Democrats Abroad
Taki's Magazine / ArchiveSteven Tucker
November 04, 2024
My all-time favorite example of electoral interference came in 1997, when Zimbabwe’s former president the Reverend Canaan Banana was scurrilously accused of several acts of homosexual abuse, leading to the truly unimprovable front-page headline “MAN RAPED BY BANANA.”
Some viewed this as no more than a nefarious attempt to hobble any future candidacy of Canaan by smearing his name with false allegations, tactics many MAGA supporters say have since been tried out against Donald Trump by female accusers with political axes to grind too. From “MAN RAPED BY BANANA” to “WOMAN RAPED BY ORANGE,” maybe?
Labour’s Love Lost
The latest example of interference in an American election, meanwhile, comes not from Russia or China, as per the usual stereotype, but from its alleged closest ally, Great Britain. In the final run-up to this week’s knife-edge presidential vote, it emerged that the governing left-wing U.K. Labour Party was apparently sending around 100 staff members across the Atlantic to campaign for the Democrats and Kamala Harris in swing states like North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.
A woman with the characteristically English name of Sofia Patel, billed as being “Head of Operations at The Labour Party,” a role I guess George Soros must recently have vacated, provided the telling email address labourforkamala@gmail.com for any activists who were interested to apply via. “Let’s show those Yanks how to win elections!” Patel said. I think the current British model for doing so is importing millions of people with names like “Patel” to act as a reliable ethnic client vote for the left-wing antiwhite parties, a tactic I reckon Kamala’s Democrats have already mastered perfectly well by themselves.
“This is illegal,” tweeted prominent Trump supporter Elon Musk, but it seems it probably isn’t; at least not if foreign mercenaries like the Patel Battalion aren’t specifically paid for their efforts. But, of course, it depends what you mean by “paid.” Patel’s email specifically said “we will sort your housing” and referred to having “ten spots available” for transatlantic helpers in North Carolina. As the Trump team reasonably argued when registering a complaint, this all clearly suggests an official Labour or Democrat “expenditure of resources,” at the very least. Whether or not getting your accommodation covered amounts in effect to receiving payment is for the authorities to decide—and we all know that the authorities will say, “No, because it’s being done for Kamala, not Donald.”
That said, if it probably isn’t illegal, it probably should be. As former Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka, British-born himself, said in his best cockney accent, Labour’s actions were “a bloody outrage.” On the other hand, Labour Party Employment Minister Alison McGovern told Sky News, “This is a normal thing that happens in elections.” Really? Which other foreign votes has the Labour Party been interfering in abroad without our knowledge, then? Next time someone on the British left spuriously accuses Vladimir Putin of facilitating the Brexit vote via unasked-for online meddling, Vlad should just parrot back, “This is a normal thing that happens in elections,” and tell anyone who doubts it to contact labourforkamala@gmail.com to receive official U.K. government confirmation of the fact.
President Evil
As Labour’s Kamala campaigners were all (at least officially) unpaid volunteers, it appears likely most will have been either know-nothing teenage lefty students with far too much time on their hands, or else recent purple-pubed university graduates in their early 20s who think the election of Donald Trump would mean the immediate imposition of fascist rule across the globe, rather than any actual adult Labour MPs—although, as Britain’s current wood-brained Foreign Secretary David Lammy has specifically smeared Trump as a “neo-Nazi-sympathizing sociopath” in the past, possibly the difference in mental capacity and political maturity between the two groups is not as wide as one might perhaps have hoped.
Yet indoctrination into a state of fanatical Trump Derangement Syndrome begins young in England. Trump’s natural state of popularity amongst British schoolchildren should be sky-high, as, unlike in America, the word “trump” is infant Anglo baby slang for “fart,” making him by rights every bit as popular amongst the under-10s as the late President Bumwilliepoopoo of Lesotho. That’s why, in October, Corbridge Church of England First School in Northumberland organized a corrective tie-in U.S. election event called an “ostracision.”
