Posted on 10/19/2020 6:27:47 AM PDT by billorites
Risks this year include no certain presidential results on election night, and high-stakes struggles up to 79 days afterward, including foreign disinformation, fake news, and big-tech censorship.
There is no shortage of polls or pundits predicting the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. But “outcomes” include more than simply election results. Who is gaming out how America — and the world — will respond? We are.
While national polls suggest an edge for former Vice President Joe Biden, the winner isn’t determined by national polls. It is determined by who wins the Electoral College. Victory is won in the states.
Due to the political stoking of fears of contracting COVID-19, a massive push has been made, mostly by the left, to encourage voting by mail. This significantly alters the calculus on Election Day and completely upends the post-election period.
Most states and local election officials aren’t prepared to process, validate, and count large numbers of mail-in ballots. In six swing states (totaling 74 Electoral College votes)—Georgia, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — no mail-in ballots may be counted before Election Day.
Since reports indicate a far greater interest in voting by mail for Democrats than Republicans, it’s likely that President Trump will be winning these states by large margins on Election Day, only to see that margin shrink in the days and weeks after Election Day. Indeed, that is precisely the narrative being crafted by leading organs of the mainstream media.
Further, voting by mail doesn’t result in the same success rate as does voting in person. The Washington Post reported that some 534,000 ballots were rejected during the 2020 primaries, either because they arrived late, the voter’s signature appeared invalid, or other failures. A separate analysis published in the Post found that as many as 4.9 percent of mail-in ballots fail to result in a counted vote. Depending on the state and the share of the vote by mail for each major party, the 1 in 20 ballots that fail to convert into a vote could be determinative.
Adding uncertainty to what is a routine exercise in vote counting (the 2000 contest in Florida being an exception) is this year’s urban unrest. An election night featuring competing claims of victory, confusion, and early calls by the media, only to be reversed on the receipt of newer data, may lead to post-election violence unlike any seen in more than 150 years.
Purportedly aiming to make sense of this fraught election year, in early August, the Transition Integrity Project (TIP) released a report suggesting that President Donald Trump would not likely leave office without an unprecedented struggle. The TIP, a self-proclaimed “bipartisan” group of some 100 people, was entirely composed of those firmly opposed to President Trump.
Their purpose wasn’t so much gaming out plausible post-election scenarios as to generate breathless propaganda suggesting that no matter the outcome, President Trump would refuse to leave the White House on Jan. 20, 2021, Inauguration Day. He flatly contradicted such propaganda in his NBC town hall last week, saying that he wants the election process to be fair and that he will abide by verified election results.
TIP’s effort marks a lost opportunity, one that the Claremont Institute in partnership with the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) sought to remedy with our own simulation of election night and what might be a highly charged and competitive aftermath — a contest after the contest.
For the task, Claremont and TPPF assembled a team of 35 people, and over the course of seven days, these constitutional scholars, along with experts in election law, foreign affairs, law enforcement, and media, decided how they would react to fast-moving events. The operation was coordinated by a retired military officer experienced in running hundreds of wargames.
The Claremont-TPPF effort produced a detailed roadmap of the likely challenges at the state level, how those might be adjudicated in state and federal courts, how domestic unrest and foreign adventurism might intensify, and, in the unlikely event that the Electoral College cannot determine a winner, how a president and vice president could be constitutionally determined.
The team foresees three basic scenarios, one of which was gamed out in detail:
The team carefully simulated the last scenario. The key takeaways from the effort included:
The Claremont Institute and the Texas Public Policy Foundation have released the results of our joint efforts in the “79 Days Report” for the 79 days from Election Day to Inauguration Day, with ample citations provided to the Constitution, statute, precedent, and history. The team asserts that America has a well-established “transition integrity” procedure — the Constitution.
It is the participants’s earnest desire that this scholarship will illuminate the path for both state elected officials and local election officials as they struggle through what may likely be the most difficult period of their careers.
We hope that our work will reassure the American people that our system of government is resilient. It was crafted by the Founders to withstand crises and to emerge through the turmoil with a government of the people, by the people, for the people, that shall not perish from the earth, but endure to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our children.
“Can” and “Will” are two totally separate things.
It did not handle an ineligible Kenyan very well at all.
Nancy Pelosi is no longer in Congress effective 3 January if the California election results have not been certified.
That's a good point, does CA have a succession plan in it's constitution should she not be seated?
This possibility scares me the most, God help us if it comes to this:
Each house determines the final election results of its membership. This means the Democratic majority in the U.S. House might decide not to seat duly elected Republican members to prevent the Republicans from holding a 26-seat majority in the state delegations if they, with one vote per state, are used to determine the president if no candidate has the needed absolute majority of seated electors’ votes. Given that the majority’s power to determine the membership of the body, House or Senate, is absolute, the sole check on the use of this political power is the potentially dire consequences of its abuse.
Yea.. that’s a new one on me. I’ve been trying to figure out: If the election goes to the House, Which House? The one sitting now? or, the new one?
“A clear victory for Vice President Biden, winning 26 states and D.C. for a total of 342 Electoral College votes. Again, because of the six states that cannot count mail-in ballots until Election Day, even in this scenario, victory won’t be known for certain, as Biden may only have 268 electoral votes late into election night.”
Wrong. In this scenario, demented joe is declared the winner that night. Mail in ballots will be ignored.
The Constitution could not handle ALL of our elected AND appointed swearing in an ineligible usurper.
It’s my understanding that the Constitution does not require Congress be seated as it does with the presidency
All of the Congress is running for reelection...right?
Widespread challenge of federal election results means all those running for election and reelection are no longer seated on 3 Jan if the election results are contested by then
The Senate on the other hand only has 1/3 or 1/2 (?) running for reelection. The rest including Senate Pres Pro Tempore Grassley (4th in succession) remain in office, as well as all of the Trump Cabinet officers until they are replaced by a new Pres
Conceivably if Pelosi ballots are not certified she is out on 3 Jan as well as all of the Congress. . The succession is then Grassley with SecState Pompeo next in line ( VP?)
I defer to experts to discuss this.
I dont know how these Pelosi power grabbing idiots think they can contest and postpone certifying election ballots for Trump when they are on the same ballots
DNC circular firing squad?
“This means the Democratic majority in the U.S. House might decide not to seat duly elected Republican members to prevent the Republicans from holding a 26-seat majority in the state delegations if they, with one vote per state, are used to determine the president if no candidate has the needed absolute majority of seated electors’ votes.””
In which case, Rule 7.62 goes into effect.
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