Election Litigation Status

[subgenius]

The words actually come from a horse’s ass. The AZ legislature passed a law as part of its election code that spells out how to contest an election. A letter from some state legislators isn’t it. This was for you lazy rubes.

silly me with my blatant punctuation for rubes.

[subgenius]

...Turns out the American experiment gets to die a death by a thousand paper cuts.

reap what you sow.

[Res Ipsa]

The Supreme Court has requested the states that Texas has asked to have their votes thrown out to file briefs by 3:00 p.m. on 12/10.

Before anyone gets excited, the Texas case is even weaker than the case the Supreme Court denied the petition on today. However, it is within the Supreme Court's original jurisdiction, so they aren't going to just toss it without briefs filed in response. A bunch of right-wingers got all hot and bothered because the case was docketed. Placing something on the docket is a clerical action that has no reflection on the merits.

Just for a second be a conservative Supreme Court justice who takes seriously the notion that the U.S. is a republic of states and who takes the language of the Constitution very seriously. Now read the part where the U.S. Constitution gives each state the right to determine how it selects presidential electors. Now, laugh hysterically at the notion that these conservatives will vote to allow Texas to disenfranchise voters in four other states.

With a straight face, the state of Texas is claiming that the odds that Biden actually won in those four states are less than the odds of me quantum tunneling through a wall. (slight exaggeration). How does their "expert" explain this in his affidavit? Well, he assumes that what each state did was take all of its ballots, dump them in a giant bin, and mix them all up. So, you see, when Trump led earlier in the count, that represented a true random sample of ballots and so it is almost mathematically impossible for Biden to have won.

He's a liar. He knows damn well that's not how the ballots were counted. He knows that, in those states, live ballots were counted first, followed by mail in ballots. He also knows that Trump told his voters not to use mail in ballots, while Biden did the opposite.

No excuse. The Court should hold him in contempt. Along with the Texas AG.

I'm fully on board with the Lincoln Project: the Republican Party needs to be burned to the ground and the earth plowed and salted. It has become the anti-America party. (Please note -- I am not advocating the burning, plowing or salting of any Republicans.)

[honorentheos]

I posted link since your google doesn't work. Watch the video and determine for yourself if words from the horse's mouth is a silly headline.

Yeah, it was a silly headline. There's nothing of value being reported on other than Rep. McCarthy tried to kiss Pence's ass with a tweet that has no basis in reality.

[honorentheos]

...Turns out the American experiment gets to die a death by a thousand paper cuts.

reap what you sow.

Huh. What a patriot.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

...Turns out the American experiment gets to die a death by a thousand paper cuts.

reap what you sow.

There it is.

- Doc

[honorentheos]

The Politico article makes some questionable assertions. The Safe Harbor law is clear on this point: the “safe harbor” it provides is safety from Congressional challenge. The portion of the statute that allows challenges also says it does not apply if the Safe Harbor deadline is met.

The Politico also fails to adequately distinguish between a challenge to a state’s electors and what happens if multiple slates of electors are presented.

ETA: Here’s a good interview in The Guardian that explains it. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.thegua ... epublicans

Thanks for the link.

Maybe I'm missing something but it still sounds like contesting the electors on the floor is a real possibility. Here's why. The law professor interviewed in the Guardian article, Edward Foley, makes the case that what Congress ought to limit their vote to is whether or not a given state followed the legal procedures in place. Safe harbor applying the confidence that this is the case so unless there is really good evidence to the contrary, Congress should simply ratify the results of the electoral college.

But his argument also presents the unlikely scenario that a Congressperson who wishes to challenge a state's results would come at it from the direction of who they think actually won.

Every conscientious member of Congress, whether representative or senator, once the objection is raised … they’re not supposed to say: ‘Who do I think won Georgia? Who do I think won Pennsylvania?’ They’re supposed to ask themselves: ‘Did Georgia and Pennsylvania utilize a procedure to achieve its own resolution of that issue? Did they do so by 8 December?’

That's not likely to happen, though. What's almost certain to happen is there will be challenges questioning the procedures and their effects on the results. And what does the law professor have to say about that?

It’s up to Congress to abide by that rule that Congress created and not be tempted to second-guess a decision that it’s not supposed to second-guess. But human beings being human beings, if members of Congress want to ignore their own rules and second-guess something which they shouldn’t be second guessing, then who’s to stop them?

And frankly that sounds exactly like the conditions we should expect where members of Congress will use the barrage of litigation and social media claims to put forward the argument the results in certain states SHOULD be questioned by Congress. That procedures were followed and the results certified isn't stopping the litigation other than judges who actually feel obligated to sustaining the law are acting as a valuable line of defense against those claims. But Congress? Uh. If all it takes is one congressperson and one senator to force a vote, I am going to go with it being pretty damn likely we'll see electoral results voted on come January 6.

And here, the law professor and I really see eye to eye.

There’s no threat to Biden’s inauguration. What there is potentially … if one senator signs anything that Representative Brooks submits, that’s going to cause there to be a repeat of what happened in 2004 … I think there will be roll-call votes.

Even though Biden’s going to be inaugurated, if a lot of senators go on record agreeing with Brooks, that’s agreeing with a claim that Biden didn’t win those states.

