Virtually any serious intellectual writing will be drowned out during Election Week, so I’m pausing until next Monday. Instead, I’ll just remind you of some bets.
In the 2016 election, I had three outstanding bets. I won all three. This year, I only made one election bet, which I’ve already won. I do however have one outstanding election-related bet: That Trump does not leave office early. Specifically:
If Donald Trump dies in office, resigns, is removed by the Senate after impeachment, or otherwise is permanently removed as per the the 25th Amendment, or if it never happens that he takes the Oath of office as POTUS on Jan 20, 2017, the BC owes [redacted] $350. Otherwise, [redacted] owes BC $100″.
There is considerable speculation that Trump, if defeated, will not gracefully acknowledge defeat. I considered this a plausible scenario back in this 2016 bet, though I ultimately won the conventional way.
This time around, many suspect Trump will actually try to illegally cling to office. While you can imagine that this attempted clinging will get him removed early, I seriously doubt it will. If Trump stubbornly refuses to leave office, the system will just let him run out his clock, ranting all the while, then sideline him on Inauguration Day.
P.S. Remember my Twitter poll from a year ago? It was really about Bolivia…
Suppose Trump loses the 2020 election and loses the recount, but refuses to leave office.
How should U.S. military leadership respond?
— Bryan Caplan (@bryan_caplan) November 14, 2019
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