Roughly once a week the Project on Ethics in Political Communication highlights something we’re reading and something we’re watching. We will largely (though not entirely) avoid the presidential election on the assumption that readers are already following it closely, and probably have strong opinions about the candidates and their rhetorical strategies.
September 16, 2024
What We’re Reading
Political Violence and Racist Lies
Two things caught our attention over the weekend, hence a Monday morning email.
First are the flip responses to another attempt on former president Trump’s life. As Politico wrote this morning:
We’ve been struck, even before yesterday’s incident, just how loose people across the ideological spectrum have been with their offhand discussion, or even encouragement, of political violence.
The point of democracy is that we argue and vote rather than assault and shoot. Political violence should never be celebrated - even if you believe the cause is righteous. Want to prevent Trump and his allies from holding power? Campaign against their policies and vote against their candidacies. Do not celebrate, make light of, or dismiss political violence.
The second is Republican vice presidential nominee, Senator J D Vance’s ongoing nonsense about Haitians living in Springfield, Ohio. This is a topic we raised last week, and bears repeating because of Vance’s argument that he is “creating stories” to draw media attention to Springfield - even though, as he put it, “it’s possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false…” The rumors, which the state’s Republican governor have called “a piece of garbage,” are disrupting communities and threatening lives. They also feed anti-immigrant sentiment, which is hugely damaging and runs counter to American ideals. Senator Vance’s comments are unethical and profoundly irresponsible.
What We’re Watching
Legislative Theater
Congress is back and busy continuing to not legislate.
The federal fiscal year ends in 14 days, and the House is no closer to keeping the lights on than they were a month ago. There are real ideological differences about government funding - there’s also a lot of politics 50 days before an election.
As Congress tries to find a way to keep the lights on, both parties are trying to force votes on legislation that won’t pass, but that will put their opponents on the record supporting policies that could come with electoral costs. For example, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is again pushing a “Right to IVF” bill to take advantage of Republican differences over the appropriateness of IVF and whether or not the government should mandate that insurance companies cover the cost of the treatment, as Trump has said.
This and similar messaging bills are ethically complicated. On one hand they help the American people see where candidates stand on important issues - casting a vote puts a legislator on the record. On the other hand, the bills are also rhetorical devices never meant to become law. They are ads as much as they are ideas.
We’re watching to see when (and if) politics gives way to policy.
September 12, 2024
What We’re Reading
Memes and Nonsense
We are reading way too much about Trump’s racist nonsense about Haitians in Ohio. One of the post popular talking points from this week’s debate between former President Trump and Vice President Harris was Trump’s claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, OH are eating pets. Liberals are “marking themselves safe from pet eaters” on Facebook and news programs in the US and around the world are showing the clip and asking commentators about it. In the ever expanding universe of ridiculous things to say, Trump’s claim is a bright shining star.
And I really wish everyone would stop talking about it. There are three reasons for this. First, some people believe it. As a result an already tense situation is getting dangerous. City officials closed city hall and county offices, and evacuated a school because of bomb threats. Garbage rumors are threatening lives. Second, repeating the nonsense, even to mock it, reinforces a frame that immigrants are dangerously different. People can see the memes and think “immigrants eat weird food and have weird customs but even they wouldn’t eat cats…” The frame that immigrants are different and do not quite belonging is reinforced, which was the point of the lie. Finally, every moment we’re talking about whether or not beleaguered people fleeing a failed state and hoping to find hope and shelter in the promise that America can be, is a moment we aren’t talking about Trump praising Hungary’s Viktor Orbán. Orbán is a “right wing populist” who has clamped down on the free press, undermined the independent judiciary, and is close to Putin. Focusing on Trump’s nonsense about Haitians makes life worse for those he attacked and distracts from the very real issue that Trump looks to dictators as role models.
What We’re Watching
You’ve (Hopefully) Got Mail
Ballots are already in the mail and more are coming. There will be a surge of mail to voters, and from voters back to election offices. That has election officials nervous. We are watching to see how election officials and the US Postal Service ensure ballots are delivered and votes counted, and how those officials assure voters their votes are being counted. We are also watching to see which campaigns remind voters that American elections have never been more accurate, and which campaigns use logistics as an excuse to undermine faith in election outcomes. If elections don’t work, democracy fails. But it’s not enough for something to be true, people also have to believe it. If voters don’t have faith in elections - even if elections are fair and accurate - democracy cannot work.