A Year Four group‚ i.e., 7- and 8-year-olds, nominated (or more likely were pushed into nominating) four world leaders who “they felt did not set a good example,” namely Kim Jong-Un, Vladimir Putin, Boris Johnson, and Donald Trump, all of whose political careers I’m sure the tots were every bit as intimately familiar with as they are with the rival ins and outs of the worlds of Peppa Pig, Paw Patrol, and Pokémon. Then they had to vote which ones were most deserving of being ostracized. The final decision in this prepubescent plebiscite, which was obviously not made with any teacher input or guidance whatsoever, was that Donald and Boris were by far the worst.
Letters Bomb
The next logical step should have been getting the kids to tamper directly in other people’s business by enlisting them all to write long, impassioned, and highly patronizing letters to U.S. voters in swing states, imploring them not to vote for the Evil Orange Hitler. Unfortunately, their entire time in Corbridge Church of England First School thus far having been devoted toward teaching them how best to hate supposed “fascists,” none of the students actually knew how to write a letter anyway.
In any case, this particular method of U.K.-based electoral interference in U.S. affairs had already been tried out, with ironic results, back in the 2004 Bush v. Kerry presidential race, when Britain’s rough version of the NYT, The Guardian, launched its deeply unsuccessful “Operation Clark County.” Here 11,000 readers were persuaded to email or write to registered swing voters across the in-play Ohio county in question, urging them not to vote for George Dubya. The end result? Voters moved decisively toward Bush, handing him victory in Clark County by 1,620 votes, a greater swing in favor of the Republicans taking place there than in any comparable Ohio area.
Some quite notable Brits mailed missives Ohio-wards too. Professional fossil-fondler Richard Dawkins paid for a stamp, warning that, if Bush won, Americans abroad would have to affect a Canadian accent through pure shame, pleading that “We in the rest of the world, who sadly cannot vote in the one election that really affects our future, are depending on you.” Dawkins signed off by trumpeting his then title as “Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University.” Richard may have understood science very well, but he certainly didn’t possess much understanding of basic human voter psychology here.
Best-selling writer of distinctly unthrilling spy thrillers John le Carré likewise informed his own unsolicited matched-up pen pal that “Probably no American President in all history has been so universally hated abroad as George W. Bush,” to which the recipient no doubt then replied, “I don’t care how they feel about him abroad, John, I’m voting for him to be President of the United States of America, not Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.” By alienating and annoying Clark County residents like this, The Guardian may very well have pushed them into voting Republican just to spite their arrogant limey junk-mailers.
Return to Sender
To prove this is what happened, you only have to examine the replies from irritated Ohioans and other offended Americans The Guardian and its condescending letter-writers received back in their turn. My favorite read as follows: “I hope your earholes turn to arseholes and shit on your shoulders.” So many similar responses did The Guardian receive that it managed to eke an entire, effort-free article (whose lazy style I hereby shamelessly imitate below) out of simply copy-and-pasting some of the most florid, abusive, and dentistry-related ones like these:
Those final two there could easily have been sent off to Labour PM Sir Keir Starmer’s bulging mailbag in 10 Downing Street by angry U.S. swing voters today.
Political Black Mail
This whole affair is like history repeating itself, especially when you examine The Guardian’s original 2004 article explaining their plan, provocatively entitled “My Fellow Non-Americans…,” in which, besides advocating a mass campaign of overseas letter-writing and emailing, they openly say things like “We’ve identified ways to give money to your preferred candidate, even though direct campaign contributions from foreigners aren’t allowed.” So have Starmer’s Labour Party in 2024, critics like Musk and Gorka may argue.
