Election Litigation Status

[Moksha]

Many Republican members have already shown their hand.

Have they? Like, House and Senate members have shown their hands and there's a threat of a majority voting to overturn the results of the electoral college?

You sure?

Yes, there was a whole bunch of them signing on to an amicus brief for the Texas lawsuit to throw out the votes for Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Michigan. This was before the Electoral College voted, but their actions to disenfranchise these voters would have changed things for the Electoral College.

[subgenius]

Have they? Like, House and Senate members have shown their hands and there's a threat of a majority voting to overturn the results of the electoral college?

You sure?

Yes, there was a whole bunch of them signing on to an amicus brief for the Texas lawsuit to throw out the votes for Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Michigan. This was before the Electoral College voted, but their actions to disenfranchise these voters would have changed things for the Electoral College.

Trump voters:
"Here is 100 votes"
Biden voters:
"Here is 50 votes"
....

...

Biden voters:
"Wait! we just found 500 votes under this table....when no one was looking....late last night."
Trump voters:
"That is suspicious, we should investigate"
Biden voters:
"AAAaaarrrghhh! you just want to disenfranchise 500 voters.....you must be racist."

[canpakes]

Trump voters, in line:
"Here are 100 votes"
Biden voters, in line:
"Here are 50 votes"

Trump voters, regarding absentee voting:
"Here are 5 votes. Trump told us not to vote via absentee"
Biden voters, regarding absentee voting:
"Here are 110 votes"

Trump voters:
"Something is suspicious, we should investigate, because we can’t bring ourselves to believe that not everyone wants to re-elect our guy, who also seems to have screwed us over regarding his admonition against absentee voting. Let’s demand that votes from predominantly black areas get tossed.”

Biden voters:
"That does look racist."

Trump voters:
:: throw weeks-long tantrum about ‘fraud’, file over 60 asinine lawsuits that actually don’t allege fraud, and then threaten to secede. ::

Fixed.

[Res Ipsa]

Hi Honor. There is universal agreement among election experts that § 15 is poorly written and hard to parse. It is not organized in a way that we would write a statute today. And we don't have anything in the way of case law that provides a guide to interpreting the statute.

Courts and lawyers use certain principles or maxims of statutory interpretation to help decipher statutes. One important one is that the different sections of a statue are to be harmonized as much as possible in a way that gives effect to the wording of each provision. Another is that clear and unambiguous language in a statue must be enforced as written and not altered. A third is that a statute should not be interpreted in a way that leads to absurd results.

So, Sections 5, 6 and 15 have to be read together. Section 15 cannot be interpreted in a way that changes unambiguous language in Sections 5 and 6. Part of the reason that Section 15 is hard to parse is that it first tells us the procedure for objections and then afterward place substantive limitations on the objections. So, here are the procedures for objections in Section 15Z:Z

Upon such reading of any such certificate or paper, the President of the Senate shall call for objections, if any. Every objection shall be made in writing, and shall state clearly and concisely, and without argument, the ground thereof, and shall be signed by at least one Senator and one Member of the House of Representatives before the same shall be received. When all objections so made to any vote or paper from a State shall have been received and read, the Senate shall thereupon withdraw, and such objections shall be submitted to the Senate for its decision; and the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall, in like manner, submit such objections to the House of Representatives for its decision;

And here are the limitations, which appear next in the statute:

no electoral vote or votes from any State which shall have been regularly given by electors whose appointment has been lawfully certified to according to section 6 of this title from which but one return has been received shall be rejected, but the two Houses concurrently may reject the vote or votes when they agree that such vote or votes have not been so regularly given by electors whose appointment has been so certified.

The fact that Congress placed substantive limits on its authority to reject votes means that there is a class of objections that are not valid under the law. And that class of objections includes not only the limitations I just quoted, but the limitations in Section 5, which clearly states that it applies to the appointment of electors under the constitution and the law.

