Are Americans Being Conditioned to Accept Delayed Elections?

Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve gotten used to a sight that should never feel normal: armed National Guard soldiers standing watch (or gardening!) in Washington, DC. Camouflage uniforms at the steps of monuments to liberty. Soldiers patrolling the capital of a constitutional democracy. That image alone should set off alarms. Yet for many, the reaction has been a shrug—just another extraordinary measure in extraordinary times.

That shrug is exactly the problem. Democracies rarely collapse overnight. They weaken step by step, as people get desensitized. Outrage fades, the unthinkable becomes routine, and the guardrails that protect self-government quietly disappear.

We saw this play out again last week. President Trump did something no president has ever done: he fired a sitting member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Lisa Cook. He told her he had “sufficient cause” to remove her, even though her post is designed to be insulated from politics. Cook and her lawyer say they’ll fight it. But the larger point is how quickly the moment passed. A president moves against the independence of America’s central bank, and the country barely pauses to react. Another breach, another national shrug emoji.

Meanwhile, in Illinois, Governor J.B. Pritzker blasted Trump for vowing to send the National Guard into Chicago, as he’s already done in Los Angeles and Washington. Think about that: the president threatening to militarize one of America’s biggest cities, and the governor publicly resisting. That’s not politics as usual—it’s an extraordinary clash over whether US troops can be dispatched into American streets at the president’s discretion.

The danger isn’t just these specific moves. It’s the trajectory they create. The more Americans hear phrases like “civil unrest” and “domestic conflict,” the more plausible it sounds to suggest elections should be delayed “for safety.” History shows how this works. In Turkey, a state of emergency after a coup attempt stretched into years, consolidating power at the top. In Russia, unrest has been a convenient excuse to tighten control over opposition. Even here at home, fear after 9/11 opened the door to surveillance powers most Americans never would have accepted earlier. Fear reshapes what people are willing to tolerate.

Yes, the Constitution fixes the timing of elections. But words on paper only work if leaders respect them and citizens demand they be upheld. If an administration argues that unrest makes elections unsafe, the courts might eventually push back—but the disruption alone could erode confidence in the process. That’s how democratic norms crumble: not with a declaration, but with doubt, confusion, and fatigue.

This is why normalization is so dangerous. If troops in our capital feel ordinary, then so do other abuses. If the independence of the Federal Reserve can be undermined without outrage, the next breach is easier to justify. What’s shocking today feels routine tomorrow, and by then the guardrails are already gone.

History offers a counterexample worth remembering. In 1864, with the Civil War raging and the nation literally torn apart, Abraham Lincoln insisted on holding the election. Suspending democracy in the name of saving it, he argued, would mean the country had already lost. His decision to go forward preserved American self-government at its most fragile moment.

The stakes today may feel less dramatic, but the principle is the same. Soldiers in the streets of Washington, the firing of an independent federal official, threats to militarize Chicago—these are not passing headlines. They are flashing neon warning signs.

The midterm elections must proceed on schedule, not because the climate will be calm—it won’t—but because democracy is designed to function in turbulence. That’s the whole point.

Democracies don’t usually die all at once. They erode slowly, one breach at a time, while citizens convince themselves that each new step is just politics. The responsibility now falls on all of us—regardless of party—to stop shrugging and start recognizing what’s at stake.

Because once we accept soldiers in the streets, political purges of independent officials, and presidential threats to militarize cities as “normal,” the idea of undermining an election won’t sound unthinkable anymore. And by then, it may be too late.

Our elections must happen on time. Period. Anything less risks sacrificing the very democracy those troops are sworn to protect.