But Bush v. Gore was a Federal power grab over a process SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED to keep the National government out of it, and the only thing that could have possibly been different had the Constitution been followed was a small chance that Joe Lieberman might have become VP in 2000.
If that had prevented the Iraq disaster and the rise to regional dominance of Iran, a) it would have resulted from following the Constitution instead of the Supreme Court claiming a power it doesn't have; and b) been more than worth a 2-3 week delay in seating the village idiot from Texas.
That's debatable.
The state legislature had set the rules for the election, but the Florida Supreme Court was going rogue and making up new rules on the fly to help Gore.
The people of the state of Florida felt that the Florida Supreme Court was not giving equal protection to all the voters in Florida by not letting, say, Pensacola (a military city) have their votes recounted too. Remember that the statewide vote margin was only a few hundred votes. A few votes picked up in Miami might be offset by a few votes picked up in Pensacola or Tampa. That's what the Florida Supreme Court was trying to prevent.
The people were not asking SCOTUS to interpret Florida election law or change Florida election law, they were asking SCOTUS to stop the Florida Supreme Court from interfering in the election as the legislature defined it.
So there were legitimate federal issues regarding certifying the election in time for the Electoral College to work that SCOTUS was faced with.
People forget that there were two SCOTUS rulings in Bush v Gore.The first was a 7-2 decision for Bush that the 14th amendment equal protection was being violated by only recounting the three heaviest Democrat counties in the state. Voters in the other counties had an equal right to have their votes recounted, too.
The second vote was 5-4 on the remedy of whether Florida had time to do a full statewide recount. SCOTUS ruled that there wasn't enough time for a full recount and put a stop to the recounts, making Florida go with the certified counts at the time.
This was all because of the short timeline to meet the Electoral College safe-harbor date.
To your point, though, note that two years later SCOTUS declined to hear the challenge from New Jersey Republican Senate candidate Doug Forrester that New Jersey illegally replaced Bob Torricelli with Frank Lautenberg on the state ballot when the election was already in progress because Torricelli was losing. THAT would have been a true power-grab of getting into state elections since there were no overarching constitutional issues at stake.
Another point in your favor is the 2000 Senate election with Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan and John Ashcroft. Recall that Mel Carnahan died in an airplane crash about three weeks before the election. The Lt. Governor vowed to appoint Carnahan's widow Jean Carnahan if Mel Carnahan won.
Critics said that since Carnahan had died and the Constitution says that a Senator must be a resident of the state, votes for him on the ballot should be discarded.
Ashcroft declined to seek SCOTUS review and eventually conceded the election when Carnahan's name won. Jean Carnahan was appointed to serve in her husband's place. Ironically (and a foreshadowing of what to expect in the future from Democrats), when President Bush nominated John Ashcroft for Attorney General, Senator Carnahan voted against his nomination despite Ashcroft graciously not contesting her win.
In fact, John Ashcroft might be a good example of the way that Republicans treat Democrats and how Democrat react in response. Sixteen years later, Jeff Sessions from Alabama seemed to be of the same kind as Ashcroft. In the intervening years, Republicans had to endure Eric Holder, Loretta Lynch, and Merrick Garland, while Republicans put up Alberto Gonzales, Michael Mukasey, and Bill Barr.
That's why we're today seeing calls for Republicans to elect fighters to stop the Democrats. That's why Mark Levin is calling for a route to SCOTUS to stop Bragg and Merchan from interfering with the RNC National Convention. We're seeing calls for no more McConnells or Grahams or Hutchinsons in the party. Electing "genteels" only emboldens Democrats to run them over by using lawfare as a weapon against their more unassertive nature.
-PJ