Election Litigation Status

[MeDotOrg]

Best line of the night: Stephen Colbert, observing that Trump has a won/loss record 1-59 on post-election litigation, said "the President is now getting sympathy cards from the New York Jets."

[Gunnar]

As of today - Trump is President.
Most likely the same will be true on January 21st.

Most likely? I was going to bet you a nickel, but now I think I should ask what odds you're offering.

Subby doesn't believe that nonsense any more than we do. There is no way he would take the bet, regardless of the odds.

[Chap]

We began the Trump presidency with Sean Spicer's "Alternative Facts" about the size of the crowd at Trump's inauguration, which was smaller than Obama's. So reality needed to be remade to avoid damage to the all important Orange Ego, the only thing in the cosmos that Trump cares about.

Now we have had a few people dressed up as 'Alternative Electors' acting out stuff for the cameras of whatever cable channels might be interested in their silly little spectacle. Again, protective remaking of reality: in the nasty inflexible real world, Trump lost the popular vote and the electoral college, but the Orange Ego cannot compute that, so ...

Looking ahead, what are the odds that on January 20 Trump will hold an Alternative Inauguration? How would he manage that, I wonder? No doubt he could find a compliant judge somewhere to administer the oath, and so on ...

Ultimately, the only solution that could preserve the Orange Ego from major damage would be the one advocated by the poet Berthold Brecht, after the uprising of June 1953 against the communist government in East Germany:

After the uprising of the 17th of June
The Secretary of the Writers' Union
Had leaflets distributed on the Stalinallee
Stating that the people
Had forfeited the confidence of the government
And could only win it back
By increased work quotas. Would it not in that case be simpler
for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?

Somewhere, over the rainbow, way up high, is the Alternative American People who can rescue Little Donald from the horror of being a loser.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

OK, I've updated the first post, which summarizes the pending cases....

One takeaway from all this is that Trump and friends have established a huge body of case law that stands as precedent. His use of the legal system to try and attack election integrity has actually strengthened the body of case law that protects election integrity. Next time around, the little boys and girls who cry "fraud" will have a much greater risk of being sanctioned by courts.

Thanks for doing all this, man. You’ve been a legal light in a big hazy bizarro Trumpworld, and invaluable to us small fries who actually things.

As to your last two sentences, what you’re saying is the GOP, if they try this BS again, someone will actually face some goddamn consequences for their actions?

- Doc

[subgenius]

Quick follow up:
were facts that were not stipulated allowed to be presented?

Yes. It was a trial. The judge requested the parties to stipulate to whatever facts they agreed to. That's not unusual. But parties are not limited to the stipulated facts, unless they agree that all relevant facts fall within the stipulation. Trump was in no way prevented from introducing evidence of fraud.
The same was true of his election contest in Wisconsin's state court, where he again failed to introduce evidence of fraud.

Apologies for the additional follow-up (and thank you for the "playing at home" clarification), but - to your knowledge -is there a publicly available link to the transcript of these trials?

[canpakes]

Apologies for the additional follow-up (and thank you for the "playing at home" clarification), but - to your knowledge -is there a publicly available link to the transcript of these trials?

I found it!

[Res Ipsa]

OK, I've updated the first post, which summarizes the pending cases....

One takeaway from all this is that Trump and friends have established a huge body of case law that stands as precedent. His use of the legal system to try and attack election integrity has actually strengthened the body of case law that protects election integrity. Next time around, the little boys and girls who cry "fraud" will have a much greater risk of being sanctioned by courts.

Thanks for doing all this, man. You’ve been a legal light in a big hazy bizarro Trumpworld, and invaluable to us small fries who actually things.

As to your last two sentences, what you’re saying is the GOP, if they try this crap again, someone will actually face some goddamn consequences for their actions?

- Doc

It’s more likely. The legal system as a whole hasn’t seen anything quite like this before, and judges don’t want to discourage people from filling bona fide election challenges or bringing actual fraud cases. So that’s why there’s a relatively high bar for sanctions.

Once there is clear precedent that laches bars filing suit after an election to challenge laws and rules you could have challenged before, it becomes harder to argue that there is a good faith basis in the law for filing suit.

I’m interested to see what the federal court in New Mexico does with the suit filed yesterday.

[Res Ipsa]

Interesting blog entry on Soviet Steven Miller and his cosplaying electors. http://www.dorfonlaw.org/2020/12/stephe ... -from.html

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

Interesting blog entry on Soviet Steven Miller and his cosplaying electors. http://www.dorfonlaw.org/2020/12/stephe ... -from.html

On January 6, we can expect some number of Trump collaborators in Congress to point to the language of 3 U.S. Code § 15 prescribing the electoral-vote-counting procedure for handling "papers purporting to be certificates of the electoral votes" and treating the self-important papers filed by the Trump alternate slates as just such purported certificates.

Greeeeeat. I guess Trump and his conmen can always set up an alternate White House in Florida and just govern from there. Because why not? There's no bottom to this.

- Doc

[honorentheos]

Interesting blog entry on Soviet Steven Miller and his cosplaying electors. http://www.dorfonlaw.org/2020/12/stephe ... -from.html

That was interesting, and for once in my entire internet experience the comments that followed were worth reading, too.

More to the immediate point, it is possible to imagine the likes of Representatives Mo Brooks, Jim Jordan, Louie Gohmert, and perhaps a handful of the other Trumpiest members of Congress not only voting to reject Joe Biden's electors from Georgia, Michigan, Pennsyvlania, and Wisconsin but actually to accept the alternate electors despite the fact that their ballots will arrive at the Capitol bearing the imprimatur of no state authority save what they have proclaimed for themselves. Should that occur and should at least one ambitious worm of a Senator--Rand Paul? Ron Johnson? Ted Cruz?--go along, Congress will be required to go through the motions of evaluating whether the votes cast by the duly appointed Biden electors or those cast by the Trump "alternate slate" are real.

I've read through a number of sources and still don't see what would prevent the challenge based on the Safe Harbor provision. He seems to agree. I've read that the safe harbor provision would most likely come into play if the House and the Senate voted differently on whether or not to accept a challenged state's electoral votes.