So what was The Guardian’s specific advice about how to illegally influence a U.S. election from the comfort of your yurt in leafy North London? By carefully proceeding as follows:
Translation: Bung $100 to the NAACP so they can bus in the Afro electorate to ballot booths en bloc, the darkies all vote Democrat, don’t they? The Guardian actually gave a specific website link, postal address, and phone number for the NAACP donations department. To avoid accusations of bias, they also provided similar contact info for the presumed Republican voters of the Christian Coalition of Ohio, but as with the NYT, I don’t think The Guardian has any right-wing or Christian readers at all, so this was just an obvious sop to avoid legal action, as perhaps was the subsection editor’s subsequent claim the whole thing was just “a bit of a joke” and “a lighthearted attempt to make some quite serious points.”
As for myself, I was going to end by advising you all from my own English base to go out and vote for Trump just to get one back at these dreadful people, but given the previous pleasing reverse-psychology example of Operation Clark County, I think I’d better settle for lying through my rotten teeth and telling you all to vote Harris-Walz instead.
The Guardian article mentioned:
Dear Limey assholes
Last week G2 launched Operation Clark County to help readers have a say in the American election by writing to undecided voters in the crucial state of Ohio. In the first three days, more than 11,000 people requested addresses. Here is some of the reaction to the project that we received from the USThe Guardian, Sunday 17 October 2004
Dear wonderful, loving friends from abroad,
We Ohioans are an ornery sort and don't take meddling well, even if it comes from people we admire and with their sincere goodwill. We are a fairly closed community overall. In my town of Springfield, I feel that there are some that consider people from the nearby cities of Columbus or Dayton, as "foreigners"- let alone someone from outside our country.
Springfield, Ohio
Have you not noticed that Americans don't give two shits what Europeans think of us? Each email someone gets from some arrogant Brit telling us why to NOT vote for George Bush is going to backfire, you stupid, yellow-toothed pansies ... I don't give a rat's ass if our election is going to have an effect on your worthless little life. I really don't. If you want to have a meaningful election in your crappy little island full of shitty food and yellow teeth, then maybe you should try not to sell your sovereignty out to Brussels and Berlin, dipshit. Oh, yeah - and brush your goddamned teeth, you filthy animals.
Wading River, NY
Right on! Just wanted to say thanks from California for your effort and concern. This IS a very important election ... There are so many people here in the States that care about the impact America has on the rest of the world. I am personally saddened for the loss of all innocent lives. The best statement Americans can make to the rest of the world is to not elect Bush for president. Thank you so much for getting involved in our world.
California
Consider this: stay out of American electoral politics. Unless you would like a company of US Navy Seals - Republican to a man - to descend upon the offices of the Guardian, bag the lot of you, and transport you to Guantanamo Bay, where you can share quarters with some lonely Taliban shepherd boys.
United States
I am a student and life-long resident of Clark County, Ohio. I just wanted you to know that this is a wonderful idea you've initiated; people here love and respect the United Kingdom, especially the prime minister. I hope this campaign will be successful for your newspaper and for us voters.
Springfield, Ohio
KEEP YOUR FUCKIN' LIMEY HANDS OFF OUR ELECTION. HEY, SHITHEADS, REMEMBER THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR? REMEMBER THE WAR OF 1812? WE DIDN'T WANT YOU, OR YOUR POLITICS HERE, THAT'S WHY WE KICKED YOUR ASSES OUT. FOR THE 47% OF YOU WHO DON'T WANT PRESIDENT BUSH, I SAY THIS ... TOUGH SHIT!
PROUD AMERICAN VOTING FOR BUSH!
Shame on you for using the people of Ohio like this. The US presidental election isn't just about foreign policy, it's about healthcare, taxes, education, transportation, natural resources and all manner of issues with little to no impact on the people of Britain.
We live in a globalised, interconnected world. If China shuts its borders to US imports, you better believe American companies, shareholders and workers are affected. Should US citizens therefore have a direct say in Chinese policies? No - Americans should demand that their own elected leaders address the issues with their Chinese counterparts. The British have a similar voice in US policies - through your own elected representatives who have any number of diplomatic, economic and military tools at their disposal. You vote for your leaders and we'll vote for ours. Your problem is with your leaders, not ours.
