Chinese citizens voted to make China great again in their local elections this week with write-in votes for Donald Trump.
Chinese people elect representatives to their local congresses every five years, but the democratic process in China is fixed to favor the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC). Independent candidates who run without the party’s approval are often harassed. While some voters choose to sit out the election, others submit write-in votes in protest, the Wall Street Journal revealed.
“If your vote doesn’t have any meaning, then why not just pick something that’s funny, or just pick in a satirical fashion?” Li Fan, the director of the research center at the World and China Institute, told the WSJ, “This year, I hear a lot of people voted for Trump.”
Other popular choices included former president Jiang Zemin, Hillary Clinton, Japanese porn star Sola Aoi, and braised chicken.
In the past, voters cast write-in votes for legitimate independent candidates, but few independent candidates are willing to run anymore. Chinese President Xi Jinping repeatedly warns the country of the dangers of Western values and democracy.
Wang Yicui, a woman from Sichuan, was allegedly physically assaulted by authorities when she went to register as an independent candidate. “I wanted to take part in the election so I would have the chance to speak out, because the people put forward by the government don’t speak for ordinary people,” she told Radio Free Asia, “I wanted to speak for ordinary people, and also actually do something to help them.”
“Once again, we see that Chinese officials are very hostile to elections, they fear them, and they will stop at nothing to ensure that they aren’t genuine elections,” human rights activist Huang Qi told RFA reporters.
Liu Huizhen, an independent candidate in Beijing, was harassed by several dozen men who simply identified themselves as “volunteers,” reports the Associated Press. They kept her under surveillance and even prevented her from leaving home.
The number of real independent candidates is decreasing.
“People are too scared. In the past three years, they’ve arrested so many people, lawyers, netizens, journalists,” Qiao Mu, a Beijing Foreign Studies University scholar who ran as an independent in 2011 but was unsuccessful, explained to the WSJ.
Without political reform, the last recourse of Chinese voters is nonsensical write-in votes.
In a number of instances, a second election had to be arranged because none of the actual candidates got 50 percent of the vote.
“Hillary and Trump are famous in China–we know all about them,” revealed a university student, “We know more about them than we do about our candidates.”
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