Letter: Our democracy is threatened

The Constitution embodies the doctrine of the separation of powers. We have three separate co-equal branches of government: the legislative (Congress), the executive (president), and the judicial (Supreme Court and other federal courts). To maintain the balance of power each branch provides oversight of the other two branches. This balance is ultimately influenced by the voters who elect members of Congress and a president.

Congress has failed to provide checks on the president’s power and, unfortunately, confirmed some Cabinet members whose aim is to dismantle the institution they have been entrusted to lead. Sadly, the GOP majority in Congress votes out of fear lest the President Influence his base to vote them out of office. For example, they accommodate Trump by their non-action when he blatantly breaks up families seeking refugee status, discriminates against Muslims by his travel ban, condones corruption by many in his Cabinet, and habitually discredits the free press.

Voting for Democrats will help Congress get back to its role of oversight.

Read “How Democracies Die” by Levitsky and Ziblatt. They describe how America is falling into the patterns of other democracies that have died, and how we can save ours.