Posted on 12/10/2020 5:41:29 AM PST by Ebenezer
If Texas has its way, the 2020 presidential election won’t be over soon.
The state of Texas has filed an unprecedented motion with the U.S. Supreme Court, asking for leave to file a complaint with the court against the states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin over the 2020 presidential election.
The motion alleges that changes made in election rules governing absentee ballots in those states by “non-legislative actors” violated the Constitution and “cumulatively preclude knowing who legitimately won the 2020 election and threaten to cloud all future elections.”
In a nutshell, Texas is saying these four states’ elections were unconstitutional—and therefore, invalid. The Lone Star State’s complaint, filed by state Attorney General Ken Paxton, asks that Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin conduct new elections to determine their electors for the Electoral College.
The motion filed by Texas includes the 41-page complaint and a 35-page brief making the legal arguments for why the Supreme Court should grant approval of the filing of the lawsuit, since Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution gives the Supreme Court—not lower federal courts—original jurisdiction over “controversies between two or more States.”
The complaint goes into great detail describing what happened in each state.
Pennsylvania: The complaint accuses Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar of, among other things, “without legislative approval, unilaterally abrogating” Pennsylvania statutes that require “signature verification for absentee or mail-in ballots.” These changes were “not ratified” by the Pennsylvania Legislature.
Georgia: Similarly, the complaint describes how Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, also “without legislative approval, unilaterally abrogated Georgia’s statute governing the signature verification process for absentee ballots.”
Michigan: The complaint states that Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson “abrogated Michigan election statutes related to absentee ballot applications and signature verification.”
Wisconsin: Lastly, the Wisconsin’s elections commission made similar changes in state laws without the permission of the Legislature that “weakened, or did away with, established security procedures put in place by the Wisconsin Legislature to ensure absentee ballot integrity.”
The complaint catalogues these and numerous other changes made in all four states by government officials, not the state legislatures.
According to Texas, these “amendments to States’ duly enacted election laws” violated the Electors Clause of the Constitution, Art. II, § 1, Cl. 2, which vests “state legislatures with plenary authority regarding the appointment of presidential electors.”
In other words, while the state legislatures have the authority to set the rules for presidential elections in their states—and thus could have made all of these changes if they had wanted to—other government officials in those states, including judges, did not have the constitutional authority to make these changes.
Second, the complaint describes how voters in different parts of these states were treated differently. For example, election officials in Philadelphia and Allegheny Counties in Pennsylvania set up a “cure process” for voters in those jurisdictions whose absentee ballots did not comply with state legal requirements. Those noncompliant ballots should have been rejected because state law does not allow such a procedure.
As a result of this behavior and similar behavior in other states, there was “more favorable treatment allotted to votes” in areas “administered by local government under Democrat control.”
This differential treatment, says Texas, violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. It cites the Supreme Court’s 2000 decisions in Bush v. Gore, which “prohibits the use of differential standards in the treatment and tabulation of ballots within a state.”
Additionally, the one-person, one-vote principle “requires counting valid votes and not counting invalid votes.” This damaged Texas because in “the shared enterprise of the entire nation electing the president and vice president, equal protection violations in one state can and do adversely affect and diminish the weight of votes cast in states that lawfully abide by the election structure set forth in the Constitution.”
Finally, Texas argues that these states violated “substantive due process” requirements because their election practices—through both “intentional failure to follow election law as enacted by” their state legislatures as well as “unauthorized acts by state election officials and their designees in local government”—reached “the point of patent and fundamental unfairness.” The states “acted unconstitutionally to lower their election standards … with the express intent to favor their candidate for president.”
Texas argues that all of these unconstitutional actions changed the outcome of the presidential election, citing the actual vote totals in each state and the number of ballots affected.
The state is asking for a declaratory judgement that the administration of the election by Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin violated the Constitution; that their Electoral College votes cannot be counted; and to order that these states “conduct a special election to appoint presidential electors.”
If the states have already appointed their presidential electors, Texas asks that their legislatures be directed “to appoint a new set of presidential electors in a manner that does not violate the Electors Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment, or to appoint no presidential electors at all.”
This is an unprecedented lawsuit, and the Supreme Court may be extremely leery and disinclined to take any actions regardless of the merits that could upset the results of a presidential election.
Texas does a good job of describing what happened in each state and why the actions of government officials making unauthorized, unilateral changes in the rules may have violated the Constitution and affected the outcome of the election.
But by almost any measure, this is the legal equivalent of a Hail Mary pass. While the questions raised are serious ones, it is unlikely that the Supreme Court will address them at this time. As Texas points out, these issues will likely be repeated in future elections. If the Supreme Court does not take up these issues now, it may well have another opportunity in the future.
