Trump's Pennsylvania complaint is brilliant

[Woody]

 

November 12, 2020

Trump's Pennsylvania complaint is brilliant

By James V. DeLong

 

The complaint filed in Pennsylvania by the Trump campaign is a superb piece of legal craftsmanship.

It was filed in federal court, not state.  The gist is that some of the state's actions, and particularly the exclusion of Republican poll-watchers during the counting of hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots, violated federal constitutional requirements.

The point is obvious enough once one thinks of it, but it's brilliant all the same.  It shifts the focus from state law, where a politicized Pennsylvania court has the last word, to federal law, where the U.S. Supreme Court rules.

As for the obviousness of the point, consider as a thought experiment a state law requiring that all votes be counted in secret by an unelected board named by the party in power.  Could it survive a constitutional challenge?

As my old Harvard constitutional law professors would have said, "to ask the question is to answer it."  It is hard to count all the constitutional guarantees violated here: Equal Protection, Due Process, Privileges and Immunities.  Indeed, the complaint stacks up the Supreme Court precedents supporting its arguments, including the long line of ringing statements in the chain of one-person-one-vote decisions.

Even the late Justice Ginsburg, who never met a progressive argument she could not support, would have trouble upholding such a law.

Given this framework, the historic decision in Bush v. Gore becomes useful but unimportant.  The problem there was that the Florida Supreme Court pretended to be interpreting state law, and the legal convention is that the U.S. Supreme Court must defer on state issues, even though the Florida court was making up new law as it went along and changing its mind shamelessly.

The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore was muddled by the need to wiggle around this problem without addressing it head-on, because it would not do to cast doubt on the integrity of fellow judges.  (The union is strong.)  Only a three-justice concurrence said flatly that the Florida Court was contradicting the Legislature, and that would not do.  Four justices went off on an opaque Equal Protection argument.

A result of this muddle, say friends in academia, is that progressive legal scholars are contemptuous of the decision and dismiss it as irrelevant.

Trump's Pennsylvania case does not have the complication of the state versus federal law interaction because it jumps over the state law and, as noted, relies on a host of U.S. SCOTUS cases about the importance of voting. 

The complaint has much more, designed to bolster its central point. Many other instances of fraudulent activity are cited, which lends credibility to the main accusation.  They are also indispensable to establish a factual case — that the exclusion not only occurred, but mattered, because thousands of ballots were counted in secret.

Reading the news reports, it appears likely that similar complaints are going to be filed in other swing states and that perhaps we are seeing the exposure of a broad-based effort to corrupt the election.  Joe Biden claimed that the Democrats were mounting the biggest voter fraud effort in history, and a good rule for living is that when someone tells you he is about to screw you over, believe him.

It is possible, then, that a number of cases will hit the Supreme Court in about three weeks.

Everyone in the legal world assumes that the justices, bruised by the excoriation the Court has received over Bush v. Gore (even though the result was right), would never put itself in the position of reversing the apparent results of a presidential election.  This assumption is the reason for the Democrats' efforts to create an irresistible bandwagon effect, but the president's lawyers may have out-maneuvered them.  The justices may have no choice except to decide the election, one way or the other, and to be put to the choice of reversing the media-claimed results or ratifying massive fraud.

The legitimacy of the Court could survive through, and even be enhanced by, a carefully explained reversal of initial results.  It could not survive a mealy-mouthed ratification of obvious fraud.  If Trump's lawyers make their case factually, the Court must agree.

As Lincoln said: "we cannot escape history.  We ... will be remembered in spite of ourselves ... in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation." 

LINK

[deleted]

He's not fighting for himself, he's fighting for the republic. 

It's why ethical people voted for him in 2016 and 2020.

[LIBills]

Amazing how Russian interference in our elections has magically disappeared as well.

That is truly amazing.

Why is it that 42 of the 48 states on the mainland called their results in a timely manner, but NC, PA, MI, AZ, GA and NV could not?

It's a serious question that every voting American should ask and it needs to be investigated.

I would still want this question to be asked if Donald Trump was invalidated as the President elect as well.

[Philly'sFinest]

30 minutes ago, Woody said:

November 12, 2020

Trump's Pennsylvania complaint is brilliant

By James V. DeLong

The complaint filed in Pennsylvania by the Trump campaign is a superb piece of legal craftsmanship.

