liberals have to hold these 
egregious statements close to 
our minds and be ready to deploy 
them when someone asks what 
makes Trump a racist. While 
liberals like myself may find 
statements he’s made about “bad 
hombres” offensive, I don’t think 
they compare to his comments on 
Judge Curiel. As demonstrated 
in the scene above, Trump’s 
supporters can easily interpret 
his 
comments 
about 
“bad 

hombres” as referring specifically 
to undocumented immigrants. It’s 
not that drawing attention to his 
“lesser offenses” isn’t important; 
we need to catalogue every 
instance of Trump’s hate. But by 
focusing on his unequivocally vile 
ones, we can begin to shift our 
citizenry’s understanding of him. 
As I’ve written in the past, I don’t 
think most Trump supporters 
are white supremacists. Rather, 

they are complicit in advancing 
racism. If liberals had done a 
better job of keeping Trump’s 
clear-cut hatred at the forefront 
of our national dialogue, maybe 
the election would have turned 
out differently.

Because so much of his 

rhetoric goes beyond the pale, 
people have also lost the ability 
to critically analyze his policy 
proposals. Ask yourself: Why 
is his plan to build a wall so 
much more unpalatable than 
other hardline approaches to 
immigration? 
It’s 
expensive, 

but so is hiring thousands more 
border 
patrol 
officers. 
And 

perhaps the wall would reify 
American prejudice and damage 
Mexican-American relations. But 
beyond those two arguments, I 
can’t think of many more issues 
with the wall.

Public knowledge of critiques 

of his policies is similarly one-
dimensional. For instance, in a 
speech castigating Trump, Mitt 
Romney suggested that his trade 
policies would start a trade war 
with China, and quickly moved on 
to another criticism. It’s not enough 
to just say Trump will instigate a 
trade war with China. What will 
this trade war look like? What 
effects will it have on American 
consumers and manufacturers? 
What about our foreign relations? 
This lack of public understanding 
is obviously coupled with the fact 
that 
candidates’ 
personalities, 

rather than substantial policy 
discussion, drove this past election. 
But going forward, liberals need to 
do our homework on why Trump’s 
policies will be so disastrous.

One 
oft-repeated 
prognosis 

of the election has been that the 
media took Trump literally but 
not seriously, while his supporters 
took him seriously but not literally. 
Now that he’s president-elect, we 
have to take him both seriously 
and literally. By writing about his 
policies with proper rigor and not 
permitting his most despicable 
moments to be forgotten, resistance 
against Trump can broaden our 
country’s understanding of both 
his ineptitude and toxicity.

Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Monday, December 5, 2016

P

in drop silence.

I cradled myself as I 

watched CNN Political 

Commentator Van Jones ask 
America: “How will we explain 
this to our children?”

In the cold of this November 

night, the only warmth I felt was 
from the tears rolling down my 
face. I thought, how did we get 
here? I closed my eyes and took 
in the stillness of that moment.

Pin drop silence.
That was my answer.
My parents immigrated to this 

country from Pakistan in the late 
’80s, hoping to start a family with 
a bright future. They embraced 
my 
brown 
skin 
with 
love, 

looked into my dark eyes with 
hope, smiling into the nursery 
filled with children of all colors 
knowing that we would grow up 
to have the same opportunities.

I thought about my childhood. 

I am American. Born and raised. 
I played tag on our playgrounds, 
bench-warmed on our sports 
teams and looked around the 
classroom and thought, these are 
my friends.

But I was conditioned from a 

young age to conform.

“You’re a terrorist.”
“You can’t do that, you’re a 

girl.”

“Go back to your country.”
I always brushed off little 

comments like that. Growing up, 
I was never at a loss for words. 
I smiled and laughed, although 

each slur silently hit at the core of 
my identity, slowly dismantling 
my self-esteem, instilling fear 
into every fiber of my being.

My mind would run a million 

miles, but my mouth would stay 
shut. I thought, there is no point 
in sharing my opinion because 
no one will listen and no one will 
change their mind. Why should 
I fight back when everyone will 
look down on me?

This is my America, too, 

but I never felt welcomed in 
it. I convinced myself that if I 
never stated my discomfort, it 
wouldn’t be real. In my naive 
desire to fit in, I would spend 
years holding my tongue.

