75 years ago today, the Empire of Japan leveled our fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii in a sneak attack. The date lives in infamy because Japan failed to first declare war, not because 2,403 Americans perished. More important even than lives, war has rules.

Growing up, the war whispered through family gatherings. In Grandpa’s boisterous pinochle crowd, the other players were all veterans. Mention the war and Uncle Sal looked away, his enormous eyes pained, shaking his head. I knew not to ask, a silence easier to bear knowing our heroes were on the side of truth.

Facts about the war came from school and random books on my father’s shelves. One, “A Farewell to Manzanar,” captivated me. I’d read Anne Frank’s diary, knew about the concentration camps, the inhumane slaughter, the evil Axis powers, but concentration camps on our soil? Imprisoning American-born children, based on nationality and fear? This engrossing story of one child’s incarceration in California could not possibly be true. Horribly, it was.

Following Pearl Harbor, the United States reacted with bravery and honor, but also unjust fear and racism. Japanese-Americans lived and died in numerous uninhabitable concentration camps, some shot for purported violations, others dying of physical hardship or preventable disease. Yet in Korematsu, the Supreme Court approved. Mass incarceration of American citizens based on racial discrimination remains officially legal today.

If the truth of Pearl Harbor, twisted by racism, was used for injustice, what are we to make of the new affront, the war on truth itself ?

On Maine’s front, witness Gov. LePage, who recently opined that Maine’s vote may have been undermined by students illegally voting in multiple places, by noncitizens, by electronic voting machines manipulated by outside vendors, or by “mishandled, miscounted or misplaced” paper ballots. With zero proof of a single such instance, LePage denigrates our entire voting system.

On the national front, a Trump surrogate also attacked the integrity of the November vote, backing Trump’s completely unfounded claim that Hillary Clinton’s 2.5 million ballot win of the popular vote is due to “millions of people who voted illegally.” Pressed to provide proof (there is none), the Tea Party News spokesperson instead made a remarkable statement: “There’s no such thing, unfortunately, anymore as facts.”

Studies of voter fraud show a smaller likelihood of finding an illegal vote than being hit by lightning. Voter fraud is not a question of opinion, it’s a lie. But if the actual truth of Pearl Harbor birthed the shame of Manzanar, the lie of voter fraud seeks its own unworthy progeny. If the people believe in voter fraud, enacting rules that diminish voting will follow. Disenfranchising poorer voters helps empower those with the most, and helps elect those who will look out for the wealthy few. This is a carefully calculated lie, a synchronized effort sweeping across the nation.

In the war on truth, what people can be led to believe is all that matters, because what we believe determines what we do. Believe in the untrustworthiness of Japanese-Americans, and we imprison their families. Believe that voter fraud is real, and we will act to suppress the vote.

After World War II, The Hague took up the question of the attack on Pearl Harbor. With their last-minute notification unsent until after the attack began, Japan was found guilty of violating the rules of engagement in war, a war crime, among many, many war crimes Japan grapples with to this day, 75 years later.

In 1988, President Ronald Reagan formally apologized for the Japanese internment camps, offering survivors a small payment in recognition of the clear injustice.

The war on truth as yet has no rules, and no arbiters. It has only begun. Its uneasy whisper inserts itself between us, making us sure of one belief or another, pitting us against each other. When the truth is hard to discern, when competing facts are in play, let us ask together: who stands to gain from this untruth? What cause wins in this war? Which will live in infamy?

Jackie Sartoris is a former Brunswick Town Councilor.