Category Archives: Election Meltdown

Wisconsin Democrats 3.5 Times More Likely Than Republicans to Vote by Mail, and Trump With Election Day Lead of 67-26 in Poll Showing Biden Winning Wisconsin Overall 49-45

August 11, 2020, 10:57 amElection MeltdownRick Hasen

Recipe for trouble: Large partisan differences in who chooses vote by mail and therefore what the vote split is by ballot type in @MULawPoll of Wisconsin. pic.twitter.com/rx6uUiY9aF— Charles Franklin (@PollsAndVotes) August 11, 2020

Jamelle Bouie: “How to Foil Trump’s Election Night Strategy; To keep the president from claiming victory on Nov. 3, Biden supporters who can vote in person may well have to.”

August 11, 2020, 7:46 amElection MeltdownRick Hasen

Jamelle Bouie NYT column: There’s no mystery about what President Trump intends to do if he holds a lead on election night in November. He’s practically broadcasting it.First, he’ll claim victory. Then, having spent most of the year denouncing… Continue reading

Today’s Must Read is David Graham in the Atlantic: “The ‘Blue Shift’ Will Decide the Election Something fundamental has changed about the ways Americans vote.”

August 10, 2020, 7:56 amElection Meltdown, The Voting WarsRick Hasen

The Atlantic: This sort of late-breaking Democratic vote is the new, though still underappreciated, normal in national elections. Americans have become accustomed to knowing who won our elections promptly, but there are many legitimate votes that are not counted immediately… Continue reading

“The 2020 Electoral End Game — Finding a Peaceful Transition of Power in a Political Question World”

August 10, 2020, 7:42 amElection Meltdown, Supreme CourtRick Hasen

Ross Martin has posted this draft on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The playing field for 2020 election disputes is not level because the incumbent-candidate is already in office. The incumbent-candidate is already asserting election irregularities that could leave the… Continue reading

“The Voting Will End Nov. 3. The Legal Battle Probably Won’t.”

August 9, 2020, 8:54 pmElection Meltdown, The Voting WarsRick Hasen

NYT: The stormy once-in-a-lifetime Florida recount battle that polarized the nation in 2000 and left the Supreme Court to decide the presidency may soon look like a high school student council election compared with what could be coming after this… Continue reading

Kansas Files Supreme Court Cert Petition in Schwab v. Fish (Formerly Fish v. Kobach), Seeking Right to Require Voters to Prove Their Citizenship with Birth or Naturalization Certificate Before Registering to Vote

August 5, 2020, 7:06 amelection administration, Election Meltdown, The Voting WarsRick Hasen

The cert. petition is here. I wrote extensively about this case, and the lack of evidence that such a law is justified by a problem with noncitizen voting, in Election Meltdown.

“Here’s how experts think the press should cover the run-up to the November election”

August 2, 2020, 8:32 pmElection MeltdownRick Hasen

CNN: The US Presidential Election is bound to look different this year.Because of the coronavirus pandemic, both Democratic and GOP party conventions have been dramatically scaled back, and it’s unlikely that there will be rooms packed with people… Continue reading

I Spoke with CNN’s Brian Stelter on “Reliable Sources” About Threats to the Fairness of, and Public’s Confidence in, The November Election Given My Analysis in “Election Meltdown”

August 2, 2020, 2:58 pmelection administration, Election MeltdownRick Hasen

Watch Part 1 and Part 2 (with co-panelists Susan Glasser and Erin Geiger Smith). More information about my new book, “Election Meltdown,” at this link.

“100 days out, parties fear chaotic election”

July 27, 2020, 6:53 amElection MeltdownRick Hasen

Reid Wilson for The Hill: A little more than three months before November’s election, partisans who back both President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden are growing anxious over what they see as the mounting potential for a chaotic… Continue reading

“How to minimize 2020 election chaos”

July 26, 2020, 12:02 pmElection MeltdownRick Hasen

Jennifer Rubin WaPo column: We also need responsible behavior from mainstream media outlets. It is too much to hope that Twitter or Facebook will take down all posts that attempt to suppress the vote, circulate false claims of fraud… Continue reading

“A bipartisan group secretly gathered to game out a contested Trump-Biden election. It wasn’t pretty”

July 26, 2020, 12:00 pmElection MeltdownRick Hasen

Boston Globe: On the second Friday in June, a group of political operatives, former government and military officials, and academics quietly convened online for what became a disturbing exercise in the fragility of American democracy.The group, which included Democrats… Continue reading

Scheduled to Be Sunday on CNN’s “Reliable Sources” Taking About the Fairness and Legitimacy of the 2020 Election

July 25, 2020, 1:36 pmElection MeltdownRick Hasen

[Sunday update: This segment was delayed because of coverage of John Lewis’s funeral procession crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge.] Tune in at 11 am eastern, and especially about the role of the media. See recommendations 5 and 6 of our… Continue reading

“A 2020 Question 100 Days Out: Will the Elections Be Free and Fair? President Trump baselessly rages about voter fraud, while Joe Biden warns of foreign interference.”

July 25, 2020, 1:28 pmElection Meltdown, The Voting WarsRick Hasen

NYT reports.

“Anatomy of an Election ‘Meltdown’ in Georgia”

July 25, 2020, 1:26 pmelection administration, Election MeltdownRick Hasen

NYT deep dive: Elections workers described a cascade of failures as they struggled to activate and operate Georgia’s new high-tech voting system. Next came a barrage of partisan blame-throwing: The Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, accused the liberal-leaning… Continue reading

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The law of politics and the politics of law