Democrats in Congress for years have labeled Donald Trump an “insurrectionist,” impeached him for stoking violence on Jan. 6, 2021, and suggested he is constitutionally prohibited from returning to the White House.
But even as those lawmakers continue to doubt Trump’s eligibility for the presidency, they also say that if he wins at the polls, they don’t expect efforts to deny him his presidential electors on Jan. 6, 2025, when Congress meets to finalize the results.
Democratic leaders are saying publicly and privately they want a drama-free transfer of power — even if it means setting aside some members’ views that Trump is ineligible to return to the presidency because of the Constitution’s bar on insurrectionist officeholders.
The 14th Amendment prohibits any federal officeholders who have “engaged in” insurrection from holding office again, and Democrats have long suggested Trump ran afoul of it when he inflamed the violent mob that attacked the Capitol four years ago. At the time, House Democrats overwhelmingly voted to impeach Trump for “incitement of insurrection.” Their leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has routinely called Trump the “insurrectionist-in-chief.” But there appears to be little appetite among Democrats to challenge results during the Jan. 6 joint session.
“The integrity of our democratic process depends on the peaceful transfer of power. Donald Trump has decided that the only valid elections are elections he wins,” Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) said in a statement to POLITICO. “He is the only President who has supported an insurrection rather than accept the will of the American people. Democrats will always ensure every vote counts and that we uphold our democracy.”…
In its March opinion, the Supreme Court implied — though didn’t explicitly state — that Congress must pass legislation to lay out a procedure to determine whether a current or former officeholder has violated the insurrection clause. It’s a gap that leaves some uncertainty about what Congress’ obligations and options are in January.
But most constitutional scholars say it would be improper for lawmakers to make a subjective judgment about Trump’s eligibility without a forum to fully air and debate the facts.
“Congress does not have the capacity in the [Jan. 6] joint session to do so,” said Derek Muller, a University of Notre Dame constitutional law expert. “Because Congress is not in a position to decide the matter, Congress should count the votes.”
Edward Foley, an Ohio State University constitutional scholar who has written about the insurrection clause, said the Supreme Court left a gap on this issue but doesn’t think members of Congress will step into the breach.
“Everything I’ve seen indicates that Democrats in Congress won’t attempt this,” Foley said.
In a hypothetical scenario in which Trump’s opponents controlled the House and Senate, with enough votes to disqualify his electors — “which they won’t have,” Foley noted — he said it’s unclear whether courts would step in to block the decision.
Monthly Archives: October 2024
“Suspicious voter registration forms in Pennsylvania linked to Arizona city councilman’s company”
Two Pennsylvania counties have identified an Arizona-based company as the source of thousands of last-minute voter registration applications that they are investigating.
The company, Field+Media Corps, which conducts voter registration and outreach programs, is run by Francisco Heredia, a Mesa councilman and a longtime voting activist in Arizona.
In Monroe County, around 30 forms the company was “responsible for submitting,” which also included mail ballot applications, were “irregular” and included what the District Attorney’s Office described in a Facebook post as several that were “fraudulent as they were not authorized by the persons named as applicants.”
“In at least one example, the named applicant is in fact deceased,” District Attorney Mike Mancuso wrote in the post, saying several of the forms he described as fraudulent had been traced to a specific person.
York County Chief Clerk Greg Monskie confirmed to Votebeat Wednesday that Field+Media Corps submitted the forms that the county is investigating. Monskie said the company submitted the forms on behalf of the Everybody Votes campaign, a national nonprofit voter registration organization….
Heredia has been a councilman in Mesa, a Phoenix suburb of about a half million people, since 2017. He was reelected in July. Before joining the council, he was for years a leader of Mi Familia Vota, a prominent Latino voter advocacy group, according to his LinkedIn profile. For a short period in 2017, he was the community relations manager for the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office.
Field+Media Corps operates voter registration drives for clients in Arizona, too. Last year, both Navajo and Mohave counties flagged voter registration forms from the company and sent them to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office for investigation, office spokesperson Richie Taylor confirmed to Votebeat Thursday.
Taylor said that Maricopa County prosecutors took the lead on investigating, because the forms were initially submitted there before being sent on to Navajo and Mohave. The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office confirmed the office opened a related investigation, but was unable to immediately provide more detail.