If I were a parent today, I 

would not be able to look into 
my child’s eyes the same way my 
parents did with hope. Instead, 
I would apologize. Apologize 
for bringing them into a nation 
where they will meet hatred 
for their identity. Apologize 
for passing on the feeling of 
isolation. 
Apologize 
for 
my 

years of silence that put them in 
this position.

To the people who once 

pointed their fingers at me for 
being different: I want to point 
back at you and say the state of 
our nation is your fault. I woke 
up disillusioned in President-
elect Donald Trump’s America 
because of you. You, parading 
around with your misogyny, 
racism and xenophobia like a 
badge of honor. This is your 
fault.

But I can’t point at you.
It’s me too. I have always had 

a voice and I made the conscious 
decision to remain silent. I 
cannot resent you because it’s 
my fault you don’t understand. 
I never gave you the chance to 
understand how it feels to be 
a person of color in America. 
I never explained the subtle 
discrimination I face that makes 
my skin itch. I never told you 
what you said to me was wrong. 
How could you know?

I grew up with you, I went to 

school with you and I brushed 
off your comments, thinking 
you still saw me as an equal. 
But you support someone who 
wants to ban me. I have spent 
my whole life staying silent out 
of fear of becoming an outsider, 
but this election has shown that 
I have been one all along.

I have spent years being 

silent, but I will be silent no 
more.

I will be loud for Latinos, 

Muslims, Black people, disabled 
people, war veterans and others 
he demonized and attacked.

They want us to stay silent, 

but this is no time to concede. 
This election shows that the 
fight is far from over. Our 
nation needs us more than ever. 
We must stand up. We must 
persevere. We must speak out.

ROLAND

DAVIDSON

LAURA SCHINAGLE

Managing Editor

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

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The case against an election recount 

ROLAND DAVIDSON | COLUMN

T

he 
Green 
Party 

presidential 
candidate 

Jill Stein filed for a 

recount in Pennsylvania, a state 
Hillary Clinton lost — which 
helped pave the way for Donald 
Trump’s election win. 
Imagine going back in 
time two months and 
telling yourself that 
sentence was true. I 
can’t fathom how that 
conversation 
would 

go, but today that is 
our reality. Auditing 
the 
vote 
translates 

into voter suppression 
policies and rhetoric, 
and 
searching 
for 

flaws in the electoral system does 
not have tangible benefits that 
outweigh this. However, because 
Stein called for the recount 
without 
Clinton’s 
consent, 

Clinton should play a role in 
the recount. 

Stein also recently filed for a 

recount in Michigan. The national 
call for it came after cybersecurity 
threats 
were 
identified 
by 

groups of computer scientists, 
including the director of the 
University of Michigan Center for 
Computer Security and Society, 
J. Alex Halderman. According 
to Halderman, a state voting 
infrastructure hack is a possibility, 
primarily 
in 
Pennsylvania, 

Wisconsin and Michigan. A hack 
in Michigan is feasible, though 
the risk seems to be lower due 
to the use of paper ballots. The 
probability of the cybersecurity 
threat is amplified by the Russian 
hacks of John Podesta and the 
Democratic National Committee 
this year, which identified a clear 
intent by a foreign actor to interfere 
with the election.

A recount would display any 

violation of the electoral process, 
but it will also cause voter 
suppression. 
The 
Democratic 

Party spent almost the entire 
length of the Clinton campaign 
defending the voting system. That 
defense was critical to stopping 
voter suppression, which is of 
increasing concern. 

This year was the first general 

election after a 2013 ruling that 
softened protections under the 
Voting Rights Act, resulting in 
14 states imposing new voting 
restrictions. That denies the 
right to vote to thousands of 
Americans, usually low-income 
and non-white individuals, from 
the electoral process. There is no 
rebutting that voter suppression 
impacts 
minority 
voters, 
as 

courts, numerous studies and 
Republican 
politicians 
have 

admitted 
to 
the 
effects 
of 

restrictions. Now, after months 
of defending the security of the 

voting system, Clinton is calling it 
into question. That poses a large 
problem.

For conservative politicians, 

voting 
security 
does 
not 

mean protection from cyber 

attacks. 
Rather, 

it 
translates 
into 

voter 
suppression 

through 
strict 

voting ID laws, felon 
disenfranchisement, 
mail-in 
ballot 

restrictions 
and 

early 
voting 

cutbacks. 
The 

Democratic 
Party 

needs to be working 
to stop suppression, 

and calling the integrity of the 
voting system into question 
does not do that. The best 
evidence for the jump between 
representing a vulnerable voting 
system and voter suppression 
comes 
from 
President-elect 

Trump himself. In response to 
the call for a recount, Trump 
falsely claimed he would have 
won the popular vote if it was 
not for millions of illegal votes. 
The potential threat of illegal 
votes is a primary driver of voter 
suppression policies.

