Let’s say Election Day comes and goes and Biden appears to have won. But wait: the Trump Admin files a lawsuit in Pennsylvania, asking that all mail-in ballots be thrown out, because…reasons.
What are the chances that that suit is decided by a judge appointed by Trump? Would that judge be required to recuse themself?
Repeat for Arizona, Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and North Carolina. Trump & McConnell have rammed through an ungodly number of federal judges…it seems like the odds would be pretty good. And how many of those are corrupt? Was that the plan all along?
Disquieting thoughts that occurred to me in the middle of the night. Talk me off the ledge, people…
Yes, this is exactly the Doomsday scenario for the Republic. It would require the GOP writ large to go along, but I think they would at this point.
It’s exactly what he said he would do at one of his rallies yesterday. And they have been laying the groundwork, as the Atlantic discusses here: What If Trump Refuses to Concede? - The Atlantic
He has definitely has made it clear that he intends to try. But I don’t the court will just blindly hand him the election if he doesn’t have the votes. If they do you can call that the day democracy officially dies in America. I think the end game of appointing a new judge to the court as quickly as possible is not keeping Trump as President at all cost but to have a conservative packed Supreme Court as his and the republican senates legacy.
That would also secure his children’s position in future politics. The children’s who father successfully transformed the court will have a lot of appeal 4 to 8 years from now.
On the one hand, this is why the Framers created an independent judiciary of jurists who cannot be removed from office except by impeachment. Regardless of ideology, justices are basically free to do as they please.
However, if the judges themselves are really, really ideological and truly support a worldview that tends to accept a degree of right wing authoritarianism or even one that embraces executive power because…reasons…then we have a problem. And the problem I now see is that the Supreme Court is increasingly ideological.
So on the one hand, the SCOTUS is better than judiciaries in some countries, where judges are actually controlled by the executive or a right wing legislature - here it was created and established as an independent branch of government. On the other hand, like many institutions that are born democratic, just because they start out that way doesn’t mean that they can’t eventually evolve into something else, and I fear that’s what we’re seeing now.
Come to think of it, for a change it would mean seeking to game the system through lawful established channels, instead of doing a “because I said so and nowhere it says I can’t and if it does who can make me?”. OTOH as usual he lacks any sense of finesse about it.
One reason to use the language of a coup is that people know it’s wrong and a violation of Democratic norms — even if they’re not familiar with the exact definition of a coup.
Language like “election tampering” or “voter suppression” signal deterioration of the democratic process. But if we get ourselves into a coup situation — like where Trump just won’t go — we need to help people help our country move into a psychic break.
We know it’s a coup if the government:
Stops counting votes;
Declares someone a winner who didn’t get the most votes; or
Allows someone to stay in power who didn’t win the election.
These are sensible red lines that people can grasp right away (and that the majority of Americans continue to believe in).
People who do power grabs always claim they’re doing it to save democracy or claim they know the “real” election results. So this doesn’t have to look like a military coup with one leader ordering the opposition to be arrested.
If any of those three principles are violated, we have to declare loudly and strongly: This is a coup.
We can be pretty sure that it will eventually be tested. Just saying the quiet part out loud has a very specific purpose. In a democracy, coups occur with consent of the governed. I don’t mean that 100% of the people consent, but the consent of their constituencies who support them - the consent of the faction.
That’s what a lot of people in this country don’t understand yet, but will. It’s the consent of the faction that is driving the republican assault on democracy. In much the same way that ‘reasonable’ Republicans assumed that they could control Trump and use him for their purposes ended up being devoured by Trumpism, the same is going to be true of the voters.
In 2016, it was the Republicans who foolishly believed they could control Trump; now it’s the right wing voters who want liberal tears who foolishly believe the same. Many of them don’t understand that they are making it easier for plutocrats to rig the economy against their small or mid-sized family business, and probably making it harder for their children to replicate their success unless they inherit a trust fund. They will eventually find out that insurance companies won’t pay out for that hospital stay or cover the cost of crop failures or the loss of their Florida or Alabama beach home. And there won’t be a goddamn thing they can do about it then. The price that’s paid…for liberal tears.
I don’t think anyone can require a Supreme Court justice to recuse him/herself. I could be wrong – please correct me if so.
