Congressman Jared Golden has been busy these past several weeks, delivering rather strange messages for a Democrat.

Rep. Golden said that “Donald Trump is going to win, [and] I’m OK with that,” that this upcoming election “should not be misleadingly portrayed as a struggle between democracy or authoritarianism,” and that assertions to the contrary are “hyperbolic threats.” I took exception to these statements, and felt it my civic duty to write the congressman, in the hopes of engaging in a good-faith back-and-forth on the subject. I did not hear back from him, despite me checking the “I’d like a response” box on the contact form. Why have it at all? And so I feel compelled to lay out these same questions in a more open forum.

Leaving aside the events of Jan. 6, 2021, entirely, we need to be clear about what former President Trump did following the rejection he received from Americans in November 2020. In seven different states, he – under the authority of absolutely nobody at all – got groups of people together, had them falsely proclaim themselves as the electors duly appointed by their respective state legislatures, and then caused those same people to submit fraudulent certificates to that effect to Congress. Trump then enjoined his own vice president to not count the genuine certificates from the actual duly appointed electors from those seven states, but instead count the fraudulent certificates from those random assortments of nobodies that falsely held themselves out to be their state’s duly appointed electors.

The special prosecutor’s office correctly identified this scheme as an attempt to keep Trump in office beyond the end of his term, in direct contravention of the expressed will of the American people. Having identified this scheme as such, they initiated criminal proceedings against former President Trump, in what has come to be colloquially known as the “Jan. 6 case” (to distinguish it from the former president’s sundry other misdeeds).

And what did the former president do when confronted with these allegations? Did he contest the alleged conduct? Did he mount an affirmative defense, arguing that it was actually legally permissible? Not at all. Instead, he went to the Supreme Court and asked them to grant him immunity from conduct which would otherwise be criminal if anybody else engaged in it.

Having received no response to my questions in private correspondence, I think it all the more pressing that Mainers hear Rep. Golden’s answer to the following: What are we to call a scheme whereby a sitting president fabricates false electoral votes, and then tries to get those counted instead of the lawful electoral votes from seven states’ worth of duly appointed electors? Would we characterize that as a democratic scheme, or an authoritarian one? And if it’s an authoritarian scheme, what is wrong with characterizing this present election as one between democracy and authoritarianism?

Why the repeated attempts to convince voters that the stakes are so low, when in fact they have never been higher? Indeed, where once the president was criminally liable for his official acts, the execrable Roberts Supreme Court recently proclaimed presidents criminally immune for all “core” official acts (whatever that’s supposed to mean), and presumptively immune (with no guidance on how one might overcome that presumption) from criminal prosecution for all official acts within the outer perimeter of presidential authority.

I can only speculate as to why my correspondence with Rep. Golden was ignored, just as I can only speculate as to why the honorable congressman has repeatedly mischaracterized the stakes of this election. Perhaps he has pretensions to higher office. That is his prerogative. For my part, I think Mainers deserve representatives and senators who take democracy seriously.