Why I Didn’t Vote for Joe Biden . . . or Donald Trump

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My absentee ballot went into the mail last week. It looked a lot like 2016’s ballot: conservative selections for various state and local positions, write-ins for President and Vice President of the United States.

I didn’t vote for Biden and Harris, because I believe they would be bad for the country. I didn’t vote for Trump and Pence, because I believe they’re also bad for the country. It’s not clear to me which would be worse, all things considered, but it doesn’t matter. Both major party tickets add up to “Absolutely no way do you get my vote”—not “maybe,” not “it’s a close call,” not “this is a tough decision”—just no. Emphatically, no.

I wrote in a couple of individuals who have demonstrated leadership ability, above-average wisdom, key conservative principles, and a sense of responsibility for their public discourse. They’ve also given me reason to believe that—if they were President and Vice President—they would see themselves as the leaders of the entire nation, not just those who already adore them.

They would attempt to persuade detractors rather than merely rouse their faithful and try to compel everyone else through policy.

So why didn’t I back one of the “electable” candidates? Several reasons.

1. I didn’t have to.

Much of the rhetoric on voting ethics assumes that no alternative exists to backing Trump-Pence or backing Biden-Harris. Actual ink on actual paper on the ballot I submitted proves that assumption is false.

Some object that failure to support Option A is defacto support of Option B. But a bit of reflection reveals that we don’t hold anything else in life to that standard, and rightfully so. Elections are not the exception.

I’m referring to the ethics of forced dilemmas—when someone wrongfully presents us with two bad options and insists we’re responsible for the outcome of whichever we choose. The truth is that the ones who created the dilemma are responsible, and no one else.

I had no hand in nominating Donald Trump. People with very different principles from me did that, and the national social cost of leaving voters with no suitable candidate to vote for is on their heads.

There is a third option. I took it. I don’t regret it.

2. It was not a “wasted” vote.

I realize that some are so focused on voting as a transaction (and on the immediate outcome of that transaction) that they can’t even begin to consider other factors. The fact remains, though, that as human beings, our principles, values and intentions play a huge role in the moral weight of our actions. We’re not machines, and our choices are more than mere math.

So a vote is an expression of beliefs and desires, regardless of how the electoral mathematics turns out. And for Christians, beliefs and desires matter—forever. It’s literally impossible to waste a vote, because votes are counted twice: once here below, as humans count, and once more above using a fundamentally different standard—just like everything else we do.

That said, for those who only see tangible, practical outcomes as real (an odd point of view for Christians!), I have arguments as well. Read on.

3. We won’t get a better result if we keep doing the same thing.

If you read the Federalist Papers and the views of many of the founding leaders of the nation, as well as the Constitution itself, it’s evident that there was a design they had in mind, and that design includes—ultimately depends on—the citizens choosing from among their own best and brightest to serve as the executive of the nation.

How did we get so far from that?

The answer is complex, but voting for candidates who fail the “basic leaderly character” test sure hasn’t helped!

I’m mainly talking to the “hold your nose and vote for Trump because he’s not Hillary and not Biden” crowd. Call me an idealist, but you’re going to develop a permanently sore nose if you keep making that compromise.

Moving past chronic rhinitis, consider what we know about political parties. They hate losing. When they lose, they reflect at least a little on why, and sometimes they learn and behave differently in the future. What the GOP needs is a lesson in the school of hard knocks. There’s no guarantee they’ll get the message—or that enough of them will get it to produce a better candidate in 2024, but if large numbers of GOP voters refuse to back Trump there’s at least a chance.

Rubber-stamping their abysmal candidates will never teach them to do better.

4. Government power doesn’t change minds.

Peter Drucker is credited with saying, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” He wasn’t wrong. While who controls the reins of power is a huge factor in what life is like for us and our families, and a huge factor in shaping the future of the nation, it’s only huge until you compare it to the biggest factor: the reins of persuasion. What matters most is what millions of individual humans actually believe and value and do.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how persuasive is Donald Trump as a voice for conservative ways of thinking?

At a time when virtually everyone recognizes that the nation is “polarized” and not listening to reason, we elected a president who is the quintessential polarizer, who listens to no-one he doesn’t already agree with, and who mischaracterizes opponents’ viewpoints—as well as hard, verifiable facts—almost as often as he exhales.

He is the anti-persuader.

He speaks to the dazzled-and-delusional crowd who view him through near messianic lenses. He speaks to the hold-your-nose and back him because he’s not Hillary and not Biden crowd. To the rest of the nation, the people who are most essential in this culture war, his communications have less than zero persuasive value. He flings verbiage at the center and the left like a middle-schooler throws cow pies and rotten eggs at an enemy’s house.

So what Trump offers to public discourse isn’t merely a zero in the people-won-over column. He pushes undecideds further from the things we believe in and galvanizes the committed left toward increased opposition to much of what we hold dear. (The old adage was never more apt: “With friends like these, who needs …”)

People of the center or left who were once for something (increasing funding for police training and technology, for example) often decide they’re against it as soon as Trump begins vocalizing support.

