Letters to the Editor: Trump isn’t running for election. He’s running against the election

To the editor: “The ballots are a disaster,” President Trump said. He added: “We’ll want to have — get rid of the ballots and you’ll have a very — we’ll have a very peaceful — there won’t be a transfer, frankly. There’ll be a continuation.” (“Trump refuses to commit to a peaceful transfer of power,” Sept. 23)

He’s normalizing his plan to have the popular vote nullified by sympathetic state legislatures, just as the Atlantic has reported. This sedition is probably already operational: The two Republicans on North Carolina’s state board of elections abruptly quit this week, claiming changes were made to election procedures without their consent.

It’s part of a culminating whole. The first pebbles in this avalanche — nationalist rhetoric and innuendo in 2016 — have built and increased until now, when large boulders tumble in plain sight. Trump hasn’t shot anyone on Fifth Avenue, but he’s doing something much worse. We are watching our system of checks and balances being used against the very democracy they are supposed to protect.

Lest you think the judiciary will save the election, let me remind you of something else Trump said on Wednesday, calmly, and with confidence: “This will end up in the Supreme Court.” My blood runs cold.

Carole Cooper, Manhattan Beach

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To the editor: As a lifelong reader of the Los Angeles Times, I was more than disappointed to see that the print edition article on Trump’s refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power was buried on Page A6.

With the election just weeks away, the terrifying news that Trump has no plans of honoring the election results should be a front-page, above-the-fold banner. His remarks should serve as a tsunami siren alerting the nation to the critical danger this president poses to democracy.

Has The Times (and our country, for that matter) been so numbed by all the other daily news that it cannot find front-page space for this most troubling threat yet from Trump? Or does The Times just not view the president’s position as a danger to America?

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) called the scenario threatened by Trump “unthinkable.” Well, Sen. Romney, think again. I can assure you that the president is thinking about it very much.

I fear for my beloved country.

Wendy Skolfield, Topanga

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To the editor: Bill Maher is looking more and more prescient. During the Democratic primary, the comedian and political commentator asked candidates what their plan was if they won and Trump refused to leave.

Some had a clever joke ready, some did not. None had a plan.

Trump’s public refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power is so much a part of his constant stream of outrageous statements and tweets that it rates only a Page A6 story in The Times. We have become inured to his comments, and we do so at our own peril.

The statement is a direct assault on the democratic process that makes us who we are as a nation. It should be addressed immediately. Nov. 3 may well be too late.

Bart Braverman, Indio

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To the editor: It does not matter whether Trump commits to a peaceful transfer of power. This country is not a banana republic.

Whether he leaves the White House or not is not his decision to make — and this reader would very much appreciate it if the stenographers of the press corps would acknowledge that fact.

Linda Whitener, Charlotte, N.C.