“If the Supreme Court does not take up these issues now, it may well have another opportunity in the future.”
What makes the author so sure of that? The “issues” will remain, but the “opportunity” will never come.
Looks like a solid case to me.
“This is an unprecedented lawsuit, and the Supreme Court may be extremely leery and disinclined to take any actions regardless of the merits that could upset the results of a presidential election.”
This statement has to have been stated a thousand times already. Only thing wrong with it is that it is wrong.
The Supreme Court would not be upsetting the results of a presidential election.
The Supreme Court would be stopping the theft of a presidential election.
if the supreme court does not take up the case, then why even have laws.
So does the Supreme Court’s hatred of Trump trump the Constitution?
“The “issues” will remain, but the “opportunity” will never come.”
Exactly. Once in full power, the communists will do whatever it takes to continue to cheat in any and all elections leaving the American people as powerless as the Chinese, Cuban or North Korean peoples are.
Correction: the last two words should be "fraudulent election."
Allowing illegal votes disenfranchises those who followed the rules and voted legally.
“If the Supreme Court does not take up these issues now, it may well have another opportunity in the future.”
No, it will never have another chance. The Court will be packed, and it will never again rule against the democrats in power. It will become a rubber stamp for every socialist program.
And it will have forfeited the trust of the American people, whose constitution it failed to defend.
Yep. If the SCOTUS doesn’t take it, we’ll be Venezuela. We’ll be encouraged to vote but the machines will always pick the winner.
Well, there is already a precedent. The Democrats lead the way when it comes to trumping the Constitution.
The Algorithms in the Dominion Software are far more sinister and damning.
Rules and Laws are definitely important but the true fraud is in the Vote Tabulating Dominion System.
There is precedent for the Court stepping in less alarming circumstances but equally as consequential. It was ca;;ed “Bush v Gore,” and it involved ONE state and an issue that was arguably a purely state matter that could have been resolved by the FL courts. Or just waiting for the votes to be counted.
It certainly would be nice if the millions of people who voted legally could have standing within our Courts to also challenge the illegalities in these four states.
I am still trying to understand how the Supreme Court could possibly ignore the disenfranchisement of millions of voters throughout the USA when Elected Officials and Non-Elected Bureaucrats in the four states illegally changed their voting rules.
“Hail mary” only counts in church, which this is not, a football game, or when a famous general in the gulf war, used it.
This is a sound case, and one that creates a, ahem, ‘laundry problem’ for those who are in the bag for ‘broken foot joe’!!
It really comes down to the purpose of voting for a President.
The President is the chief executive of the citizens of The United States.
A person seeking to be our chief executive must meet certain requirements.
If a person can meet those requirements, than he/she may campaign to seek election.
We can quibble over small details, but the purpose of voting in this country is to allow the citizens to have a say, a voice, in who should be the chief executive. An equal voice.
This system is supposed to produce the best person for the office of chief executive.
It has been assumed, from the very start of these United States, that the voters would pay attention to the knowledge, skills, experience and energy of any Presidential candidates.
This would force candidates to be as prepared as possible for the job. They would have the necessary training and experience to be a chief executive.
But, what happens in a system where cheating is allowed?
The candidate does not need to be prepared for that office.
The candidate is not seeking to become the chief executive of The United States.
The candidate in a cheating election serves as The Godfather of a criminal syndicate handing out stolen money to his/her loyal supporting crooks.
I’m not sure, but the (to put it mildly) issue of the voting machines might be brought up by the plaintiffs when they make their case before SCOTUS. I wouldn’t rule out the argument that the unconstitutional changes in election laws in the four defendant states set the stage for the type of fraud perpetrated by Dominion.
“”””“This is an unprecedented lawsuit, and the Supreme Court may be extremely leery and disinclined to take any actions regardless of the merits that could upset the results of a presidential election.”
This statement has to have been stated a thousand times already. Only thing wrong with it is that it is wrong.
The Supreme Court would not be upsetting the results of a presidential election.
The Supreme Court would be stopping the theft of a presidential election.””””
I agree. The Supreme Court can simply tell the 4 States to read and follow the US Constitution that has been in effect for over two hundred years. Namely, the Legislature in each state sets the rules for conducting elections.
If “non-legislative actors’ illegally changed the rules, the the Legislature must correct those illegal actions.
And the method to correct the illegalities is for the Legislature to override the popular vote and name its own slate of Electors to the Electoral College.
What are the qualifications for a cheating President?
He/she must be beholding to the criminals that elected him/her.
Experience? Not necessary.
Proper education! Not necessary.
Energy? Not necessary.
Willingness to hand out stolen wealth and power to the cheaters? Necessary.
A cheating system will not produce the best person for the job of chief executive of The United States.
Not by a long shot.
It will produce the best cheater.
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