“This is true in the case of small claims courts and similar civil actions. But, if it applied equally to ALL courts, how could a DA bring charges against a murder or robbery suspect, for example?”
Criminal acts are against the state. The DA can bring action because he represents the state. Murder isn’t just a crime against the person, but against the state - in a nation-state model of justice. If we had a tribal society, that wouldn’t be true.
And Congressmen were affected by limiting their ability to collect money for running.
“courts HAVE overturned election results before.”
As I noted, “The courts are not meant to overturn national elections based on “I don’t like the outcome”.
“To date, NO court has heard the merits of this case”
Not true. Ankeney was the first that I can think of, and there have been multiple others since.
“This, then, brings us to the crux of this issue and why, IMO, no court has recognized an individual’s standing to bring charges against the POTUS.”
Because in the majority of cases, the plaintiffs had suffered no specific damage. The rules for the courts say that if everyone suffers equally, then no one suffers. This prevents nuisance cases, and it is applied all the time.
No, they weren't. What it did was place an extra layer of bureacracy between them and their donors in the form of 501c's which made it inconvemient, but did not prevent them from collecting campaign donations. It also violated the free speech rights of the people by preventing individuals from presenting ads that mentioned specific candidates.
As I noted, “The courts are not meant to overturn national elections based on “I don’t like the outcome”.
When courts have overturned election results in the past, it WAS on the basis of "I don't like the outcome". However, the plaintiff used a section of the law to codify their claim, but the effect is no different. Someone still didn't like the outcome of the election, thus the court challenge.
Ankeney was the first that I can think of, and there have been multiple others since.
The Ankeny case was a hearing to obtain a writ to block the state's election results. A hearing does not require all the evidence to be presented the way a jury trial does. In addition, since that time, additional information has been developed that shows the intent to decive that was not available at the time of the Ankeny hearing.
Because in the majority of cases, the plaintiffs had suffered no specific damage. The rules for the courts say that if everyone suffers equally, then no one suffers. This prevents nuisance cases, and it is applied all the time.
Again, that applies to CIVIL court cases, NOT criminal court cases. The rules of evidence are different between civil and criminal court cases and, contrary to your contention about nuisance cases, those are filed all the time. This is why there has been a push of late to develop "loser pays" conditions for lawsuits to reduce the number of nuisance cases.