I was born and raised in Soviet Ukraine and because of that, I cannot imagine pulling the lever for Kamala Harris. Whatever she may say about Donald Trump, a vote for Harris is the vote in favor of destroying our democratic institutions. It makes my skin crawl.

I grew up in a place where the General Secretary of the Communist Party, Leonid Brezhnev, regularly delivered slurred speeches littered with clichés on national television. Lines to buy basic goods were long and fear of government persecution ran deep. In the meantime, the USSR got tangled up in Afghanistan, sponsored terrorist activity against Israel, and devoted itself to exporting Communism worldwide. Every so often the decrepit leadership herded the population off to “vote,” but it was voting in name only—a single candidate appeared on the ballot. That period was known as zastoi, or stagnation.

My worldview solidified when I turned 12 and a new man was appointed General Secretary. His name was Mikhail Gorbachev. Young and energetic, Gorbachev tossed away the censorship regime, allowed small enterprises, and ushered in competitive elections.  

With that background informing my life in America, I can see that 2024 is not a policy election. Joe Biden—remember him?—loved to pepper us with the catchphrase “democracy is on the ballot.” He was right, but not in the way he meant. To have experienced the late-stage socialism of the USSR is to know that if a mentally impaired man is role playing as head of state, we do not live in a democracy.

This is not to say that I am not partial to Trump’s economic agenda—I like the idea of deregulation. A Department of Government Efficiency headed by Elon Musk, one of the most successful business leaders of my generation, is a terrific way to upend American stagnation. In contrast, the Democratic nominee has proposed price controls—one of the worst tools of the socialist economic portfolio.

And it’s not that I don’t favor a Trumpian foreign policy. With Trump as commander in chief we had no new wars. Today, we have a war between Russia and Ukraine—something that was unthinkable even just three years ago—and a seven-front war in Israel with ripple effects worldwide.

There is much more to like about the 45^th president’s proposed policies: his stances on domestic energy development, illegal immigration, and stopping the flow of fentanyl—the drug that turned great American cities like San Francisco into hellscapes. I can go on, of course, and these are all important reasons support Trump, but none of these is my main reason.

Biden was already exhibiting signs of dementia when he ran in 2020, but with the media circling the wagons and healthy people “quarantined” because of COVID, there was plausible deniability. The very fact that voters were questioning the cognitive status of the prospective leader of the free world was itself a real problem, but people were distracted.

Still, I found it impossible to look at Biden without thinking of a decrepit Soviet leader. We can talk of certain parallel features of that regime as they seem to be increasingly common in the U.S., like creeping censorship, the cult of equity and so on. But the most important mark of our lack of freedom was the uncertain way we began talking about the source of power—“they” were making decisions for us and we knew it. At best, we could decipher which way the wind was blowing and adjust accordingly, but we never had any say in the way the country was ruled.

For four years, America was governed by an extraconstitutional regime in D.C. In the recently released book Disappearing the President, investigative journalist Lee Smith explains how a “shadow network” of 20-30 people, all Barack Obama’s cronies, were able  to make all the important decisions. It is beyond frightening. Even if a voter is reluctant to believe Smith, he doesn’t need this information to understand that something is terribly wrong with Biden in the White House.

After Old Joe’s lapses passed the threshold of deniability, he had to be tossed, and Harris was inserted in his place. But considering her lack of both substance and charisma, there is little doubt that she is merely another puppet of the post-democratic regime.

Both Biden and Harris—the two individuals whose names appeared on our ballots—are mere figureheads providing cover to this unelected executive. Whoever had the idea of putting them on top of the presidential ticket must really hate the country. How else do we explain the humiliation of saddling us with such an obviously deficient head of state. He must hate women, too; it’s a cruel joke to prop up such a stereotypical wine aunt into the role of potentially becoming our first female president.

2024 might just be America’s last chance to take back our republic. We have to reclaim our democratic institutions before the shadow network engineers a demographic shift that could eliminate the possibility of any electoral challenge to its supremacy. The office of the presidency will be forever disgraced. The Obama machine will go into overdrive to destroy what’s left of our institutions.

Voters should consider voting for Trump regardless of any policy disagreements. They can elect officials who champion their ideals later; what they can’t do is reclaim democracy from the shadow network.