The 2024 election will be a nation-defining struggle. We must not deceive ourselves. | Opinion

It seems important to note some things.

First, the Republican Party now again nominates for the presidency the most dangerous and iniquitous human being ever put forward by a major American political party. There should be no doubt about this. It’s flatly and undeniably true.

Directing a multifaceted conspiracy to overthrow the democratically elected government of the United States is only the worst of his endless cascade of transgressions.

Second, he is now joined, as partner, with the most dangerous and iniquitous person to be nominated by a major political party for governor of North Carolina in the modern history of the state. (Not to mention the NC Republican nominee for Superintendent of Public Instruction.) This partnership of hate and constitutional rejectionism is what we face.

Every person who votes for them, who aids and abets them, who supports them in any fashion, who joins in their antidemocratic and brutal crusade, demeans himself and demeans the country. They also endanger the world. They literally endanger the world.

It is vital to be clear-eyed about this. Free of pretense. To be fearless, not faithless. To be unwilling to ignore the existential and defining threat we immediately face. We can wish it were not so. But that doesn’t change a thing. It is, flatly, what it is.

As historian Heather Cox Richardson has written that a second Trump term would mean “an end of American democracy. I have absolutely no doubt about that, and he’s made it very clear.” He’ll put in power “those who want to burn it all down.” As long as “somebody gets hurt, that’s enough for them.”

Third, against this horrifying regime there is now just one actual, remaining, viable opponent — the engaged citizenry of the United States. And there is only one entity, one institution, through which to wage the nation-defining struggle — the American Democratic Party. I could wish that wasn’t the case. Like many, I’ve had my disagreements with the Democrats. But there’s no one else. No law, no regulation, no constitutional provision, no court, no guardrail will save us. No political class, no consultants, no group of experts or commentators will come to our rescue.

The Democratic Party is now, at least, well and truly named. It will itself, in 2024, either save the American democracy or it won’t, and the American democracy will fall. We can deceive ourselves about this, I suppose. Millions do. But if you are in a great battle to save your form of government, your essence as a people, it does not help, it does not assist the cause, to pretend it otherwise.

To claim that the unfolding darkness is not actually upon us. To behave like a child. We are now, like it or not, essential sisters and brothers in the cause of America. Or we aid the other side.

Anyone who thinks that if Trump again becomes president he and his crew will ever surrender power is a fool. A fool who hears no evil, sees none, speaks of none. A fool who buries his head in poisoned sand..

I regret greatly that this is the point to which we have come. But such regret serves no purpose. It eases no burden, lifts no banner. The vast Republican Party, in North Carolina and across the nation, has enrolled in the sedition caucus — whether through ambition, hatred or cowardice. The choice is made. For the rest of us, it is all hands on deck. All citizens obliged. We are both the heirs and the guarantors of freedom.

Contributing columnist Gene Nichol is a professor of law at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.