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As absolutely unlikely as it might seem on first glance, according to actual DC canon, there is a non-zero percent possibility that Batman would have at least considered the possibility of voting for Donald Trump for President of the United States — or, at least endorsing him. And he’s not alone: Lois Lane and Green Lantern Guy Gardner might have thought about doing so, as well.

Okay, admittedly, they might not have thought too long about it, but according to DC Universe: Decisions — a four-issue miniseries published by DC to coincide with the 2008 U.S. elections — Lois and Guy are both proud Republicans, and Bruce Wayne is open to doing whatever gives him a tactical advantage. “What can I say? I’m a product of my upbringing,” Lois told husband Clark Kent in the first issue of the series explaining her position. “I’m proudly for a strong military, small government, low taxes, and maximum individual freedom.” (Okay, maybe that last line pretty much guarantees that Lois wouldn’t have thought about a Trump vote even for a second.)

DC Universe: Decisions is, bluntly, the kind of comic book that literally feels impossible to imagine being published today: a series that unequivocally states which political party many of the big DC superheroes belongs to, co-written by a conservative writer and a more liberal counterpart. (Bill Willingham and Judd Winick, respectively.) It’s a series that is, surprisingly, actually part of DC canon — it was connected to a Titans run in the main DC line that Winick was writing — which means that, as strange as it may be to think about, we really can make educated guesses as to how some of the more famous comic book characters in the world might have voted in past elections.

The plot of the series is simple: someone is trying to assassinate Presidential candidates even before the primaries are over, on both sides of the aisle. It’s obviously a ploy to destabilize the system, but it nonetheless sets heroes across the DCU on edge and has many of them endorsing various candidates, and in the process, outing their affiliations in the process. It’s how we know that Vixen, Beast Boy, and Firestorm support Democrats, while Power Girl, Wildcat, and Hackman are all going for the Republican candidates. Well… kind of.

The thing is, DC Universe: Decisions cheats in a couple of important ways. Firstly, the words “Republican” and “Democrat” are purposefully absent from the description of each candidate — but very easily inferred, and heavily implied throughout — so there’s some level of plausible deniability for DC and/or any fans that want to distance themselves from the suggested political leanings represented herein. Secondly, both Batman and Wonder Woman’s seeming declarations (he’s Republican, she’s Democratic) prove to be potentially fake, with the characters revealing later they were specifically attempting to get close to specific campaigns for mission-related reasons. The big guns, after all, need to remain as impartial as possible in order to keep their appeal as broad as possible.

To that end, Superman doesn’t even hint at leaning towards a political party in the series. In fact, in the final issue, he gives a speech about how important it is to not tell anyone who you’re voting for. “Whoever is elected to the highest office in the land should not think that they will not have our full support,” he explains. “We don’t take sides. The battles we fight are larger than those on the political spectrum.” It’s at once a summing up of why we don’t see comics like this more often, and also an argument against the comic it’s actually appearing in, somewhat amazingly. It’s weird to end a series that explicitly exists to lay out a political framework for the DCU heroes with Superman of all people telling everyone that it shouldn’t exist, but, honestly, that tension kind of sums up the entire perverse appeal of DC Universe: Decisions.

Of course, I’m the DC fan who also likes to think that Superman would see the error of his ways when one of the candidates is power-hungry demagogue with a history of fascistic language, instead delivering a new speech where he says, “I believe in America and you should vote for the other candidate,” but still. Some feats might even be beyond the Man of Steel sometimes.

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