The risk of voter suppression 

is large enough to outweigh the 
benefits of calling for a recount. 
Even Halderman admits that 
the probability of a hack is quite 
low. That low probability is 
outweighed by the high chances 
of voter suppression. I could 
be swayed to think otherwise 
if I heard a more compelling 
justification for a recount. A 
Michigan recount will not win 
Clinton the vote, but this doesn’t 
seem to be the main goal of most 
recount 
proponents. 
Rather, 

the main benefit to citizens of 
Michigan seems to be only for 
those who want to verify that 
there was not a hack. “Just 
trying to be sure” is not a valid 
enough benefit to risk justifying 
voter suppression in tons of 
states. Democrats should be 
building public confidence in 
elections by pushing for policies 
that protect voter rights, not by 
pushing for an audit.

The best case for a recount 

I have seen comes from a 
Vox editorial that argues the 
reverse of my argument, that 
normalizing 
recounts 
would 

increase public confidence in 
elections. The piece argues that 
if recounts always happened 
then it “won’t give credence to 
conspiracy theorists, and it will 
bolster rather than undermine 
public confidence.” That said, 
think of all the damage that 
normalized recounts could do.

Take, 
for 
example, 
the 

governor’s race in North Carolina, 
which still has not been officially 
called. 
Democratic 
nominee 

Attorney General Roy Cooper 
has unofficially received 9,700 
more ballots than incumbent 
Republican Gov. Pat McCrory. 
McCrory has refused to concede 
the election in an attempt to 
hold onto his governor seat. 
Furthermore, McCrory called for 
a recount in several counties with 
no evidence of foul play. McCrory 
has brought the efficacy of North 
Carolina’s election into play, and 
there will be negative impacts.

The North Carolina recount is 

clearly a last-ditch attempt to hold 
onto power by a politician who is 
basing his strategy in allegations. 
However, breaking down the 
public confidence of the North 
Carolina election is going to have 
a negative consequence: voter 
suppression. One justification for 
the North Carolina recount has 
come after widespread claims 
of voter fraud from McCrory’s 
campaign. There is no evidence 
for this accusation, but it manifests 
itself in voter suppression policy. 
The incumbent’s campaign is 
using voter fraud as a basis for 
a lawsuit to not count same-day 
registration ballots in the election. 
 

North Carolina displays what 

happens when claims for recounts 
go haywire. Politicians refusing 
to 
concede 
elections, 
false 

evidence of voter fraud and voter 
suppression come as the result 
of dismantling public confidence 
in the electoral process. Now 
imagine if recounts were a norm 
and happened all the time. The 
chances 
that 
these 
recounts 

would resemble North Carolina’s 
would increase exponentially.

However, I will not condemn 

Clinton for participating in the 
recount. Stein calling for the 
audit meant that a recount was 
going to happen with or without 
Clinton, making any risk of 
dismantling public confidence in 
the electoral process inevitable. 
Therefore, Clinton is not directly 
at fault for any voter suppression 
that the recount creates. It is also 
difficult to blame a politician 
who simply wishes to ensure an 
inescapable recount was going 
to occur properly. While Clinton 
may not be directly to blame, this 
problem highlights a necessity 
for policy that fights back against 
voter suppression. The United 
States needs public confidence 
in elections, and the best way to 
accomplish this is by increasing 
the 
protections 
originally 

granted by the Voting Rights Act.

Max Lubell can be reached at 

mlubell@umich.edu.

MAX

LUBELL

MAX LUBELL | COLUMN

EMILY WOLFE | CONTACT EMILY AT ELWOLFE@UMICH.EDU

Roland Davidson can be reached at 

mhenryda@umich.edu.

Demario Longmire, Toni Wang, 

Sabrina Bilimoria, Alyssa Brandon, 

Christian Paneda, Ashley Tjhung are 

Michigan in Color Editors. Michigan 

in Color is a section of The Michigan 

Daily by and for people of color.

The price of silence

Trump’s event horizon

NARMEEN 
REHMAN

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