Fareed Zakaria recaps a Trump-election-stealing theory — in effect, a possibly legitimate conspiracy theory — that is growing in speculative weight, which I'll compress even further:
* Post-Election Day, Republicans contest thousands of mail-in ballots, causing a blizzard of Democratic countersuits.
* This creates such mayhem, confusion and delay that states must choose their presidential electors themselves.
* Eight of the nine swing states have Republican legislatures, which choose Republican electors; Democratic governors or perhaps Democratic secretaries of state choose a competing, equally partisan slate of electors.
* Now we have twice the confusion when some of the electors' legitimacy are challenged; hence when Congress meets on 6 January to add up the Electoral votes, the votes of those states hopelessly enmeshed in legal conflict are simply not counted.
* This deprives both nominees of the 270 Electoral-vote threshold.
* The election goes to Congress, as mandated by the Constitution.
* Each state has one vote, among whom there are presently 26 Republican delegations, 23 Democratic delegations, and one tied.
* Thus another soul-killing four years of Trump's hell, at the end of which we are irretrievably toast.
Trump, suggests Zakaria, is knowingly, premeditatively involved in the GOP strategy, or conspiracy, if you like; the columnist notes this remark at a 16 September presidential press conference: "At a certain point, it goes to Congress. You know, at a certain point, it goes to Congress. You know that."
No, we don't. That's just one possible outcome among several. Plus we can't be entirely sure that Republicans' three-vote edge in Congress (as of today) would hold. If the nation votes overwhelmingly for Biden — which I believe it will — leaving no doubt whatsoever as to the victor, we could see an honest-to-God mass insurrection in this country were Republicans to ruthlessly dictate the loser-as-winner. And that might be enough of a haunting spectre for merely three Republican delegations to say, no thanks.
What if Biden wins the popular vote by only 3-4% while things are essentially tied in states like Florida or Wisconsin or Pennsylvania, creating an electoral college boondoggle?
All I know is the Trump cartel is not going to concede defeat, no matter what, and if the vote is at all close—and it will be—they’ll use every tool they’ve got to maintain power.
Posted by: Jason | September 26, 2020 at 07:51 PM
A contingent election with a vote by House delegation, is only used if no candidate has received a majority of all the EVs, and contested EVs could not give any candidate a majority. It would only be triggered by a 269-269 tie, or if a third party candidate got enough EVs to deny any candidate a majority.
The situation described is one in which enough EVs are contested that no candidate can get a majority, but c candidate could get a majority if the contests were decided. The new Congress has to decide all contests when it receives the EV tallies as part of it's opening procedure, on or within a few days after January 3. Simple majorities of both House and Senate have to agree how a disputed state's EVs are to be counted, so it is possible that there will be no agreement between the two, and the EVs needed for either candidate to win could remain contested, indefinitely. If there is no resolution by noon on Inauguration Day, the Speaker becomes acting president until there is a resolution.
Not to worry about how that scenario will play out, because if red-controlled state govts declare their presidential elections invalid, they pretty much have to claim the same about all elections on the same ballot. Enough House and Senate seats could end up still contested on January 3, that it will be a matter of controversy who gets seated, and therefore which party has the majority that gets to vote all those presidential EV tallies up or down.
Posted by: Glen Tomkins | September 27, 2020 at 05:25 PM
Glen has pointed out some pretty serious flaws with this strategy. Trump has also stated his desire for the call to go to his stacked Supreme Court to invalidate mail in ballots and end the count on November 3rd. All of these schemes seem unlikely.
Watchdog efforts at the local level are going to be essential this election. Look what happened with the ballot tampering in North Carolina's 9th congressional district in 2018. Most of these people are sloppy, arrogant and actually brag in public about their intent. I expect this sort of thing will be widespread in red states at the local and state levels. It's what they do.
Posted by: Halster | September 27, 2020 at 06:35 PM