We republish below an unofficial translation of the following article from the Brazilian New Democratic newspaper A Nova Democracia, originally published on November 5, 2024.
The votes of the US elections begin to be counted today (11/5), in a process of permanent uncertainty about which reactionary, between Kamala Harris (“Democrat”) and Donald Trump (Republican), will head the management of the imperialist state of the United States for the next 4 years. The votes of Arabs, Muslims and supporters of Palestine will play a key role in the final result, according to polls. This year’s election in the US was marked by turbulence, such as the hoax behind the attack on the ultra-reactionary Donald Trump, and the explosions of ballot boxes across the country.
Support from billionaires and boycott
Following the pattern of the last elections, the Yankee state made a great campaign to mobilize people to vote. The intention is to reverse the growing number of absentee voters or even protest votes, a sign of the growing demoralization of the old political system in force in the country and the dissatisfaction of the popular masses with the electoral process – which, ultimately, has the purpose of legitimizing the old order. According to a survey by the Associated Press Center for Public Affairs Research, 70 percent of voters are frustrated or anxious about the election, and few express enthusiasm.
Both candidates were financed by imperialist billionaires to push the campaign; Harris has received support from tycoons such as Bill Gates and James Dimon, while Trump is supported by reactionary riches, many from Silicon Valley.
The particularity of this year lies in the fact that the Palestinian issue has a central weight in the elections, and even in the boycott rates. “In 2020 I voted. And I voted for Biden. But then, this time, we saw this genocide unfold under a Democratic president. I realized that the two parties are exactly the same thing, except for the way they attract voters,” said a student at Columbia University, in an interview with The Worker newspaper. “As a Palestinian, just seeing the atrocities of the past year, it doesn’t make sense for me to vote for any of them. Even if it means we will have Trump. Because to me it doesn’t mean anything. They are the same.”
Exploded ballot boxes and hoaxes during elections
At the same time, political violence was, once again, the rule during the election. A revealing episode was the hoax behind the shots fired at Trump, which raised the Yankee political crisis to levels not seen in decades, with chances of rising to unprecedented levels.
In October, ballot box explosions were also recorded between the 8th and 29th, with no conclusion yet as to who was behind them. The monopoly press and election auditors branded the explosions an “attack on democracy”. The newspaper of the imperialist bourgeoisie aligned with the “Democrats”, The New York Times, said that anonymous police sources said that ballots had phrases like “Free Palestine” and “Free Gaza”, but, officially, the FBI said nothing. The newspaper The Worker says it could be a false flag, but the participation of progressive sectors behind it cannot be ruled out.
The counting of the votes will continue in the coming days. The end of the farce, however, does not tend to alleviate the ongoing political crisis in the US, since the economic crisis, linked to the general crisis of the imperialist system, tends to continue – thus leading to more wars of aggression, the deepening of the migration issue (a consequence of the plundering of oppressed countries) and the withdrawal of rights and greater exploitation of the North American proletariat, to name just a few of the symptoms.
