I flew down to Texas to help with the Biden/Harris bus tour, intended to drum up enthusiasm at polling locations. Instead, I ended up spending the afternoon calling 911. 1/

See all these pickup trucks with Trump flags? They were sitting along I-35, waiting to ambush the Biden/Harris campaign bus as it traveled from San Antonio to Austin. 2/

These Trump supporters, many of whom were armed, surrounded the bus on the interstate and attempted to drive it off the road. They outnumbered police 50-1, and they ended up hitting a staffer’s car. 3/

The police refused to help. When I flagged down one officer, he said his hands were tied: “not my jurisdiction.” He was wearing a blue stripe bandana. 4/

Understandably, though nobody was hurt, the rest of the tour was cancelled. And as a historian who studied the rise of the Third Reich, I can tell you: this is how a democracy dies. 5/

While Germany still had elections and Hitler was merely a disgraced politician, his militia of Brownshirts interrupted his opponents’ political meetings and incited violence on the streets. You know what happened next. 6/

We don’t know what Trump’s supporters (or Russia) have planned for Tuesday. We don’t know what kind of intimidation and suppression will inevitably occur. 7/

But we can be prepared. In the next four days, we can create such a landslide that their efforts are futile, sending a message that Nazi tactics have no place in America. 8/

Consider traveling to a swing state near you to canvass in person: https://joebiden.com/where-to-canvass/ 9/

And if you can’t, please commit to one shift of phone banking per day. Since we can’t celebrate Halloween, you could do it with your roommates or loved ones. https://joebiden.com/take-action/  10/

We have four days, and I sure as hell don’t want to wake up on Wednesday wishing I had done more to save our democracy. Please join me. 11/11