December 10, 2020: Meritless Texas Challenge to Election Results Headed for Defeat

 

12/10/20: Now, cometh before the court, the Texas case, an Alamo-like defense of Trump’s last chance to win a second term. 

 

To understand the Texas challenge, a few helpful notes: 

ONE: When a state sues another, over water rights or air pollution issues, the case goes straight to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

If New York sues Ohio, for example, New York would not want the case to be decided in the Ohio courts, and vice versa.

 

TWO: The high court need not take the case. If a majority of justices find the Texas challenge without merit, or that core issues have been settled by previous decisions, they may choose not to hear it at all.

 

THREE: The president is pumped to learn that 18 red states have joined Texas in this last-ditch plea. On Thursday he tweeted, “19 states are fighting for us, almost unheard of support!” 

Technically, you could argue there’s one more “ditch” if Trump is stymied by the highest court in the land. As that great “patriot,” Rush Limbaugh, suggested yesterday, if Trump loses, the red states should secede. (See: 12/9/20.) 

(This is why Rush has a Presidential Medal of Freedom?)

Texas already tried to challenge the results of one election in 1860.

 

FOUR: The president did not mention that the four states named in the lawsuit, and 23 other states and the District of Columbia joined in opposition to the move.

 

FIVE: This final challenge to the November results is the product of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s fertile imagination. 

(For more on Paxton, who was served with an F.B.I. subpoena at his office in an ongoing felony case this week, see: 12/8/20.) 

One legal expert, Amy Howe, explains the basics of the challenge: 

The filing… accuses government officials in the four states of using the COVID-19 pandemic to make changes to their states’ election laws through “executive fiat or friendly lawsuits, thereby weakening ballot integrity.” The state officials, Paxton writes, “flooded” their states with absentee ballots and “weakened the strongest security measures protecting the integrity of the vote – signature verification and witness requirements.”

 

As a result, Paxton contends, the 2020 election “suffered from significant and unconstitutional irregularities in those four states” – for example, treating voters in Democratic areas more favorably than in other areas.

 

SIX:  Did you know that Texas allows mail-in ballots? In some mysterious way, these ballots, cast in red states by people that vote mostly for Trump, are legit. 

In Paxton’s state only people over age 65 can be trusted to sign their mail-in ballots, provide proof of who they are, fold them, put them in a special envelop, lick the flap, put the first envelop in a second, lick the flap, and affix the correct amount of postage. You can even vote from jail in Texas, under certain circumstances, which is kind of fun. 

(Paxton may someday have to avail himself of that provision in the law.)

 

SEVEN: Texans may vote in person if they show one of seven kinds of photo identification, including driver’s licenses, and handgun licenses, because people who love guns, tend to vote Republican.

 

EIGHT: Texas relaxed its regulations regarding voter ID last year, after federal judges found old rules discriminated against poor voters, and had been written purposely to be discriminatory.

 

NINE: We know this challenge will face serious headwinds, since almost every legal point raised has been shot down in the lower courts. In a previous lawsuit, filed on nearly identical grounds, a conservative justice on the Wisconsin Supreme Court joined liberal colleagues in rejecting the request to overturn the state’s vote. To do so, he said, in a case built “on so flimsy a foundation [emphasis added, unless otherwise noted]” would be to do “indelible damage to every future election.” 

Now Paxton and his pals were back…resting their new filing on the same flimsy foundation as before.

 

TEN: A federal judge threw out a previous challenge to the Pennsylvania voting results, saying rather cheekily, “Charges of unfairness are serious. But calling an election unfair does not make it so.”

 

ELEVEN: Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, admittedly a Democrat, had trouble taking the Paxton challenge seriously. 

“This lawsuit seems to suggest that the voters of Michigan messed with Texas,” she tweeted. “They didn’t. Case closed.”

 

TWELVE: In the lawsuit filed by Attorney General Paxton and crafted by a lawyer named John Eastman, it was noted, as “evidence,” that no person had ever been elected president if they met defeat in both Ohio and Florida. 

