tThat doesn’t really match your thread title
I imagine the Supreme Court could have certified Trump as the winner to placate the insurrectionists, but then promptly reversed and overruled itself once the rioters were no longer a threat to the lives and safety of the Congresspeople. The Constitutional complication might still be real and come into play if Trump has already been sworn in (it’s January 20 or later). Then it becomes a matter of, is the outcome now too set in concrete to reverse?
I don’t know if it’s “the most optimal,” but Beau of the Fifth Column described a possible worse outcome. If Trump had actually had the fortitude to go with them, he likely would have been let into the Capitol sooner, resulting in the possibility they could have taken hostages or hurt/killed people.
Unfortunately, he’s posted so prolifically about this that I couldn’t find that particular clip again. But I remember watching it.
Would this have resulted in forcing the government to acquiesce? I doubt it. While the US does in fact negotiate with terrorists when they think it will lead to less bloodshed, that comes much later if they think they can’t just outmaneuver them.
They’d likely just convince them they were playing along just long enough to get them out, and then take them down much more quickly than they are now.
You don’t stage a successful coup without the backing of some sort of military force. The most they had at the Capitol were people who like to play military at their clubhouse.
There’d be no reason the Supreme Court would have had to do anything: law enforcement can and will lie.
(Apologies if this is a side-track.)
A couple of posters have mentioned an enquiry - of course if this has Republicans on it they will argue:
- the crowd were just behaving like tourists
- the crowd was largely left-wing agitators
- the crowd were trying to restore democracy after the election was stolen
etc.
Most coups were miraculously completely legal and executed by heroes after it was done. I believe the constitution itself was a treasonous document the moment it was written (probably still is under British law) :: The winners write the history (and law) books.
Nope. The Constitution was written in 1787, ratified in 1788, some years after the Treaty of Paris by which Britain recognized the independence of the US.
Yeah, it’s kind of a weird question to ask whether a coup would hold Constitutional legal water. Either the coup leaders would succeed in getting enough backing from the military and political establishment to enforce their will, or they won’t. The Constitution doesn’t really play into it.
The most optimal outcome, in my opinion, would be if they had never breached the Capital in the first place. Up to that point, it was just a demonstration, not an attempt to overthrow the duly elected government of our democratic nation. Once they forced their way in, it became an attempted coup.
The Supreme Court has no real constitutional role in certification. If Congress, at gunpoint, had certified results contrary with the law, we have a constitutional crisis. There is no objective answer for how that gets resolved.
Well, one wonders why Mr. Trump doesn’t do as the heads of state of Nazi-occupied countries did: establish governments-in-exile, coordinate resistance, issue executive orders; follow the courage of his convictions, the risks be damned?
Or…could he just be a fucking phony?
I have to say I really don’t understand what OP wants. The most “optimal” outcome would have been the coup succeeded–meaning through the use of physical force, they got Congress to proclaim Trump the winner. Then a groundswell of support would emerge from Congressional Republicans and the military, who would both say Trump was legally President. At that point Trump would continue on as President and the constitutional government of the United States would have ended.
It’s like asking “what is the best outcome Hitler could have expected in the Beer Hall Putsch”, and it’s the same–that the military joined the putsch and installed him as dictator. It’s pretty straight forward.
It was a coup attempt, coup attempts have nothing to do with laws and constitutions. Much like the Beer Hall Putsch, the 1/6 coup had essentially no chance of success–for one, at actually getting a quorom of both houses to certify Trump–too many of them ended up escaping to areas they couldn’t easily access. For two, the military and its upper brass tend to not be that culturally or socially aligned with the crazy white militia types, almost none of them would sign on for a coup.
I think it did. The vote could have been postponed. Without certification of the electors, they could say the election was now in the hand of the House, and hold a vote where Trump would win. Many would scream about it, some would take to the streets. The military, following “President” Trump’s orders, would shoot them down like dogs. The rest of us would hold out hope that “the courts” would set things straight, but somehow years go by and nothing is decided.
Four years pass, Trump either 1) has enough mischief done to ensure an election victory or 2) has a “reason” to postpone the election. He appoints Don Jr. as VP, who takes over after Sr eventually dies.
Yeah, this is what I was trying to get at in my first response.
I think most of the invaders simply had the goal of getting into the building, having some whoops, and causing chaos. Their optimal goal was to achieve what they did without getting into trouble. So many of them probably did succeed in having their optimal outcome.
For those with a more serious goal, I think they believed they could confront Congress and force the certification vote to recognise Trump as the winner. I think they would have stated that the votes in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin had been rigged, and that an honest vote would have been for Trump, and therefore the President of the Senate would have to do his 12th Amendment duty and cast those votes for Trump. And that they were going to oversee him and make sure that he did count those votes as they demanded, and that the rest of Congress would acknowledge the Trump electoral victory. Then, once they had the vote count victory, with Trump in the White House as President and Commander-in-Chief, he’d be able to make the vote stick.
It wasn’t treasonous, no, but it was illegal under the Articles of Confederation, the then current law, which required unanimous consent to make any alterations.
why do you think a conservative Republican SCOTUS would have to be “coerced” into certifying Trump?
That was Velocity’s premise in the post I was responding to.
I’m not sure they’d have to be coerced. They could say the 12th amendment was followed and the House properly decided based on the fact that no one got the “majority” of votes when the Senate tried to do their counting. They could decline any real inquiry as this is a “political question.” Three or four justices might say some ominous things about the state of our democracy, but I’m sure the majority would figure this is a one time aberration and things will get back to normal in 2024.
Because that very same “conservative Republican SCOTUS” refused, 7-2, to even take up the Texas challenge lawsuit. They were hardly a rubber-stamp for Trump.
I can’t get over the fact that Brian Sicknik was a Trump supporter. How can we expect these people to see these people as their enemies?