One of the sillier claims of this year’s political silly season is that former President Trump is a threat to democracy, and that’s a reason to vote for President Biden and the Democrats. They point to what they call the insurrection – but really was more of an out-of-control rally, march, and protest that became a riot, causing a little over $2 million in damages to the US Capitol and leading to a series of deaths from heart attacks and suicides of Capitol Police Officers. But let’s get grounded in reality, and note that it was a time of bad behavior in America coming out of the pandemic – Black Lives Matter protests and rallies sometimes spilled over into disorder and even riots, causing over $2 billion in property damage to cities and towns across America. Politics sometimes spills over into outright bad behavior as people get carried away.

It’s not at all clear what the insurrection could have become had it been even more disorderly. Maybe the Capitol building would have partially burned or more rooms destroyed, though I would imagine they have fire suppression equipment and, if necessary, they would have called in the military or National Guard to restore order. But it’s really unlikely it would have had any long-term consequences besides more historical artifacts being destroyed or more people being assaulted or killed. The certification of votes would have continued either in the Capitol or another building, and President Biden would still have become president. The courts and law enforcement would have kept the process moving forward, even if there is a jerk in the White House who doesn’t believe in following the law or is a believer in conspiracy theories that he won the election.

The White House is one cog in the great system known as the American system of government. American democracy and its laws have a lot of redundancy built into the system. Power is widely distributed, and especially these days, with the political parties and different regions of the country having such widely varied views on the major issues of the day, it’s unlikely any one group is going to cow the rest of the country to go along and allow domination by one political party. The White House can be run by a complete madman, a person who has little respect for the laws or institutions of democracy, but the gears of the system keep clanking along, producing mostly good results for the people as a whole, following long-term trends, rather than just the will of one man at the top of the government. The President has a lot of power, but he doesn’t have direct control over the US Supreme Court, the Congress, lower-level courts, the many police agencies across the nation, and certainly not state and local governments.

What would happen if America elected a man who went completely berserk in the White House? Probably not much in the long-term, even if it got a lot of scary news headlines. For one, if the White House started to violate the law, they would likely be sued, and courts would start prescribing orders to stop engaging in the actions they are engaging in. If they continued to persist, ignoring court orders and violating the law, fines could be assessed, and government employees arrested. Maybe not the President, but many lower-level employees would fear the threat of jail time, ruined careers, and significant fines. There would be the immediate outrage of a large portion of the US population, followed by Congressional investigations and those by law enforcement agencies like the FBI and the Justice Department. During the next election, the President’s party would be punished at the polls, the opposition swept into office, and even further investigations and isolation of the President in the White House. States, especially those controlled by the opposite party, are very likely to support court orders and laws, and pose significant resistance to whatever unlawful acts are engaged in at the White House.

Could the President play with election laws to try to make them more favorable to himself or herself – and their chosen party? Yes. But again, there are limitations to what any political institution can do in American democracy. Presidents live and die on waves of popular opinion, and even when they don’t fear getting impeached or voted out of office, congresspersons certainly do. Politicians can appear tone-deaf to protests and public opinion, but their careers live and die based on the whims of voters. If you don’t respect the wishes of your district, you will get tossed out in either a primary or general election. Gerrymandering can protect incumbents, but it can’t guarantee them re-election, especially in an era when primaries are always a threat. Despite the wishes of power brokers in political parties, primaries have taken much of their grip over the system. Voters ultimately decide who is in power and who is tossed out on the street.

If you take the threat to democracy off the table, that makes room to debate the actual issues facing our country and the pros and cons of both candidates. It allows people to review the candidates and think about which one best serves their interests. Often it’s a trade-off – for some issues, you might be better off with a Democrat in the White House, for others, a Republican. You have to weigh their pros and cons. But the threat to democracy isn’t a real threat because the political system is so large and diverse, and if one actor behaves badly, much of the system will pop up as resistance to their actions. Large bodies with diverse power bases rarely move quickly, and this is important for protecting democracy.