Interesting, perhaps. 

Legally? 

Irrelevant. 

Trump’s lawyers might as well have said, “No man has ever been elected president who wore a toupee and enjoyed yodeling as a hobby.” 

Plus, check your facts! 

Nixon won both Florida and Ohio in 1960. Not until 1968 did he win a chance to take up residence in the White House and start tapping reporter’s phones and burglarizing people’s offices.

 

THIRTEEN: The Texas filing is a piñata filled with lame complaints. Signatures weren’t checked! Ballot drop-off boxes were not secured with locks and chains and chastity belts! The voting machines were rigged. 

We even had another irrelevant claim: Trump won 18 of 19 “bellwether counties.” According to the Texas challenge, that meant there was no possible way he could have lost.

 

FOURTEEN: Just for fun, the blogger decided to see how many counties there are in various states. Pennsylvania has 67; and if you want, you can go to this website and learn how all of them were named. Ohio has 88. I knew that because I have lived in the state most of my life. Georgia has 159. That includes Gwinnet County, named after this blogger’s ancestor, on his mother’s side. 

Button Gwinnett signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, got a Georgia county named after him, and has been generally forgotten since. 

Gwinnett County went blue on Election Day, by the way, tallying 241,827 votes for Biden, 166,413 for Trump. 

In the hand recount, which the Trump team demanded, the president did see a net of 285 votes in Gwinnett, which is a lot, and a bit of a stain on the county name. The totals after that second tally, in that county: Biden 242,490, Trump 167,361. 

Statewide, however, Trump still lost. 

As for a third count of the state’s vote – a second machine tally – I can’t find results for individual counties. 

Statewide, Trump lost again.

 

FIFTEEN: Texas is not the only red state to sign onto this case and to have decided that under proper conditions (those conditions determined by their lawmakers and implemented by their officials), citizens can vote by mail! If you are over 65, and have certain health issues, in Missouri you can vote by mail. 

Indiana: If you are scheduled to work during the entire 12 hours the polls are open on Election Day, or you have a disability, you can vote by mail. 

South Carolina: Students attending school outside of the county in which they claim residence (i.e. college students, away from home) can lick a stamp and send in a vote. 

Kansas: “Advance voting by mail has been allowed to all Kansas voters since 1996.” 

Incredible. 

The states complaining vociferously about other states allowing mail-in ballots – and not following their own rules – have their own different rules and allow mail-in ballots.

 

SIXTEEN: I live in Ohio, which went (sadly) for Trump, by 53.3% to 45.3% for Joe Biden. 

This fall, Ohio was “flooded with ballots.” This blogger and his wife, who live in Cincinnati, each received from the state and various get-out-the-vote groups, four ballots apiece (4). 

Having no interest in racking up felonies and spending our golden years behind bars, we each filled out and returned one (1). 

As in other states, certain rules made it safe for officials to believe the ballots we cast were legit. My wife and I each signed our ballots in the same way we would if we had appeared in person on Election Day and asked to vote. Had we voted in person we would have been required to show voter ID. Since we voted by mail, we were asked to supply either the last four digits of our Social Security number or provide the number from our Ohio driver’s license. 

So you had to ask: Why didn’t Texas challenge Ohio’s vote?

 

SEVENTEEN: How about Florida, which also went for Trump, and which, unlike Ohio, has signed onto the Texas challenge? 

Almost the first line we see on the website, MyFloridaElections.com. reads: “Under Florida law, all registered voters are permitted to vote by mail.” 

This. 

Is. 

So stupid. 

President Trump voted by mail in Florida for this election. What the hell!

 

EIGHTEEN: Consider Utah. That state’s attorney general signed onto the Texas lawsuit. County clerks in Utah mailed out ballots to every registered voter, a practice the Texas AG and the president both sought to enjoin.

