We are fortunate to live in a democracy that places the highest priority on conducting free and fair elections. According to a statement from the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the lead federal government agency for election infrastructure security, the day after the election, “Our election infrastructure has never been more secure and the election community never better prepared to deliver safe, secure, free and fair elections for the American people. … Importantly, we have no evidence of any malicious activity that had a material impact on the security or integrity of our election infrastructure.”

Unlike foreign dictatorships that control the process from the top down, our elections are administered on the local level. They take place in libraries, school gyms and community centers, and are staffed mainly by volunteers. For a determinative level of fraud to occur, thousands of election workers, our neighbors, would need to be complicit and go undetected.

During this election, an estimated 98% of ballots were cast on paper or had a verifiable paper trail, including all ballots in swing states. From there, votes are tallied electronically but verified through hand-count audits to ensure there are no malfunctions or foul play. When there are errors, like there were in Milwaukee this year, election officials conduct recounts to fix the mistakes. That is a sign of a working system, not a broken one. And if anything remains in question, campaigns or concerned citizens have the right to bring cases through the judicial system.

Despite all these safeguards, 30% of Americans believed the election results were illegitimate in 2020, and a similar number felt their votes would not be counted accurately going into this election. After the election, that number fell to 4%. We cannot be a country where you believe the results when your side wins, and the election is considered “stolen” when your side loses.

If you are a Democrat suspicious of President Donald Trump’s wins in battleground states, I ask if you question the results in the same states that sent us four Democratic senators. And if you are a Republican who believed President Joe Biden stole the election through fraud in 2020, I ask why you think Democrats were unable to do something similar this time around.

In California, we have chosen to make our elections as inclusive as possible by instituting universal vote by mail, early voting and same-day voter registration. The trade-off is counting these votes, many arriving in the mail after election day, is slow, and in some cases unacceptably slow. I understand that the stretched-out process does not instill great confidence and hope that our state and local officials can work to speed it up. But we cannot let a slow and at times inefficient process be the basis for election denial. We must count all the legally cast votes, no matter how long it takes, if we want our voices to be heard.

I have seen the consequences of election denial. On the night of Jan. 6, 2021, as I sat in my Capitol Hill office, having just been evacuated from the House Chamber, I wrote, “We were reminded that words matter. When the president claims fraud and his allies bow down when they should stand up, anarchy is invited.” There will always be conspiracy theories and claims of fraud coming from the dark corners of the internet. The difference has always been whether people in power denounce the lies or embrace and spread them.

Holding elected office is a great responsibility, and I, for my part, refuse to betray that responsibility by espousing lies. The national election did not turn out the way I wanted. I think the consequences will be grave, but I still respect the process that led to this result. I will work with colleagues on both sides of the aisle when possible to improve people’s lives, and I will stand against overreach and proposals that go after our communities. Instead of sowing doubt and division, I’m going to dust myself off, work to bring people together, and try to change the results for the next election, not the last one. I encourage everyone else to do the same.

Peters, a Democrat, is a former environmental attorney who represents California’s 50th Congressional District. He lives in Bird Rock.