Asked about the Pennsylvania and Arizona investigations, Heredia said the company trains workers to fill out forms accurately. When asked about the characterization of some submitted forms as fraudulent, Heredia said Field+Media Corps has a zero tolerance policy for workers who submit fraudulent forms.
He said the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office contacted his company last year in connection with an investigation into two canvassers the company employed. Field+Media Corps fired those two workers, Heredia said.
Clients or past clients of Field+Media Corps in Arizona include several prominent Arizona voter advocacy groups, including LUCHA, Chispa AZ, and CPLC Action Fund, according to the company’s website.
This election cycle, the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office has flagged FieldCorps, the parent company of Field+Media Corps, for submitting a high percentage of incomplete or inaccurate forms, office spokesperson Sierra Ciaramella confirmed Wednesday….
Breaking: Justice Alito Won’t Put Cornel West’s Name at this Late Date on Pennsylvania Ballot
The Justice acted without referring the matter to the Court, something that only happens when a matter is unlikely to attract the support of even a single Justice.
“Chinese national in Michigan casts irretrievable ballot in US election, now faces charges”
A Chinese national studying at the University of Michigan is facing serious charges after officials say he voted this past weekend in the battleground state.
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Washtenaw County Prosecutor Eli Savit announced the charges against the student on Wednesday. They did not name the student.
Reporting from the Detroit News, part of the USA TODAY Network, identified the student as a 19-year-old from China who is legally in the U.S. but isn’t a citizen, and therefore ineligible to cast a ballot,
The voter registered to vote on Sunday using his identification from the University of Michigan signed a document identifying himself as a U.S. citizen and his ballot was entered into a tabulator, the Michigan Secretary of State’s Office told the Detroit News.
“We’re grateful for the swift action of the clerk in this case, who took the appropriate steps and referred the case to law enforcement,” according to a joint statement from Benson and Savit….
While voter fraud grabs headlines when it does occur, it is rare, according to election experts. Of 42 voting jurisdictions in the 2016 election, officials only referred 30 suspected cases of noncitizens voting out of 23.5 million votes cast, according to research from the nonpartisan Brennan Center for Justice.
“Elon Musk’s America PAC Has Created an Election Denial Cesspool on X”
For months, billionaire and X owner Elon Musk has used his platform to share election conspiracy theories that could undermine faith in the outcome of the 2024 election. Last week, the political action committee (PAC) Musk backs took it a step further, launching a group on X called the Election Integrity Community. The group has nearly 50,000 members and says that it is meant to be a place where users can “share potential incidents of voter fraud or irregularities you see while voting in the 2024 election.”
In practice, it is a cesspool of election conspiracy theories, alleging everything from unauthorized immigrants voting to misspelled candidate names on ballots. “It’s just an election denier jamboree,” says Paul Barrett, deputy director of the Center for Business and Human Rights at New York University, who authored a recent report on how social media facilitates political violence….
Newest “Law & Democracy” Podcast
Discussing among other things ahead of Election Day, the intentional sabotaging of drop boxes, available on Apple Podcasts and YouTube.
Steve Mazie in The Economist on Whether Litigation May Matter to the Outcome of the 2024 Election
Here:
Amid teetering uncertainty over who will win next week’s presidential election, little suspense looms about one thing: if Donald Trump loses, he will not concede to Kamala Harris. Instead, as he has been doing throughout his campaign, Mr Trump will repeat false claims of fraud from the 2020 election and apply them to 2024 with a fresh emphasis on a supposed scourge of non-citizen voting. And he will take those claims to court. Mr Trump’s team and supporters filed more than five dozen post-election lawsuits in 2020, resulting in one inconsequential win and 64 losses. Might he have a better shot at litigating a loss this time around?
Probably not. The courts are already busy considering hundreds of legal claims—regarding voter identification, registered-voter rolls and early voting, among other issues—from Republicans and Democrats alike. Few significant cases are going Mr Trump’s way. The chances of a lawsuit after November 5th turning an electoral loss into a win are low. But Mr Trump’s legal strategy could cultivate a destabilising post-election landscape in America for the second time in two cycles.