What We’re Reading
Making Promises You Can’t Keep
Donald Trump recently promised to pay for IVF treatments if elected president. For her part, Kamala Harris said she would “…bring back the bipartisan border security bill that [Trump] killed and I will sign it into law.” Neither candidate can keep their promise without the help of Congress - which is unlikely to support the former and has already rejected the latter. Both candidates, in other words, are making promises they can’t keep.
These claims brought to mind a political communication ethics case study on candidates using vague rhetoric and making false promises. One argument is that of course people shouldn’t promise to do things they can’t do - it’s both a bad thing to do, and risks increasing voter cynicism because elected officials never do what they say. On the other hand, campaign promises are ways of expressing a candidate’s values. In the case of Trump, saying he would make IVF treatment free is a way of saying he cares about helping families. Harris’ position says she supports both border security and being bipartisan. The policy itself may matter less than what the policy conveys about a candidate’s priorities and values.
What We’re Watching
Debates Budget and Presidential
Next week’s scheduled presidential debate is getting the headlines. We, of course, will be watching.
Getting less attention are the bubbling debates about the federal budget. The federal fiscal year ends at the end of this month. As has has become their habit, Congress has yet to pass federal appropriations bills and is instead working on a temporary solution, or continuing resolution (CR). Congress is debating about adding a provision that would require people to prove they’re US citizens before they can register to vote (it’s already illegal for non-citizens to vote, and there is no evidence non-citizen voting is a problem). They are also debating about the length of the CR. House Speaker Mike Johnson is proposing a six-month CR, others want a shorter term deal, and some don’t want a deal at all and prefer that the government down (an unlikely outcome, but on the table).
The whole thing is ethically suspect. Congress is using people’s paychecks to score partisan points. Putting agencies - and therefore the people who work in those agencies and their families - in limbo. This treats people as means to political ends. Connecting legislation that would make the illegal illegaler while inventing a scary problem that doesn’t exist and that is unrelated to federal funding, is about politics, not paying the bills.
Budgets are reflections of values. The current budget debate says Congress cares more about politics than it does policymaking. We are watching to see if Speaker Johnson can quickly dispense with the political posturing and focus on the task of governing. We are ever skeptical, but ever hopeful.
What We’re Reading
The Ethics of America’s Story
Ted Anthony of the Associated Press recently wrote, “Americans live in one of the only societies that was built not upon hundreds of years of common culture but upon stories themselves.” As he points out, what the American story is and who gets to tell it “can be a contentious thing.”
Countless scholars from countless disciplines have argued that human beings tell stories to make sense of a complex and seemingly chaotic world. Stories help us identify causes, assign credit and blame, explain our current circumstances, and help tell us what comes next.
Politicians tell stories to explain current events and how people should feel about the future. They tell us it’s “morning in America” and that their personal stories - and therefore our personal stories - are "uniquely American.” Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama were masters of this narrative.
But of course America’s story is more complicated than that. It includes slavery, mass killing, cruelty, and exploitation. The United States has never been as good as its ideals. Bill Clinton might have been wrong when he said, “there is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.”
What, then, are the ethics of telling an American story? Should we be, as philosopher Richard Rorty argued, “loyal to a dream country rather than the one to which [we] wake up in the morning”? Should candidates, as I have argued, ground their rhetoric in a prophetic version of American civil religion? Should candidates tell an aspirational story of who we could be, a clear-eyed story of who we are, or whatever story works to win an election? Should they tell some combination of the real, ideal and pragmatic? Or do the ethics of it matter at all? What, if any, ethical obligation do politicians have to the story of America itself?
What We’re Watching
False Claims of Election Fraud
In 2016 Donald Trump claimed the Iowa Caucuses were rigged for Sen. Ted Cruz. He has been lying about the 2020 election for four years. Now Trump is building on those lies to undermine faith in the 2024 election.
A number of states have passed or tried to pass rules making it more difficult to certify election results. These moves are largely driven by people who still wrongly say that Trump won the 2020 election. Ungrounded arguments of fraud driving these efforts can needlessly delay election results and distort outcomes. Nonsense claims of widespread fraud undermine faith in elections.
Evidence-based claims of fraud should, of course, be taken seriously by election officials. But groundless claims, driven by politics, and meant to undermine faith in the outcome of an election that hasn’t even happened yet, decrease trust in a core democratic institution. If people don’t believe in elections, democracy is done.
We are watching to see how the press, elected and appointed officials - and ultimately candidates - respond to attempts to pre-deny the outcome of the 2024 election.