It was filed in federal court, not state.  The gist is that some of the state's actions, and particularly the exclusion of Republican poll-watchers during the counting of hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots, violated federal constitutional requirements.

The point is obvious enough once one thinks of it, but it's brilliant all the same.  It shifts the focus from state law, where a politicized Pennsylvania court has the last word, to federal law, where the U.S. Supreme Court rules.

As for the obviousness of the point, consider as a thought experiment a state law requiring that all votes be counted in secret by an unelected board named by the party in power.  Could it survive a constitutional challenge?

As my old Harvard constitutional law professors would have said, "to ask the question is to answer it."  It is hard to count all the constitutional guarantees violated here: Equal Protection, Due Process, Privileges and Immunities.  Indeed, the complaint stacks up the Supreme Court precedents supporting its arguments, including the long line of ringing statements in the chain of one-person-one-vote decisions.

Even the late Justice Ginsburg, who never met a progressive argument she could not support, would have trouble upholding such a law.

Given this framework, the historic decision in Bush v. Gore becomes useful but unimportant.  The problem there was that the Florida Supreme Court pretended to be interpreting state law, and the legal convention is that the U.S. Supreme Court must defer on state issues, even though the Florida court was making up new law as it went along and changing its mind shamelessly.

The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore was muddled by the need to wiggle around this problem without addressing it head-on, because it would not do to cast doubt on the integrity of fellow judges.  (The union is strong.)  Only a three-justice concurrence said flatly that the Florida Court was contradicting the Legislature, and that would not do.  Four justices went off on an opaque Equal Protection argument.

A result of this muddle, say friends in academia, is that progressive legal scholars are contemptuous of the decision and dismiss it as irrelevant.

Trump's Pennsylvania case does not have the complication of the state versus federal law interaction because it jumps over the state law and, as noted, relies on a host of U.S. SCOTUS cases about the importance of voting. 

The complaint has much more, designed to bolster its central point. Many other instances of fraudulent activity are cited, which lends credibility to the main accusation.  They are also indispensable to establish a factual case — that the exclusion not only occurred, but mattered, because thousands of ballots were counted in secret.

Reading the news reports, it appears likely that similar complaints are going to be filed in other swing states and that perhaps we are seeing the exposure of a broad-based effort to corrupt the election.  Joe Biden claimed that the Democrats were mounting the biggest voter fraud effort in history, and a good rule for living is that when someone tells you he is about to screw you over, believe him.

It is possible, then, that a number of cases will hit the Supreme Court in about three weeks.

Everyone in the legal world assumes that the justices, bruised by the excoriation the Court has received over Bush v. Gore (even though the result was right), would never put itself in the position of reversing the apparent results of a presidential election.  This assumption is the reason for the Democrats' efforts to create an irresistible bandwagon effect, but the president's lawyers may have out-maneuvered them.  The justices may have no choice except to decide the election, one way or the other, and to be put to the choice of reversing the media-claimed results or ratifying massive fraud.

The legitimacy of the Court could survive through, and even be enhanced by, a carefully explained reversal of initial results.  It could not survive a mealy-mouthed ratification of obvious fraud.  If Trump's lawyers make their case factually, the Court must agree.

As Lincoln said: "we cannot escape history.  We ... will be remembered in spite of ourselves ... in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation." 

LINK

It has to be brilliant, and it has to go above the corrupt Democratic state Supreme Court.

I think they are in trouble if the SCOTUS takes it up, and I don't see how they could not.

[212frawk]

12 minutes ago, LIBills said:

Why is it that 42 of the 48 states on the mainland called their results in a timely manner, but NC, PA, MI, AZ, GA and NV could not?

It's a serious question that every voting American should ask and it needs to be investigated.

if you havent figured this out by now, you  dont deserve to know.  

[LIBills]

5 minutes ago, 212frawk said:

if you havent figured this out by now, you  dont deserve to know.  

ok

[212frawk]

21 minutes ago, LIBills said:

Amazing how Russian interference in our elections has magically disappeared as well.

That is truly amazing.

 

have considered the difference between illegally influencing votes v illegally casting votes?  just a thought. 