Undated/Misdated Mail-in Ballot Issue Returns to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, with Republicans Wanting a Lower Court Order to Count Them Put on Hold for 2024
Yesterday I wrote about this decision of the PA Commonwealth Court, that has injected new uncertainty over the treatment of misdated or undated but timely mail in ballots in Pennsylvania. This issue keeps percolating up to the PA Supreme Court, which has passed on the opportunity this election to consider whether failure to count these ballots violates the state constitution’s voting rights protections. Yesterday the Commonwealth Court found a constitutional violation in the context of an earlier election, and the question is whether this ruling could now apply to this imminent election.
Today the Republican Party went to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and filed this motion, asking for a ruling by Monday, the day before election day. The relief it wants: “The Court therefore should stay or, at a minimum, modify the majority’s order to make clear that all county boards of elections remain bound to enforce the General Assembly’s date requirement in the 2024 General Election and all future elections pending this Court’s decision on the forthcoming appeal.”
Getting clarity on this point is crucial given the new uncertainty injected yesterday by the lower court.
AP on Those Potentially Fraudulent Voter Registration Forms in Lancaster PA
AP:
York County Chief Clerk Greg Monskie confirmed this week that his county was reviewing suspect forms. County Commissioner Julie Wheeler issued a statement saying voter registration forms and mail-in ballot applications were among a “large delivery containing thousands of election-related materials” that the county elections office received from a third-party organization. She said that if a review comes across suspected fraud, the district attorney will investigate….
The York district attorney’s office said it was in contact with the board of commissioners and elections office, but did not indicate if a criminal investigation had been launched.
Lancaster County officials have not disclosed who they suspect is responsible. In a text exchange with The Associated Press, Wheeler attributed the documents that York County received to Field+Media Corps, which she said was “acting on behalf of” the Everybody Votes Campaign. Everybody Votes is a nonpartisan national organization that promotes voter registration.
In an email Tuesday, Field+Media Corps chief executive Francisco Heredia said his Mesa, Arizona-based organization had not been contacted by election officials in Pennsylvania counties and had no additional information on the alleged problematic forms.
If Field+Media Corps does get contacted, he said, it will “work with local officials to help resolve any discrepancies to allow eligible people to vote.” He said there were six or seven other organizations also working in the area.
In an email response, a spokesman for the Everybody Votes Campaign said this week that it had not been contacted by officials in Lancaster, York or Monroe counties about any ongoing investigation and had no additional information on the forms.
“Fearing Election Day violence, local cops are becoming fast experts in election law”
As Election Day nears, police chiefs and sheriffs around the country are bracing themselves for violent threats against election workers, turmoil at voting sites and intimidation of voters.
In Maricopa County, Arizona, multiple emergency hubs will be running on Nov. 5. In Georgia, all new police officers are now required to study election law. In Omaha, Nebraska, the sheriff has even inspected ballot-counting machines in response to residents’ concerns. And across the nation, local law enforcement officials have been huddling with election officials to game out how they will handle bomb threats, SWAT hoaxes and white powdery substances if they materialize on Election Day.
It all points to what many law enforcement officials and election experts see as a dire new normal: elections in America marred by threats, mischief and violence.
“It is a new reality,” said Meghan Noland, the executive director of the Major County Sheriffs Association. “What we preach is that, while we hope that Election Day is peaceful and calm and safe for everyone, hope is not a strategy; preparation is.”…
“‘January 6th is going to be pretty fun’: How MAGA activists are preparing to undermine the election if Trump loses”
Before Election Day has even arrived, the “Stop the Steal” movement has reemerged in force, with some of the same activists who tried to overturn former President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss outlining a step-by-step guide to undermine the results if he falls short again.
For months, those activists – who have been priming Trump supporters to believe the only way the former president can lose in 2024 is through fraud – have laid out proposals to thwart a potential Kamala Harris victory. Their plans include challenging results in court, pressuring lawmakers to block election certification, and encouraging protests – culminating on January 6, 2025, the day Congress will once again certify the results.
“I have a plan and strategy,” Ivan Raiklin, a former Green Beret and political operative who has close ties to associates of Trump, told a group of Pennsylvania activists earlier this month. “And then January 6th is going to be pretty fun.”