Washington DC
Real Americans aren't interested in your pansy-ass, tea-sipping opinions. If you want to save the world, begin with your own worthless corner of it.
Texas, USA
Thank you, thank you, thank you! What a wonderful idea! I am a US citizen who is scared to death that Bush and Klan will get back in. We need all the help we can get to ditch this bunch of maniacs.
United States
I just read a hilarious proposal to involve your readership in the upcoming US presidential election. At least, I'm hoping that it is genius satire. Nothing will do more to undermine the Democratic cause in Ohio than having patronising Brits wander around Clark County telling people how to vote. Just, for a second, imagine if the Washington Post sent folks from Ohio to do the same in Oxfordshire. I'm saying this as a Democrat, and as someone who has spent the last few years in the UK. That is, with all due respect. Please, please, be rational, and move slowly away from the self-defeating hubris.
United States
I enjoy reading your paper and agree with your politics, but this is really too much.Your plan, if carried out, will hurt the Bush opposition TERRIBLY. We cannot afford to have this associated with John Kerry or anyone else. It will be; the press is going in for a kill, days before the election.
United States
Your idea is superb and frankly, we need a little help over here right now.
Ohio
My dear, beloved Brits,
I understand the Guardian is sponsoring a service where British citizens write to Americans to advise them on how to vote. Thank heavens! I was adrift in a sea of confusion and you are my beacon of hope!
Feel free to respond to this email with your advice. Please keep in mind that I am something of an anglophile, so this is not confrontational. Please remember, too, that I am merely an American. That means I am not very bright. It means I have no culture or sense of history. It also means that I am barely literate, so please don't use big, fancy words.
Set me straight, folks!
Dayton, Ohio
Hey England, Scotland and Wales,
Mind your own business. We don't need weenie-spined Limeys meddling in our presidental election. If it wasn't for America, you'd all be speaking German. And if America would have had a president, then, of the likes of Kerry, you'd all be goose-stepping around Buckingham Palace. YOU ARE NOT WANTED!! Whether you want to support either party. BUTT OUT!!!
United States
Please be advised that I have forwarded this to the CIA and FBI.
United States
As an American who is very anti-Bush, I applaud your letter-writing campaign. I have read some of the letters that you published, and while I agree with most of the content, I also believe they will not be persuasive. This is because they are too aggressive and, as stated on your website, you don't know anything about these voters. If they happen to be leaning toward Bush, these letters will not put them off.
New York
THE AMERICAN TAXPAYERS HAVE SPENT TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS PROTECTING THE PEOPLES OF THE EU, AND WHAT DO WE GET IN RETURN. BETRAYAL, BETRAYAL, BETRAYAL. I HAVE BEEN TO YOUR COUNTRY, THE COUNTRY OF MY ANCESTORS, AND I KNOW WHY THEY LEFT.
MAY YOU HAVE TO HAVE A TOOTH CAPPED. I UNDERSTAND IT TAKES AT LEAST 18 MONTHS FOR YOUR GREAT MEDICAL SERVICES TO GET AROUND TO YOU. HAVE A GREAT DAY.
Harlan, Kentucky
We all enjoyed this at work. Cheers.
United States
Thank you for taking such an active interest in the elections here in America. I appreciate what the Guardian is doing. Your effort to reach out to "swing states" and make a difference is commendable. I hope that many of your readers will take your challenge to help make a change in Washington by contacting voters.
Clarke County, Georgia
Keep your noses out of our business. As I recall we kicked your asses out of our country back in 1776. We do not require input from losers and idiots on who we vote for in our own country. Fuck off and die asshole!!!!!
