I’ve seen plenty of rigged elections. In Rwanda in 2003, I watched President Paul Kagame waving from the top of an armoured car as he celebrated winning 95% of the vote. The night before, I had been with the main opposition candidate, who told me he had no chance of winning because his party had been banned, his campaign leaflets had been seized and all of his provincial campaign managers had been arrested the previous day. As he spoke, some of those campaign managers were paraded on television, denouncing their former leader. 

It hardly needs saying that the United States is nothing like Rwanda. American elections are free, decentralised and very hard to rig. Courts are quick to strike down attempts to tamper with them. The system has its quirks, but it works. So Democrats who fret that Donald Trump will steal the midterms in November are overstating the danger.

However, they are not wrong to worry that he will try. Mr Trump tried to overturn the result of an election he lost in 2020. And though he is not on the ballot, he is about to lose again, as his war of choice drives up energy prices. Our new midterm model gives his Republican Party a 98% chance of losing the House and a nearly even chance of losing the Senate. He may be tempted to deploy ICE agents to key states to deter minorities from coming out on voting day. He probably cannot change the result. But he is sure to accuse the other side of cheating if he loses.

And that is part of what may be his most enduring legacy, our cover leader argues. He has aggravated divisions and amplified distrust. Only 25% of Americans are confident the midterms will be fair, and more than half think their fellow citizens are morally bad. By undermining trust in the system, Mr Trump makes it easier for a future would-be strongman to inflict yet more damage on American democracy.

Relations have soured under Donald Trump. But the rot runs deeper than one rogue president