Under your interpretation, if there is only one set of electors and those electors qualify for Safe Harbor, the Congress must separate and render a decision even though it would violate the law to reject the electors. That would be absurd, as the law as written compels Congress to accept the votes. I am saying that, because the Vice President presides over the joint session (Just as he can preside over the Senate), he has the ability to reject a challenge that is on its face invalid. In fact, this is a way that the Republican Senate could save itself the embarrassment of having to vote against Trump -- Pence simply rules any objection that ignores sections 5 or 6 as invalid.

I fully recognize that poorly written statutes can generate all sorts of interpretations. But if I take the unambiguous language of Sections 5 and 6 and, as I should be required to do, interpret the ambiguous section 15 so that it harmonizes rather than conflicts with the clear language of the other sections, this is where I get. Section 15 cannot undo Section 5's clear statement that votes "shall be counted" and it should not be interpreted to require absurd results like requiring Congress to vote on questions that it has no discretion to answer.

[Res Ipsa]

The Supreme Court ruled on three petitions/motions this morning. None of them were election related. The Supreme Court website is very informative and easy to use. https://www.supremecourt.gov You can search the docket for any of the petitions for cert that have been filed and see the dates they are scheduled to be considered. You can also look at the list of orders for that day. If orders are issued on a given day, the Court usually does so at 9:30 EST.

There are six cases with petitions for certiorari and/or motions that I'm aware of on the docket: the four Krakens, Lin Wood's case in GA, and Kellie Ward's election contest in AZ. There may be a couple more, as there is a lag between filing the petition and the clerk docketing the petition. Again, docketing a cert petition says nothing about the likelihood that the court will accept it -- it's purely a clerical act. So far, all of the election-related petitions are on the normal docket, which means that the court is unlikely to decide whether to accept or reject them until after the inauguration. I'll update if that changes -- several of the lawyers I follow on Twitter are monitoring all of these cases.

[subgenius]

Fixed.

finally, your true thoughts on the election, thank you.

[subgenius]

President Donald Trump’s spy chief is considering holding up a report to Congress on foreign efforts to sway the Nov. 3 election, arguing that China should be cited more prominently for its attempts to influence American voters, according to people familiar with the matter.

The disagreement that’s dividing U.S. intelligence officials and analysts has prompted Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to weigh withholding his certification of the report that’s supposed to be delivered to U.S. lawmakers on Friday, the people said.


Ratcliffe wants the report to more fully reflect the national security threat that China’s efforts posed, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity owing to the sensitivity of the information.

[canpakes]

Fixed.

finally, your true thoughts on the election, thank you.

I guess that would make me a better person than the one who can’t take a stand.

You’re incapable of stating that you believe widespread use of narrow and targeted voter fraud occurred. I wonder why you can’t. ; )

[subgenius]

... questions that it has no discretion to answer.

related questioms among the cries for evidence not being presented.
If a case is dismissed because because it has no standing, would evidence have been/be presented?

[honorentheos]

Hi Honor. There is universal agreement among election experts that § 15 is poorly written and hard to parse. It is not organized in a way that we would write a statute today. And we don't have anything in the way of case law that provides a guide to interpreting the statute.

...

I fully recognize that poorly written statutes can generate all sorts of interpretations. But if I take the unambiguous language of Sections 5 and 6 and, as I should be required to do, interpret the ambiguous section 15 so that it harmonizes rather than conflicts with the clear language of the other sections, this is where I get. Section 15 cannot undo Section 5's clear statement that votes "shall be counted" and it should not be interpreted to require absurd results like requiring Congress to vote on questions that it has no discretion to answer.

Thanks, Res. I appreciate the detailed reply.

Regarding the comment that there is no case law to serve as precedent, while not case law do you know if Ohio had certified before the safe harbor date in 2004 when their electors were challenged by two Democrats and it resulted in separate session review and voting? I've looked around and it appeared they did by one day but there was some ambiguity due to laws allowing challenges that would hindered the state from achieving the goal.

If so, wouldn't this tell us it's quite possible for state's in 2021 to see their electors challenged even if that challenge isn't successful?