The Insurrection Will Ultimately Save Our Democracy

No one will ever forget what happened on 1/6/21. Someone needs to explain that to Republicans.

I sat on my couch that afternoon, on month ten of working from home, glued to my television. It was hard to process. Even as my phone blew up with concerned texts, e-mails, and phone calls from friends and family who know I live within a mile of our Capitol, the full impact hadn’t struck.

Then my wife, a preschool teacher from Virginia who has been in-person since August, came home around 4 p.m. and she was crying. I was shocked. What happened? Was something wrong? Did something happen at school?

“That,” she said, pointing at the TV screen. “Look at what those [expletive deleted] are doing to us!”

I will never forget that moment for as long as I live. The way she said, “us” was far beyond me and her. It was the first time in my 38 years on Earth that the thought of American democracy failing had legitimately crossed my mind.

Fear wasn’t new to me. I lived in Washington, D.C. on 9/11/01, as a college junior at The George Washington University, within a few blocks of the White House. I knew that fear. I had a college friend whose apartment overlooked the Pentagon and saw the attack happen in real-time. I had another friend who quite literally found God on that…