Knoxville, Iowa
Gentle folks at the Guardian,
In your plea to get your non-American readers to write to voters in Clark County, Iowa, you are correct that events in the US have had, and will have, effects on world events. For example, we have pulled your chestnuts out of the fire in two world wars that were occasioned by European diplomacy. Maybe you'd like a vote in which American president will oversee the next rescue. The next time you have elections in Great Britain, I shall endeavour to send names of your citizens to people in France, Iraq, India, the United Arab Emirates, Botswana, Pakistan, China and Argentina so that they may attempt to influence your election. It's only fair that everybody in the world should have a say in the selection of the prime minister.
California
Mind your own flipping business.
United States
Dear Guardian folks,
While I empathise with your plight, this attempt to influence voters by sending letters from foreigners will have a negative effect on your ultimate goal. You will cause people to empathise with the president, not the other way around. People will read these letters and say, "John Le who? Never heard of him, but who is he to tell me who to vote for?"
Ohio
I am a registered voter in Clark County, Ohio, and am very much interested in hearing what our overseas friends have to say about our election. You are correct in assuming that this election in the US is the most important election in memory. The threat of terrorism is a very real threat, not just in our country, but all over the world. In this day and age there must be worldwide unity against these fanatical groups who just hate. Not just Americans, but all western civilisation.
United States
Thanks for running this initiative. It may be the only way I get to have an impact on the American election, despite the fact that I'm a registered American voter. See, I vote in New York, which is solidly Democratic. Due to the electoral college system, once a majority is secured in any state, subsequent votes don't really matter. Whether NY goes 51% or 99%, the impact on who actually wins is the same. So thanks for the opportunity to impact somebody else's vote, where it may really matter.
Amsterdam, Holland
Who in the hell do you think you are??? Well, I'll tell you, you're a bunch of meddling socialist pricks! Stay the hell out of our country and politics. And another thing, John Kerry is a worthless lying sack of crap so it doesn't surprise me that a socialist rag like yours would back him. I hope your cynical ploy blows up in your cowardly faces, you bunch of mealy-mouthed morons!
United States
I used to visit the UK every year. I love the history and culture of your country. But after I heard about your campaign to influence our elections, I've decided that neither myself, nor my family will ever visit again. I'm offended by your campaign and because of it, I'm remembering more of the negative aspects I've seen in the UK than the positive ones. Though I still love the castles!
Detroit
Dear British friends,
I think you have an interesting idea to encourage international grassroots efforts, but I sincerely doubt most Springfielders are going to be influenced by letters from a country they probably can't even point to on a map. I wish you luck with your campaign, but I warn you that you're not likely to accomplish much.
Dayton, Ohio
You radical leftwingers are worse than the Taliban. I suggest you stand back and take a good hard look at yourselves.
PS: When do you propose to add Michael Moore to your staff of lunatics?
United States
I suggest that if a particular reader of the Guardian would like to vote in America - would really like to influence the American election, say - that reader should move to America, become a citizen of the United States. Everyone is welcome here. Even the readers of the Guardian. But if you don't wish to be an American, to live in Ohio, for instance, and participate in the American political process, that is too bad. Perhaps there is something wrong with you. Perhaps it is your teeth.
New York
Go back to sipping your tea and leave our people alone.
Ohio
As an American who is afraid of the terrible ramifications if Bush is elected, I commend your efforts to try to get Britons involved. Although many Americans would be critical of British people "meddling" with our politics and elections, all the world will share in the disaster if Bush is re-elected. Many of us are very concerned. I teach young adults, most of whom have been very uninvolved in voting and politics. Many of them are going to vote. We need all the help we can get.
United States
As a US citizen, I want to advise you that you and anyone that participates in subverting the US presidential election can be criminally charged and perhaps even charged as spies.
California
Thank God above for you English! Just when I was beginning to despair at the thought of Bush being re-elected, you come along with a strategy to help us! Your invitation to your readership and rationale for offering it are provocative at the least, and laudable at best.
Springfield, Ohio
· www.guardian.co.uk/clarkcounty
