Version 1 was shut down due to lack of description. Oops, I thought it was pretty evident.
Also providing an alternate URL. For some, it appears the original URL is pay walled.
The article is based on a think-tank essay that warns & informs that the Trump administration intends to take (steal) the midterms regardless of outcome. They will also impede the voting process.
Alternate URL:
https://archive.ph/2FoW1
Original:
I doono. Does Trump realize he can’t run again? If he does the GOP is toast.
I know he wants to steal the election, thats not in question. The question is can he accomplish it? I don’t know. I don’t know if he actually has the power over elections that he wants to have.
Another real question is will anyone actually go to prison for all of this? If law enforcement and the democrats keep being spineless and ignoring this, it empowers fascists to do worse and worse things each time.
Whats depressing is no matter how evil and incompetent the GOP is, they will still get 55 million votes in the midterms. However if the democrats can get 60-65 million votes, then they will win the house.
Trump has never met an election that he didn’t want to cheat. Now that he has the (SCOTUS bestowed) authority of a king, and the aforementioned systemic support, I fully expect the midterms to be a red faced screaming shitshow.
There’s a very large machine backing this administration and those providing much of the money (big tech, Musk etc.) have a handpicked servant in Vance, or so it appears. They already control much of the media, education, religious organizations, not to mention bigots.
Probably. Is he planning on trying to stay in power anyway? Quite possibly.
But, note that the article, and this thread, are about this year’s midterm elections, not the presidential election in two years.
It’s a recognized problem. I’ve been seeing for months, in multiple places, references to the need to protect the validity of the midterms and to be as prepared as possible for attempts to interfere.
Hoe successful Republican attacks will be, how many and what type will actually occur, and how successful defenses will be, all remain to be seen.
Trump’s weakness is that he shouts out his plans ahead of time. People have learned that no matter how insane they sound they have to believe them.
He’s already lost the no vote by mail decree; it’s too close to the election to implement. Whether the USPS will obey the illegal order to not count mailed in ballots or at least set up conditions so onerous (one bad ballot in a district would disqualify all of them) is going to the courts, which have no been fond of allowing the president to interfere in Congress’ role this one way.
Sending ICE to polling places will be fought by states, and that probably includes Republican states. Not to mention there aren’t enough ICE agents to cover the number of polling spots and deport brown people at the same time. Seizing ballot machines, as in the OP’s link, is not a presidential power, and again trying to do so would require an army.
Obviously, Trump will try every scheme, illegal or not. The only reason he has to is that his name has become such poison that Republicans refuse to campaign with him. He knows that thousands in every district who once voted for him are switching their votes to Democrats. They are not likely to approve his shutting down their votes. He needs public approval to carry out his plans. He got it in 2024; he won’t have it 2026.
None of this means the election will go smoothly or that Trump won’t fight like the cornered rat he is. The only real bright point is that he’s told everybody what he plans on doing, giving them two months to set up defences. And they already are.
The thugs hired by ICE that have lied and murdered people at a poling place scares the hell out of me. If a gun goes off, I would think that the place would be shut down. I can’t imagine stepping over dead bodies to get to the voting machine.
Trump’s power is the ability to make you worry about things he may never do. That’s the antagonists advantage. But stealing a national election takes a lot of work that I don’t know if he has the wherewithal to put in. Especially because it can’t be explained away without triggering his narcissistic rage.
Republicans lose, he can blame it on him not being on the ballot, them not passing the laws he wanted passed. He’ll get bored and sooth himself by renaming another landmark. He’ll probably still be obsessing about 2020 after the midterms.
That isn’t say Dems shouldn’t be prepared for a fight, but I think they need to understand that the threat to steal the election part of this, hoping they can force people to tune out and give up before the first ballot is cast.
If this was something they felt confident in, they wouldn’t be pumping so much money into midterm campaigns to save seats.
I understood that it is each state, not Congress, that determines what votes count in that state and how they will be counted.
He has an army, it’s called the National Guard. He has not hesitated to override Governors’ control of their states’ National Guards when it suited him and he thought he could get away with it.
I don’t know whether and how much Republicans will try to steal this election by making it less free and fair than our elections usually have been. I am fairly certain that if Republicans lose enough to damage their control of power, the next two years will be mired in accusations and attempts to prove that elections were “stolen” by ineligible voters voting for Democrats, and by any other means Republican imaginations can come up with. It will be interesting (for certain values of that word) to see who, if anyone, is sworn in and seated in Congress next January.
The election will go through and the Democrats will be in charge of the House in January and probably also the Senate.
After that, though, we’re in big trouble. Trump will not sign any bills Congress passes. There will be a government shutdown. Trump won’t care. If there’s no government there’s no seven-day-a-week investigations of his administration. I haven’t seen anyone predict this, but I think it’s the most likely outcome. Could Trump use this to call a national emergency? Who knows what he might do?
Quite a lot of people in various places over the last couple of centuries have risked becoming dead bodies in order to have the right to vote. I don’t think it’s actually going to come to that, but if it does, damn it, try to vote anyway. Because if that works, we’ve got no defenses left, and they’re probably coming for you anyway.
This, exactly. Show up, and don’t let them scare you out of it.
I’m far less worried about what Trump is likely to say or do than what voters are likely to do, or not do.
We’ve all seen how wrong polls can be when forecasting elections results. So while Trump is polling low, and Democrats are talking like it’s their election to lose, we all know how capricious voters can be, and how gifted Dems are at snatching defeat from jaws of victory. I mean look at Hakim Jeffreys. Who is thrilled to see him become speaker of the house? It’s like looking forward to a colonoscopy appointment.
That’s not actually a threat as long as he can’t pocket veto. Refuse to sign, a bill becomes law. A veto can still be overridden if it’s important enough. And some they have to pass are important enough.
Keep in mind that Trump will be fully a lame duck at this point. Which will be its own problem because normal presidents start fading into the sunset, whereas Trump will be fully in his “part of the documentary where the cult leader starts wearing sunglasses all the time” era.
He’s probably going to want to destroy the country out of spite, and Republicans will have yet another opportunity to actually take the off ramp they refused for the last 11 years.
This is important. He holds a hammer over Republican congress critters at this point, but once he’s past the midterms they may be able to find their gonads and challenge all the shit he’s pulled.
We thought that the Senators he refused to endorse and lost their primaries would vote against him and we were disappointed. Will that change after the midterms? Remember that a veto requires a two-thirds vote from both houses. That’s a lot of defectors. And most of them will face primaries and re-election in 2028. Trump won’t run again; most of them will. And the MAGA base will be out for revenge.
Oh, the Democrats might not get their laundry list past a veto. But a clean continuing resolution on the budget? A defense funding bill? How many Republicans will want to let those vetoes stand if it wasn’t a party line vote to pass?
Put on your best red MAGA hat and flash the ICE thugs a “Thumb-up” and get into that booth and vote a straight Blue ticket.