Ken Burns: ‘Something more fundamental at stake’ in this election

Filmmaker and historian Ken Burns warned Tuesday that the U.S. is facing its fourth great national crisis, arguing that the stakes of the midterm elections extend beyond political differences and spill into the survival of democracy.

In a New York Times opinion piece published on Election Day, Burns accused the Trump administration of fueling misinformation to undermine the rule of law and sowing divisions that threaten the foundations of American democracy.

“As we go to the polls today in this most consequential of midterm elections, we face our country’s fourth great crisis,” Burns wrote, comparing the current political climate to the Civil War, the Great Depression and World War II.

Burns argued that the county’s democratic institutions endured those earlier crises with peaceful transitions of power and the judiciary maintaining its independence. This time, however, he suggested those safeguards are under unprecedented strain.

“Elections are in doubt, the highest court seems compromised, history has been distorted, books have been banned, and dictators have been coddled while our closest allies have been ridiculed and dismissed,” he wrote. “People are rightly concerned whether our institutions are at a breaking point.”

Burns, whose latest PBS documentary series examines the American Revolution, said his nearly decade-long work on the project offered lessons about the fragility of American democracy and the dangers of concentrating power in the executive branch.

He argued that the nation’s founders would be dismayed by the willingness of lawmakers to surrender their constitutional authority to the Trump administration.

“I think the founders would be hugely disappointed that so many members of the legislative branch have ceded so much power to the executive branch, which has filled that vacuum with corruption and assaults on the rule of law, even undermining the fundamental right to vote,” Burns wrote.

The filmmaker also pointed to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and the continued influence of election denial from President Trump and the Republican Party as signs of the county’s democratic decline.

Despite his concerns, Burns remained optimistic that Americans could overcome the country’s political divisions, pointing to earlier periods of upheaval throughout history, including during Reconstruction and the Vietnam War.

He urged voters to consider whether candidates seeking office are willing to uphold the Constitution rather than simply advance their party’s political agenda.

“Most midterm elections are seen as referendums on the policies of the president. This one is no different. But there’s something more fundamental at stake here, beyond policy differences,” Burns wrote.

“This election is about the people — who are empowered to check our chief executive — and the candidates running for Congress, who either have sworn an oath to the Constitution or hope to do so,” he continued. “Whether they are prepared to honor their oath should matter enormously to everyone who values the idea of us — the idea of America.”