Trump’s allies – and the former president himself – are increasingly pushing debunked claims of voter fraud, spreading their rhetoric through podcasts with massive audiences, megachurch sermons and political rallies in key states. Some Trump backers, including pastors associated with Christian nationalist ideas, have described the election as a fight between good and evil, describing Harris as the antichrist or suggesting that God has anointed Trump as the victor.
Four years ago, Trump’s unsuccessful efforts to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden didn’t truly materialize until after the election. They were largely improvised and ad hoc, with a flurry of hastily filed lawsuits that went nowhere and efforts to convince state legislators to block certification that fell short.
But this time around, MAGA activists have been planning to undermine a potential Harris victory well in advance of the election, with some even arguing that state legislators should simply ignore the election results and award electoral votes to Trump by default.
Congress passed a measure in 2022 that makes it harder to overturn a certified presidential election, and with Trump now out of office, he and his allies cannot wield levers of the executive branch to try to influence the election. But experts say that the people involved in these conspiracy theory-driven efforts appear to be better organized, more determined and, in some cases, more extreme than four years ago….
Federal law enforcement officials are also ringing alarm bells. A bulletin put out earlier this month by the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Intelligence warned that extremist rhetoric about the election could motivate people to “engage in violence, as we saw during the 2020 election cycle.”…
“Michigan Election Denial Activists Seize on Voter Report Glitch”
Election denial activists on Wednesday seized on errors in a routine Michigan voting report to claim that multiple people were casting ballots under a single voter’s name.
The report was marred by a glitch that made it appear as though some voters had voted more than once, according to the secretary of state’s office. The report was quickly corrected, according to Angela Benander, a spokeswoman for the office.
The glitch was the result of a formatting error in a routine report generated from voter roll files, Ms. Benander said in a statement. The report counted people’s past addresses on separate lines, “resulting in the same ballot for the same voter appearing on multiple lines of information all associated with one unique voter ID,” she said.
“Each of these voters only had one vote recorded for this election,” Ms. Benander said.
The incident underscores the extent to which small glitches and mistakes — which are inevitable in the management of elections by thousands of jurisdictions and all 50 states — can be amplified by a well-organized network of election denial activists bent on elevating false claims to enforce the notion promoted by Donald J. Trump and his allies that Democrats are rigging the election.,,,
“Billionaires’ new playground”
Billionaire DNA is coursing through the U.S. election system like never before, smashing campaign finance records and ushering in a new age of influence.
Why it matters: In an election that both sides see as existential, the moral guardrails for political spending are vanishing. Today’s billionaires are shredding populist taboos, driving news cycles and increasingly shaping the terms of American democracy.
The big picture: 150 billionaire families have spent a total of $1.9 billion in support of presidential and congressional candidates this cycle, according to a report by Americans for Tax Fairness released one week before the election.
- That’s $700 million (or 58%) more than the $1.2 billion spent by more than 600 individual billionaires during the 2020 election, according to the group’s analysis.
- A Financial Times analysis also published this week found that billionaires had contributed at least $695 million, or 18%, of the total funds raised by the presidential candidates and allied groups.
- At least $568 million of that has gone to former President Trump’s campaign and allied groups, compared to about $127 million to support Vice President Harris.
Between the lines: Those figures likely underestimate the true totals, given the extent to which some mega-donors choose to conceal their identity when funding political causes.
“GOP leaders in some states move to block Justice Dept. election monitors”
The Justice Department’s ability to monitor local jurisdictions for voting rights irregularities on Election Day, already curtailed by the Supreme Court, is facing a new hurdle: opposition from Republicans who are seeking to block federal authorities from polling sites.
The U.S. government has regularly dispatched hundreds of monitors to voting locations in blue, red and swing states, aiming to protect ballot access, discourage improper partisan influence and act as a moderating force on political campaigns.
While the Justice Department has the legal right to request access to polling sites, inflamed partisanship and ideological extremism have contributed to greater resistance to such activitiesin some GOP-controlled states, legal experts said. Those states have attempted to politicize the process and cast federal monitors as partisans from the Biden administration who cannot be trusted.