We may have already lost the culture war. 2016 may have sealed that outcome. Regardless, I’m against the current course of anti-persuasion and voted accordingly.

5. Character is upstream of politics.

The office of President of the United States is one of such high stakes that candidates must be filtered by some character essentials before we even begin to consider their political views and agenda.

  • What if war breaks out (from outside the nation or within it)?
  • What if a far deadlier pandemic than COVID-19 sweeps the world?
  • What if a series of other natural disasters of unusual scale strikes the nation?
  • What if mob violence and riots occur in five or ten times the number of cities we saw in 2020?

In these situations, sober-minded, competent, big-picture, adult leadership matters far more than Democrat or Republican. Political philosophy matters in these situations, but philosophy can’t compensate for basic character and competence.

6. There must be trust.

I can’t trust Donald Trump. He’s not unique in that regard. I can’t find it in my heart to trust anyone who openly admires dictators, who has at any time in his adult life publicly bragged about groping women, who fires employees by Twitter and publicly shames people who have loyally stuck their necks out for him over and over again, who has made disrespect of any and all who differ from him the one enduring principle of his public life.

I also can’t trust people who display a fondness for conspiracy theories and for encouraging others to do same. I’m talking about narratives that are clearly contrary to verifiable facts. If you’re out of touch with reality, I might be your friend; I might be your relative; I might like you personally; I might love you as a fellow Christian or a part of my family. But I can’t trust you.

It’s not that I won’t or don’t want to. I can’t.

“Trust” is always a scoped term: Trust for what? Trust to do what? In this case, demagogs, bullies, narcissists, and fantasy-worlders can’t be trusted to make decisions for the good of the organizations they lead. Whether it’s U.S. President or president of the town glee club, they don’t get my vote.

Discussion

Agree. I, too, voted third party for the same reasons you explain.

Tyler is a pastor in Olympia, WA and works in State government.

Also agree. For me it is mostly point three. I understand why others don’t see it this way and I support their voting their conscience just as I have done. To me though, the Republican Party seems to nominate increasingly ridiculous (and liberal) candidates. I certainly understand the “yeah but the other guy” argument… but I no longer find it convincing. I’ve voted third party for the last few presidential elections and I’m content with it.

Like Aaron, I voted for neither Trump nor Biden. I’m tired of all the craziness. I chose instead to vote for Jo Jorgensen, the Libertarian presidential candidate.

The hardest part about writing that was keeping it down to a somewhat manageable size. There are so many reasons.

But I do want to tack on a couple more very briefly:

7. You can’t really separate policy agenda from basic leaderly character.

Can’t do it at any level of leadership and can’t do it at the Presidential level. I’m sure I’ll be characterized as saying a leader has to be exemplary in every way or that I’m expecting the President to be an exemplary Christian, or—and this has already happened before: of expecting the President to be Jesus.

These are straw men.

I use the phrase “basic leaderly character” intentionally. There are a handful of essentials that need to be there for any leadership role, and in many areas of life we don’t even try to argue that a leader’s agenda negates how he treats people, how he relates to factual information, or how well he actually leads, etc. We usually get that those go together in a single package. When elections roll around we switch gears and want to apply completely different rules to the leader of the most powerful nation on the planet. Doesn’t make sense to me.

34 You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. (Mt 12:34)

A man who says and tweets the kind of stuff Trump does is not a trustworthy human being. There’s chapter and verse.

8. Being anti-abortion doesn’t compensate for all the other stuff.

There are better ways to say it, I’m sure, but that’s the gist.

  • Abortion needs to be opposed on many levels and the Presidential level is not the most important of them.
  • A candidate’s anti-abortion stance doesn’t make him more trustworthy or less damaging in other areas that are just as important. Fetal lives matter, but so do adult lives, the lives of the elderly, the lives of the sick, the lives of young men sent to war, the lives of police officers, the list goes on.

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

Aaron, you said, “[I can’t admire someone] who has at any time in his adult life publicly bragged about groping women.” David?

Another day. And another TDS article at Sharper Iron. After Trump wins re-election (and I do very strongly believe that he will—my political evaluations are sometimes in error, but never in doubt) will you continue this trend, or will we finally get a break from the constant drumbeat? We get it. You don’t like Trump.

One serious question. You said you don’t know whether Biden/Harris would be worse for the country than Trump/Pence. Is that based on the assumption that Biden wouldn’t be able to actually get done the things he’s campaigning on doing? Or do you think what Trump has done—done, NOT said—in the past four years is more negative for the country than the opposite policies would have been? Or is there something else that leads you to the point of indecision?

Thank you! Points #7 and #8 are among the most important, I think. To them I would add the following:

- Christian testimony is more important than political outcomes.

It is undeniable that Christians had a great deal to do with the rise of Trump by their vocal support - even during the Republican primary. I believed this has destroyed the credibility of Christians and the resulting backlash from non-believers will erode what’s left of Christian moral influence. “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you” (Romans 2:24). I would rather face persecution than sacrifice the testimony of Christ for temporary political power.

