The Unbearable Whiteness of Treason: Objections to Biden’s Victory

• In Event: Electoral Integrity and Election Denial in the United States

Abstract

Despite no credible evidence of fraud in the 2020 presidential election, 139 members of the House of Representatives as well as 8 senators voted to sustain one or more objections to the certification of the election results. While the votes of the Senators might be easily explained by a combination of their presidential ambitions or fear of a future primary challenge, the House members were overwhelmingly longtime members from safe seats. What explains this political theater? Why did members of Congress engage in what appeared to be a genuine effort to circumvent democracy and deprive the rightful winner of the office of the President? We consider the demographic make-up of the districts represented by those members, and even accounting for presidential vote share, the best predictor of whether a member voted to reject the election was whiteness of their district.

Authors

• Michael Latner, California Polytechnic State University

• Charles Smith, University of California, Irvine

• Anthony J. McGann, University of Strathclyde

• Alex Keena, Virginia Commonwealth University