  

Utah Gov. Gary Herbert, and Utah Governor-elect Spencer Cox, both politicians of the Republican style, seemed surprised Wednesday to learn the state’s attorney general had signed the amicus brief (a “friendly brief”) supporting the challenge: “We don’t know what his motivation is. Just as we would not want other states challenging Utah’s election results, we do not think we should intervene in other states’ elections. This is an unwise use of taxpayers’ money.”

 

NINETEEN: The Arizona attorney general joined the fight on the side of neighbor Texas. That is, he agreed that Arizona should sue Arizona to ensure voting had been fair. Who disagreed with that choice? Governor Doug Ducey – another Republican. The election in his state, he said, had been fairly decided. 

Trump lost. 

Gov. Ducey explained:

In Arizona, we have some of the strongest election laws in the country, laws that prioritize accountability and clearly lay out procedures for conducting, canvassing, and even contesting the results of an election. We’ve got ID at the polls. We review EVERY signature (every single one) on early ballots – by hand – unlike other states that use computers. Prohibitions on ballot harvesting. Bipartisan poll observers. Clear deadlines, including no ballots allowed after Election Day.

 

TWENTY: Even supporters of the president expressed serious reservations. Sen. John Cornyn (from Texas!!!!) was baffled by Paxton’s stratagem. He admitted to a reporter that he was struggling “to understand the legal theory.” 

Senate Whip John Thune of South Dakota was equally baffled. “I just don’t know why a state like Texas which never wants anybody telling them what to do, now wants to tell a bunch of other states how to run their elections. I doubt the Supreme Court will take it up.”  

Nebraska’s Sen. Ben Sasse, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, predicted the justices would dismiss the case: 

I’m not a lawyer, but I suspect the Supreme Court swats this away. From the brief, it looks like a fella begging for a pardon filed a PR stunt rather than a lawsuit – as all of its assertions have already been rejected by federal courts and Texas’ own solicitor general isn’t signing on.  

 

(That solicitor would have had the job of arguing the merits of the case before the high court. Assuming it had merits.) 

Two conservative lawyers, Carter Phillips and John Danforth, who are, CNN noted, “close friends with Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, respectively” also filed an amicus brief. 

Against the Texas claim. 

Attorney General Paxton, they argued, was making “a mockery of federalism and separation of powers. It would violate the most fundamental constitutional principles for this Court to serve as the trial court for presidential election disputes.”

 

* 

THEREFORE, it is with great confidence that this blogger is ready to place a bet of $100 with any Trump supporter who believes the U.S. Supreme Court is about to rule in the favor of their Orange God. 

I am betting the justices won’t. 

 

POSTSCRIPT: Sec. of State Mike Pompeo achieves the rare Inspector-General-Triple-Play, managing to get a third IG at the Department of State to quit (see: Steve Linick, 5/17/20). A report submitted by the IG’s office finds that Susan Pompeo, the secretary’s wife, has been flying around the world with her husband, without getting proper approval. An IG’s office has responsibility for looking for waste, fraud, or abuse in the agency for which he or she works. 

You know. Wasting taxpayer dollars. 

A majority of Mrs. Pompeo’s trips in the last two years, six out of eight, IG Matthew Klimow reports, have been unauthorized. 

In any case, Sec. Pompeo refused to sit down with his own Inspector General and answer questions. 

Good old Mike. 

He’s the guy who convinced Trump to fire Linick, who was investigating reports that Mrs. Pompeo (her again!) used State Department employees to walk the family dog, pick up the family’s dry cleaning, and – if I am reading this report right – help her address and mail personal cards and make dinner reservations. 

Again, your taxpayer dollars at work. 

 

FUN FACT - NUTJOBS: Pennsylvania Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward explains why she supported the challenge to the electoral votes, cast for Biden, in her own state. Besides being a Republican, Sen. Ward admitted, “If I would say to you, ‘I don’t want to do it, “I’d get my house bombed tonight.”