Journalist: I think that’s a very likely scenario.

It’s taking us into a realm of American politics that I’m not sure we’ve had before. I mean, it’s a denial of reality that’s very dangerous.

Elections require accepting results, even if your team loses. Your team will win next time, maybe. You give the winning team a chance to govern based on what the voters said this time. You have to acknowledge that reality. For significant numbers of members of Congress, going on the record, if that’s what happens, in defiance of that reality, that will be really dangerous for the operation of competitive elections.

edit: accidently copied text back to this post rather than new thread, then had to remove the duplicate posting.

[MeDotOrg]

Supreme Court Rejects Pennsylvania GOP block of Biden victory,

The Supreme Court on Tuesday denied a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to block certification of the commonwealth's election results, delivering a near fatal blow to the GOP's long-shot bid to invalidate President-elect Joe Biden's victory.

The Supreme Court's action is a crushing loss for Trump, who has frequently touted the high court's potential to overturn his election loss.

Just hours before the court's order was released, Trump made a direct appeal to state officials and members of the Supreme Court to assist him in his efforts to subvert the will of voters, as he continually and falsely suggested there was massive voter fraud during the election.

You remember when people said 'it's all over but the shouting'? Unfortunately, there's still going to be a lot of shouting.

[Moksha]

Supreme Court Rejects Pennsylvania GOP block of Biden victory,

The Supreme Court on Tuesday denied a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to block certification of the commonwealth's election results, delivering a near fatal blow to the GOP's long-shot bid to invalidate President-elect Joe Biden's victory.

The Supreme Court's action is a crushing loss for Trump, who has frequently touted the high court's potential to overturn his election loss.

Just hours before the court's order was released, Trump made a direct appeal to state officials and members of the Supreme Court to assist him in his efforts to subvert the will of voters, as he continually and falsely suggested there was massive voter fraud during the election.

Lindsey Graham insists that Trump will remain as the "Shadow President" (or at least the head seditionist).

[Res Ipsa]

The Politico article makes some questionable assertions. The Safe Harbor law is clear on this point: the “safe harbor” it provides is safety from Congressional challenge. The portion of the statute that allows challenges also says it does not apply if the Safe Harbor deadline is met.

The Politico also fails to adequately distinguish between a challenge to a state’s electors and what happens if multiple slates of electors are presented.

ETA: Here’s a good interview in The Guardian that explains it. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.thegua ... epublicans

Thanks for the link.

Maybe I'm missing something but it still sounds like contesting the electors on the floor is a real possibility. Here's why. The law professor interviewed in the Guardian article, Edward Foley, makes the case that what Congress ought to limit their vote to is whether or not a given state followed the legal procedures in place. Safe harbor applying the confidence that this is the case so unless there is really good evidence to the contrary, Congress should simply ratify the results of the electoral college.

But his argument also presents the unlikely scenario that a Congressperson who wishes to challenge a state's results would come at it from the direction of who they think actually won.

Every conscientious member of Congress, whether representative or senator, once the objection is raised … they’re not supposed to say: ‘Who do I think won Georgia? Who do I think won Pennsylvania?’ They’re supposed to ask themselves: ‘Did Georgia and Pennsylvania utilize a procedure to achieve its own resolution of that issue? Did they do so by 8 December?’

That's not likely to happen, though. What's almost certain to happen is there will be challenges questioning the procedures and their effects on the results. And what does the law professor have to say about that?

It’s up to Congress to abide by that rule that Congress created and not be tempted to second-guess a decision that it’s not supposed to second-guess. But human beings being human beings, if members of Congress want to ignore their own rules and second-guess something which they shouldn’t be second guessing, then who’s to stop them?

And frankly that sounds exactly like the conditions we should expect where members of Congress will use the barrage of litigation and social media claims to put forward the argument the results in certain states SHOULD be questioned by Congress. That procedures were followed and the results certified isn't stopping the litigation other than judges who actually feel obligated to sustaining the law are acting as a valuable line of defense against those claims. But Congress? Uh. If all it takes is one congressperson and one senator to force a vote, I am going to go with it being pretty damn likely we'll see electoral results voted on come January 6.

And here, the law professor and I really see eye to eye.

There’s no threat to Biden’s inauguration. What there is potentially … if one senator signs anything that Representative Brooks submits, that’s going to cause there to be a repeat of what happened in 2004 … I think there will be roll-call votes.

Even though Biden’s going to be inaugurated, if a lot of senators go on record agreeing with Brooks, that’s agreeing with a claim that Biden didn’t win those states.

Journalist: I think that’s a very likely scenario.

It’s taking us into a realm of American politics that I’m not sure we’ve had before. I mean, it’s a denial of reality that’s very dangerous.

Elections require accepting results, even if your team loses. Your team will win next time, maybe. You give the winning team a chance to govern based on what the voters said this time. You have to acknowledge that reality. For significant numbers of members of Congress, going on the record, if that’s what happens, in defiance of that reality, that will be really dangerous for the operation of competitive elections.

Well, yes. I suppose it's possible that Congress could violate its own clear law. But, hell, if that's what's going to happen, the country's done anyway.