>If anything, a higher voter turnout may give a bad regime more confidence, or at least give them a nice talking point about their “mandate.” This is ahistoric

>If anything, a higher voter turnout may give a bad regime more confidence, or at least give them a nice talking point about their “mandate.” This is ahistorical. Bad regimes do not need an excuse to talk about how they are The One True Choice Of The People. In fact, bad an unpopular regimes have two very common modus operandis to maintain power, or at least the patina of democratic legitimacy. The first is simply fraudulent elections. We’re taking litteral ballot stuffing, and other unfair and unfree election tactics. The second, which has a long history in the United States, is voter suppression. This is where you make policies that ostensibly applies to everyone and makes elections “safer” or somehow better, but actually makes it harder on groups you think will oppose you from actually voting. Tactics include literacy tests, poll taxes, photographic ids, strict registration requirements that target students, selectively closing polling places early, or simply closing them in certain precincts, targetting strict handwriting or punctuation. Even gerrymandering could be considered election rigging. In all of these suppression cases, the commonality is that the politician is not being chosen by the voters, but rather the politician is choosing the voters.