How did the US elections come to this?

It's the night before the US Mid-Term Elections, and all through the land, and beyond, all the press coverage has set up a really divisive and downright nasty election.

To a heretofore unprecedented extent, this election is a clash of absolutely irreconcilable opposites. On one side is a set of candidates who have certain policy beliefs, but still believe in the election process and the democratic system. On the other side, over half of the candidates still believe that Donald Trump won the last election in 2020, despite all the evidence and innumerable court cases to the contrary. Furthermore, many of them are openly saying that, if they lose tomorrow night, they will not accept the results, and will still insist that they have really won and that the system is corrupt and the system is fixed (although not if they win). Some candidates for state governor and secretary of state from that party say that they will not necessarily carry out the will of the electorate if they don't like the looks of it. Further furthermore, that side even has armed vigilantes patrolling polling stations, supposedly looking to spot irregularities and voter fraud, but in reality as an attempt to intimidate and deter voters from the other side.

Now, you might think that one of those sides would be much more mainstream and popular, that the other side would be way too extreme and immoderate for most people. But it turns out that the two sides are neck and neck, and that the anti-democratic side is even, if anything, expected to prevail.

It all seems highly improbable to an outside observer. It's hard to know how things in America have come to this pass. Well, the simple answer is Donald Trump, but that doesn't really explain anything. That half of the voting population of the United States - many millions of people - would support candidates who openly question the traditional proven democratic process when it suits them just boggles the mind. It's a sad and disturbing prospect.