- Truth matters.

Not only have many Christians publicly dismissed or explained away the legion of lies that Trump spreads daily, I have seen Christians share or otherwise promote blatant misinformation to promote Trump’s agenda with verifiably false accusations, intentionally misleading quotes ripped out of context, or just not telling the whole story. Do we not think the truth matters? What does it say about the agenda we are promoting if we feel we must use untruth or neglect fact checking to support it? If we can’t stand on truth we have nothing left to stand on.

Here’s where I’m at:

I think a godly, discerning Christian could vote for Donald Trump. But they should do so with their eyes open, knowing exactly what he is and what he is not.

I also think a godly, discerning Christian could vote third party/skip the top of the ticket. But they should also do so with their eyes open, knowing that their vote will not achieve objective results.

I don’t think a godly, discerning Chrsitian could vote for Joe Biden. Period.

Josh Stilwell, associate pastor, Alathea Baptist Church, Des Moines, Iowa.

Fun and Mental

….is that one candidate worships in Samaria instead of Jerusalem, the other worships Moloch. The sequence of sins of Israel clearly indicates that the latter is worse than the former. One doesn’t need to like the sins of Jeroboam to appreciate the fact that he’s not Ahab, no?

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

If I had to base it on the spirituality of the person, I wouldn’t have been able to vote for a candidate in my lifetime.

Hard to downplay the role of the president when it comes to abortion on a day when a third Supreme Court nominee of a first term President is confirmed and sworn in to serve. Most believe the Supreme Court is the key to overturning the legality of abortion, and clearly the president has an important role in selections. How different would the Supreme Court look if another candidate was elected in 2016? How different will it look in four years as a result of this election? Certainly abortion is not the only issue our country faces, and voting for life is not the only way to stand for life, but the role of the president as pertaining to abortion is definitely not worth downplaying.

Adam Breiner

adammbreiner@gmail.com

[Bert Perry]

….is that one candidate worships in Samaria instead of Jerusalem, the other worships Moloch. The sequence of sins of Israel clearly indicates that the latter is worse than the former. One doesn’t need to like the sins of Jeroboam to appreciate the fact that he’s not Ahab, no?

We do not have to vote for either Samaria or Moloch.

So, you’re offering “the way I see it…” and I’m offering 7 reasons (5 in the post, 2 in the comments). I find that interesting.

None of my reasons even come close to “He isn’t godly enough” or “He isn’t Christian enough” or “He isn’t spiritual enough” or whatever. Basic leaderly character isn’t the unique possession of any particular religion. It’s common grace ….and everything from Confucianism to the “enlightened self interest” of many atheists supports it—but mostly common sense.

As for Abortion & Court nominees, now there’s an argument.

But I have a counter. It’s not all that “hard” for a couple of reasons.

  • Most of the reduction in abortions has happened and will continue to happen (if it does) at the level of “people changing their minds about it.”
  • The second greatest reduction has been state level legislation… but it’s a big step down from number 1.
  • Even if the Court overturns Roe v. Wade, it’s going to throw the matter back on hearts and minds and state laws.
  • A new “conservative” (remember how often we’ve seen that label used on Justices who turned out to have different views than expected) judge only makes a difference if a majority in the Senate + Democratic President doesn’t pack the court. (A majority that, if it happens, is quite likely attributable to the President we’ve had the last four years.)

The prospect of court packing only intensifying the “culture eats policy” argument I’ve been making. If enough people want something, they’re going to find a way.

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

not in the Supreme Court, the Senate, the House, or the Presidency.

That said, I am not going to let the perfect be the harm of the good. Call that pragmatism if you want. Go ahead.

Leftists have a real agenda. Liberals have a real agenda. Maybe you shield yourself from them. I get a front-row seat every day on campus. It pains me that the majority view on campus now is that “focusing on the written word” is racist and white supremacist. That expecting a person to be accountable for their individual actions is white supremacy. That showing up on time and often is white supremacy. That reading and learning is white supremacy. But it is.

Wake up.

I listen to all the reasons for not voting for Trump, and they seem like grasping after straws, feeble attempts to rationalize a poor decision. I’m sorry, but not liking Trump is a sorry reason to not vote for him. It’s way too emotional and subjective, in spite of all the justifications to present it as an objective, principled choice. It betrays a weak understanding of how politics work in America.

There are two possible outcomes in this election—Trump or Biden. One of these two will win. If Trump loses, Biden wins. If Biden wins, the leftest, anti-God agenda will sweep in with a vengeance. The Supreme Court will almost certainly be expanded to neutralize Trump’s appointments. Religious liberty will be under attack with renewed energy. Higher taxes and thousands of regulations will be imposed. Socialistic solutions will be adopted which will make problems worse, not better. And everyone who refused to vote for Trump will bear some responsibility for these outcomes. That’s just the way it works, like it or not.

G. N. Barkman