That said, of those who seem to be the leading contenders, Amy Coney Barrett doesn’t concern me (on this particular issue). There doesn’t seem to be even a hint of improper judicial behavior in her record. Seems likely that she’d behave ethically in a situation where the Court had to rule on some issue arising in the course of the election, up to and including recusal, if that’s the appropriate thing.
Barbara Lagoa might be a different story. There is some concern over her non-recusal in a case involving voting rights in Florida.
Lagoa is actually fairly moderate (I’ve drafted briefs for cases she presided over). Her appointments have been a SOP to the Cuban community, not to the Heritage Foundation/Federalist Society.
In this world today, who knows what’s possible? So theoretically, I suppose after the election there could be evidence that needs to be investigated that fraud happened with the mail-in ballots. Given that there has never been any such evidence in previous elections, I think this is highly unlikely. But if so, then of course Trump would have a legitimate lawsuit. Otherwise, in the absence of such evidence, any lawsuit will be frivolous, and I predict SCoTUS will return a unanimous decision invalidating it so fast it will make your head spin.
My original nightmare scenario involved the federal appeals court level, since (presumably) they’d be the ones who would first get the suit seeking to overturn a state’s election results. But the distinction is probably moot, since any decision would certainly be appealed to the SCOTUS.
Not that I want my theory to be tested, but I think folks in this thread overestimate the number of people who actually personally like and believe in Trump, especially if supporting him would put their own personal power into jeopardy, which such a coup would do to Congress and the courts. If it got to that point, he wouldn’t even need the courts’ okay anyway; he’d just do it. He doesn’t care about fig leaves or anything, even if saner politicians would.
It’s not about personally liking or belieivng in him, it’s about using him to increase and consoldate their own power.
The error we made in the past was to underestimate those who would support an authoratarian if it would advance their own interests.
Their personal power is waning. If they lose this election, they may be in the woods for longer than the rest of their lifetimes, most of the power players in Washington are a bit long of tooth these days.
They have nothing to lose by supporting a takeover at this point.
Sure, but that assumes that Trump will share any of his newfound power. Why should they think he would do so? If he’s a dictator, why would he need anyone else? What reason do they have to think that he just won’t dissolve Congress, tear down the courts, kick them all to the ghettos, and live as the single fat cat among pigeons? At least in a democracy, they’ll keep their money, and can graduate to some cushy crony job, instead of having all their stuff confiscated by Herr Trump and warming themselves next to an oil barrel.
Right, which is how we got into this mess to begin with, and they haven’t controlled Trump for the last four years. Why would they suddenly think they can now, especially once they help him wield ultimate power? “Oh, we got him to the highest office in the land and kept him there; surely his behavior since then indicates he’ll keep us in mind once he doesn’t need us anymore.” They’re evil, not stupid. What do they have to gain, compared to the risk? Does anyone think it’s out of bounds for Herr Trump to suddenly loot, er, “nationalize” any US based corporation he can and completely crash the world economy for his own sole personal benefit? That’s the point I’ve never been able to get around thinking about this.
People are also really bad at understanding the concept of a sunk costs, cutting their losses, and not throwing good money after bad.
If what they are doing isn’t working, then doing more of it will be the solution.
What you are asking is why does anyone ever support an authoritarian, how does an authoritarian ever come to power? If we had no examples of people doing exactly what you are asking why they would do, then your questions would be more on point. To be honest, I don’t understand the mindset itself, but there is a difference between not being able to understand or explain the failed firings of another’s neurons and accepting the reality that this is something that people do do.
It’s a sucker’s game, and the ones who are the most conned are the ones who think that they are in on it.
As a bit of an example, there’s a blockchain scam that goes around with different “bitcoin” style monies. What they do is that they send out emails to people, and tell them that they are going to start a scam. They tell them that they will be bidding up the price of the “bitcoin” and that when it gets high enough, they will tell all of their subscribers when to sell.
What actually happens is that they sell of their own, and then they send out an email to everyone telling them that they are the exclusive ones who are getting this info first. Some sell before it bottoms out, most don’t.
But all of them fall for it the next time, thinking that this time they will be the ones to win and it will be the others who are scammed.