I think I heard Fareed Zakaria make that argument but I don’t understand on what legal precedent they could do so. (?)
AIUI, this is a myth. The state legislatures only can set law as to how the electors are selected (not the same thing as the legislature selecting the electors themselves) - and this has to be done before the election day itself. They absolutely cannot reverse an existing election outcome (“let’s replace all of Biden’s Democratic electors in Pennsylvania with the Republican slate of electors.”) If shenanigans like this went to the Supreme Court, it would probably be a 9-0 ruling against it.
Additionally, it would be political suicide to do so.
From my understanding, they can certainly try. Then Biden would have to bring suit, which should be upheld by the courts, but they could instead rule that the federal law preventing them from changing the method of appointment afterwards is unconstitutional.
Bolding mine. I keep seeing this statement, but I don’t understand it. 49% of Pennsylvanians would probably hail these legislators as heroes. And even if they were all voted out of office in a year or two, who cares? Most of them have other careers already.
Sadly, I can see the “originalists” on the SCOTUS following this exact line of thinking: “The Constitution is silent on how states name their electors” or some such.
Also, national suicide, because there would be a national insurrection and revolt, maybe not a civil war, but damn close, and the economy would collapse.
All true – and reassuring.
I keep asking myself, who will say no to this? And the answer has to be – don’t laugh – corporate America. They’re the ones who stand to lose the most if the center doesn’t hold, and they’re the only ones with the leverage to stop it from happening.
No Republican wants to see the S&P drop 75%.
I agree about the suicide.
To me, changing the method of selecting electors now would be an ex post facto law prohibited by Article I, Section 9.
But if a Supreme Court majority is really in love with Trump, they could say that the ex post facto rule only applies to criminal matters.
Most likely, at least five of them can’t stand the guy. Surely the phrase “my justices” rankled.
Are we there yet?
It is illegal to change electors at this point:
…[M]ost constitutional experts agree that, under the legislature’s authority to choose the “manner” of appointing electors, a legislature could theoretically decide before Election Day to cancel the popular vote for presidential electors and instead appoint them directly. But Congress’s enactment of a uniform national Election Day under its own constitutional authority — which supersedes any contrary state actions — prohibits the choice of electors from being made based on elections held or laws passed after Election Day.
In other words, under the constitutional timing provision as implemented by federal law, the absolute last day a state legislature could have decided to appoint the state’s presidential electors for this election was November 3, 2020. Once that date passed, the determinative popular votes had all been cast, and therefore the legislature’s authority to change the state’s manner of appointing electors in 2020 passed as well . SOURCE
Replying to my link from earlier today.
On Twitter and possibly IRL the two federal agents that interviewed this guy and got him to recant are getting death threats. *
I listened to quite a bit of the tape of the interview - it was good, textbook technique.
They started by making it seem like they believed him, but wanted to help him tighten up his story. I noticed that they slipped in a little Qanon coded language, talking about the Storm.
Then they used some interview techniques to glean out exactly what he saw and heard, which came out to him overhearing two supervisors say “All on the third except one on the fourth”. And he thought it was suspicious that he was asked to pick up ballots mailed after the 3rd, instead of leaving them in peoples mailboxes I guess. He picked up a total of one ballot after Election Day.
Since those were the only factual things he could attest to and they are totally unsubstantial, the considered him to have recanted.
But Project Veritas is saying he was manipulated by evil mind control techniques. They posted the tape and the identities of the agents online.
Trump tweeted his support for the disgruntled postal worker, commending them for sticking with the TRUTH. In the meantime the agents are getting death threats. And the tape also has names of the other postal workers he’s accusing.
Really, I don’t know how Barr sleeps at night.
- This hasn’t been reported yet, but I saw the threats on Veritas’s feed. I’m not linking to it.
He doesn’t think he’s doing anything wrong.
I wonder.
My nephew (almost my age) posted something on FB negative about Bernie Sanders back in April or so. As I recall it tripped my BS meter, saying that Bernie had never had a full time job. Hmm, that’s hard to do unless you’re homeless maybe…
I went to snopes, debunked, and posted on his page. His reply: he hadn’t really read it but he knew Bernie was a bad guy so he posted it. And no, he didn’t delete the post or anything.
The ends justify the means, in other words. I’m going to extrapolate that to these people, might makes right, do you still beat your wife?, come jump on the bandwagon, bait and switch, etc.
Barr may think he’s cutting corners for a greater good.
Would there, though? I don’t think so. 46 percent would be delighted, and most of the rest would probably just choose to complain on Twitter.
You really think that once one side has commandeered the military command structure there will be much of a resistance?
By who?
When the military implicitly backs the “stolen election” narrative, how long before you “always been at war with eastasia”?
From where I am sitting there is no difference between Trump and someone preparing a “coup” in plain sight. Remember that when Biden really takes office he and all of his cronies are facing serious jail time.These people have nothing to lose. The idea of a peaceful transition depends in a large part on everyone cooperating. I do not think the system has many contingencies for bad actors.
I agree that the chances of justices actually going along with the idea that legislatures can extemporaneously jump in and violate state constitutions and past legislation is constitutionally invalid and not likely. But it’s also clear that we have an increasingly partisan group of justices that might at least entertain such thoughts, and even if they agree to look at the case and hear arguments and decide nothing else, that’s bad because it lends more credence to the idea that Trump might have, depending on circumstances and the right arguments, a legal pathway to the White House that could effectively circumvent elections.
So let’s say that this seed gets planted, that the courts at least consider the possibility that legislatures could possibly replace a slate of electors, what do you think would happen in subsequent elections? What also would be Biden’s perceived legitimacy if they default to the law rather than the vote? It’s creating a very dangerous range of potential outcomes, IMO.
I’ve said in this thread that I don’t believe that the trump clown show can really, believably stage a coup, much less a military-style coup. But then I see stuff like this General Barry McCaffrey interview on MSNBC, and it gives me pause.
Key quotes from Gen. McCaffrey:
I have been shot at a lot and nearly killed a bunch of times. I‘m not an alarmist. I stay cool under pressure. Mark me down as alarmed. I just listened to Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) — wonderful, experienced, mature guy — say this is just payback to [Mark] Esper not being a loyalist. I don’t believe it. We’re watching a setup of some people who are unqualified for office to be in control of the 2.1 million men and women of the armed forces.
I remind our viewers, the only one who can give orders to the armed forces is the president and the secretary of defense. This acting secretary Chris Miller is a perfectly good, experienced combat soldier. He is unqualified for this office. The other three, one of them, a retired one-star, is a dangerous man. That team moving in, no one in his right mind would have accepted an appointment for 90 days. These people are in there to control a coercive institution of U.S. democracy. Watch out.
If I was a CIA officer trying to understand what was going on in a third-world country and I saw this pattern of behavior, I would say the stronghand’s trying to take over the government and defy an election — and I think they’re playing with that idea inside the White House.
That’s alright, they can make up for their profits by turning you in for sedition and collecting the rewards.
I agree with most of what the General says. It is concerning. There are folks in the White House considering it. But I still don’t believe that they can’t pull it off. And I don’t think they will try once it’s explained why it can’t work.
That said, it’s ridiculous that they are even going down this path at all. And it does weaken America’s defense at a particularly fragile time. I just hope there aren’t any actors (state-sponsored or otherwise) out there that are looking at this as an opportunity.
I’ve already heard mention that this would be the opportune time for Israel to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities. It’s a wonder Iran still has a nuclear program if Israel took advantage of each “opportunity”. Seems to me Israel had 4 years to do so if they wanted to, with Trump’s blessing.