Princeton University Professor Kim Lane Scheppele, a leading scholar of democratic backsliding, study how authoritarian regimes like that of former Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán consolidate power — and how the people rebound.
Watch her reaction to this development in a video interview below.
For the first time in more than two decades, the United States has refused to invite international election observers from Europe to observe the upcoming midterm elections.
The Trump administration’s decision puts the United States in the company of Russia and Belarus, the only two other countries to have refused to admit observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OCME), whose Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) is widely viewed as the “gold standard” in election observations.
The development, first reported in the United States this week by MS NOW, otherwise received little attention domestically, but it’s being viewed globally as part of the Trump administration’s global attack on international institutions that the country once led.
“The U.S. is just disengaging from the entire system of democratic support and human rights monitoring in the world,” Princeton University professor Kim Lane Scheppele, a leading scholar of democratic backsliding and resurgence, told All Rise News in a video interview.
ODIHR election monitors have been monitoring U.S. federal elections continuously since 2002, and its director Maria Telalian expressed her “regret” at being disinvited from observing the midterms.
“Election observation is not a judgment on a country or its institutions. It provides voters, election administrators, contestants and the wider public with an independent and objective assessment of the electoral process,” Telalian wrote in a statement.
In an extended interview for the All Rise News playlist on Legal AF, Professor Scheppele discussed how the United States became a “standard setter” on election observation following the collapse of the Soviet Union. She predicted that the Trump administration’s snub would call attention to reports most U.S. citizens never read and likely take for granted — including their findings that contradict Trump’s favored election myths and lies.
For example, ODIHR’s report on the last presidential elections praised the security of U.S. elections while debunking false claims of voter fraud in its executive summary.
“The campaign was marked by disinformation and instances of violence, including harsh and intolerant language against women and immigrants by one candidate,” the November 2024 report said. “Repeated unfounded claims about election fraud negatively impacted the public trust. Substantial efforts were undertaken to ensure election integrity and security, and election officials conducted their duties professionally despite numerous threats against them.”
Citing those findings, Scheppele noted that European election monitors “called out the fake claims of fraud. and the disinformation and the violence directed against election officials.”
“So, that’s where American elections were going before now, and I think the Trump administration — whoever it is that looked at this report — said we don’t want that report again,” she added.
Watch the full video interview below.