[LIBills]

5 minutes ago, 212frawk said:

have considered the difference between illegally influencing votes v illegally casting votes?  just a thought. 

I never thought of that at all man, thank you.

[212frawk]

1 minute ago, LIBills said:

I never thought of that at all man, thank you.

happy to help

[deleted]

18 minutes ago, 212frawk said:

have considered the difference between illegally influencing votes v illegally casting votes?  just a thought. 

Explain.

[LIBills]

1 minute ago, FanBack said:

Explain.

No, reframe from it.

Tell him, please don't explain it.

You will regret it. 

[212frawk]

Just now, LIBills said:

No, reframe from it.

Tell him, please don't explain it.

You will regret it. 

reframe from it?  

Explain

[LIBills]

4 minutes ago, 212frawk said:

reframe from it?  

Explain

I am telling fanback to take back his quote "explain" because he will regret your response.

There, I explained it.

[212frawk]

2 minutes ago, LIBills said:

I am telling fanback to take back his quote "explain" because he will regret your response.

There, I explained it.

dont see how you got from point a to point b but ok.  I accept your explanation. 

[LIBills]

1 minute ago, 212frawk said:

dont see how you got from point a to point b but ok.  I accept your explanation. 

I don't know either.

 

[SackMan518]

3 hours ago, Philly'sFinest said:

It has to be brilliant, and it has to go above the corrupt Democratic state Supreme Court.

I think they are in trouble if the SCOTUS takes it up, and I don't see how they could not.

The issue of the ballots being counted past midnight on Election night will go out the window because where the Democrats fucked up is how they try everything and that is to have a judge rule on something to reinterpret the law to benefit them. The actual election day laws, for Pennsylvania and other states, was never amended through legislation which is why the SCOTUS will toss out all of those post-midnight ballots. Plus this guy is REALLY not a fan of Biden...

 

[Woody]

And Brett Kavanaugh isn't a fan of Kamala. 

 

[jc856]

4 hours ago, FanBack said:

He's not fighting for himself, he's fighting for the republic. 

It's why ethical people voted for him in 2016 and 2020.

I have a hard time believing he’s not fighting for himself, but maybe you could convince me somehow, idk

[Woody]

Just now, jc856 said:

I have a hard time believing he’s not fighting for himself, but maybe you could convince me somehow, idk

He could be doing it for a multitude of reasons.  I know he hates the globalists.  He pretty much told them to fuck off last time he went to Davos.   

 

[Philly'sFinest]

Looks like the courts are seeing what many are saying about Pennsylvania 

[SackMan518]

50 minutes ago, Philly'sFinest said:

Looks like the courts are seeing what many are saying about Pennsylvania 

Media is in overdrive convincing the public that Biden as "President Elect" is legit.

Look, they even invented a special office of the President Elect yet he's gotten no intelligence briefings or cooperation from the government for any kind of transition and now he's talking to foreign leaders in violation of the, wait for...

LOGAN ACT!

[Thebowflexbody]

Biden = Illegitimate

[212frawk]

ONE
TERM 
LOSER

HISTORIC LOSER

OWNER OF THE TRIFECTA!
LOST THE POPULAR VOTE (TWICE)
IMPEACHED
ONE TERM LOSER

 

[Professor Pigworth]

I can't help but wonder if maybe the faith and effort were lacking in Donald's supporters.  Maybe Donald's people were unworthy of Donald and the precious gift of a second term under his steady and competent leadership which was so tantalizingly in reach. A second term that would have meant so much to so many but will now, sadly, never be.

I guess the thing to do now is to just move on, keep a stiff upper lip and not get hung up on regrets and what might have been.

Sad. But it is so sad, isn't it? 

[Thebowflexbody]

7 minutes ago, Professor Pigworth said:

I can't help but wonder if maybe the faith and effort were lacking in Donald's supporters.  Maybe Donald's people were unworthy of Donald and the precious gift of a second term under his steady and competent leadership which was so tantalizingly in reach. A second term that would have meant so much to so many but will now, sadly, never be.

I guess the thing to do now is to just move on, keep a stiff upper lip and not get hung up on regrets and what might have been.

Sad. But it is so sad, isn't it? 

Douche.  LOL