(A new column that will recur until it’s no longer true.)

Possibly the worst thing anyone can be at this moment in time is a Republican running for office in November. This means you Smilin’ Pete Stauber.

The Republican party has been so tainted by the corruption and moral bankruptcy of Trump and his enablers that anyone who identifies as Republican is complicit.

This was evident at Saturday’s No Kings rally, an all-ages repudiation of the evil turn this country has taken under Trump and his gang of fellow haters of true American ideals.

The vast space of Duluth’s Civic Center courtyard was filled with people unwilling to accept the brutal stupidity and lies of Trump and his minions. Trump and his fellow creeps declared war on America, and America is fighting back.

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon was the keynote speaker, and he wanted all Minnesotans to know that his office is prepared for whatever election interference the Trump administration is prepared to throw this way.

Simon reminded the audience of a fact Republicans conveniently forget – we’re all immigrants on this bus. He talked about his own great-grandfather coming to this land.

“He fled persecution in Eastern Europe, he had nothing, and he came here to Duluth to make a new life in a new world,” he said.

Trump and his flock of haters have conveniently forgotten that they too are progeny of immigrants to this country. Perhaps they just don’t have the mental capacity to make that connection. You would have to be pretty dumb and/or totally corrupt to be a Republican these days.

People are fed up with the stupidity. The two signs displayed above were common sentiments shared on signs throughout the massive rally. People used to make fun of George Bush Jr.’s apparent lack of intelligence, but now many of those critics will say he is a towering genius and world-class humanitarian compared to the current dolt sharting in the chair tucked into the Resolute Desk.

Secretary Simon reminded the crowd of how awful this administration is.

“Within hours of Alex Pretti being gunned down on the streets of Minneapolis, within hours of that, we in Minnesota got a letter from Attorney General Pam Bondi,” he said.

“In that letter, she made three demands. These were demands that she said would lead perhaps to a draw down of ICE forces on our streets. And one of the demands in her letter was that I should hand over to her and the Justice Department millions upon millions of private, personal, sensitive data records on registered voters in Minnesota. I will tell you now what I told her within hours of that ransom note, the answer is, No.

“That wasn’t the last outrage. I wish it was, but it wasn’t,” Simon said. “A few days after that, you may remember the FBI raided a Fulton County, that’s Atlanta, Georgia, elections office. They made off with about 700 boxes full of stuff related not to this election this year related to the 2020 presidential election. The fact that something like that is happening in 2026 to the United States of America is an outrage.

“But that wasn’t the last outrage.

“A few days later, you may remember, the President gave an interview in which he said that he thought we should, quote, nationalize or take over elections in what he said are about 15 places in the United States. Now, he did not mention which 15 places. This is a person who had told the media recently that he is convinced that he won Minnesota three times. I think we know that he lost Minnesota three times.

“All of this has us wondering, unfortunately, will our own federal government interfere in the 2026, election? We don’t know. We hope not, but we have no choice but to plan for it.”

Yes, you read that right – our elected officials in Minnesota are preparing for federal interference in the November 2026 mid-term elections.

Are they alone? Of course not. Any state that has Trump and his corrupt gang of thugs figured out is preparing for this November and November 2028.

“In the office of Secretary of State, we have what we call an all hazards approach to planning for elections,” Simon said. “All Hazards. That means we have to plan for all sorts of stuff that may not happen. In fact, it may be a very real possibility. So we have to plan for things like bomb threats or power outages or weather events. And I’m very sad to tell you that in the year 2026, we have to add to that list of things to plan for.”

While we are enveloped daily in the gloom and doom that the Trump administration has wrought, Simon, after acknowleding it, brought a sunshiny outlook as well in his belief in Minnesota.

He gave three reasons why, despite Trump and his fellow idiots, we should be optimistic.

First, the way to beat them is to vote them out.

“Remember you don’t have to go to a polling place at all,” he said. “You can vote by mail and vote from your kitchen table if that’s what you want to do. We also, critically in this year, given these threats, we should remember we have laws in Minnesota, very strict laws, about who can be in a polling place and what they can do when they’re in a polling place. And you can bet that we have robust laws against all forms of voter intimidation, and you can bet we’re going to enforce them strongly in Minnesota this year.

“Number two, another reason that I’m optimistic is this is Minnesota. We have a strong culture of voting here. Let’s not forget we are number one in America in voter turnout.”

And, finally, Simon got down to the things Trump just does not understand.

“Maybe the most important is all of us here today. We the People. We matter. We count,” Simon said. “Almost 250 years ago, Americans fought back against a king whose forces were the most powerful in the world. That King was arrogant, that King was overconfident, that King was delusional, that King was dismissive of Americans who challenged his authority when Americans believed in their cause and believed in each other and they declare to the world on July 4, 1776, we hold these truths to be self evident, that all of us are created equal, and that among our rights are the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They pushed back, they stepped up, they stood up, and they won. And I know that we in Minnesota will win too. We will overcome these assaults on our democracy, because we know we’re made of tough stuff. When we in Minnesota face a stress test, and we have over the last few years, when we face a stress test, we don’t just pass the test, we ace the test. We will push back, we will win, and when we do, history will judge us very well. The way we’ll beat back these challenges to our democracy is through democracy itself. We will vote our way to victory.”