DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus What MAGA Is Causing For Elections

If I were to pick some one to guard the box, it would definitely be you. ✊

you say that now until somebody offers me free chipotle to look the other way

In Florida, the polling location IS Chipotle, at least that's what the flyer in my mail said.

I wonder if this was a republican nutjob or just some criminal?

While we don't yet know, it would be rather naive to believe their house was just broke into randomly.

Suspect shouted "Where is Nancy?" before assaulting Pelosi's husband at home, source says

A suspect broke into the Pelosi residence in San Francisco Friday morning and "violently assaulted" House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband, Paul Pelosi, while she was not at home, according to a spokesperson for the House speaker, Drew Hamill. According to a source briefed on the attack, the assailant first asked Paul Pelosi where his wife was.

The source told CBS News that before the assault occurred, the intruder confronted Paul Pelosi, shouting, "Where is Nancy, where is Nancy?"

San Francisco Police Chief William Scott said responding officers witnessed the suspect attacking Paul Pelosi with a hammer.

"When the officers arrived on scene, they encountered an adult male and Mr. Pelosi's husband, Paul," Scott said. "Our officers observed Mr. Pelosi and the suspect both holding a hammer. The suspect pulled the hammer away from Mr. Pelosi and violently assaulted him with it. Our officers immediately tackled the suspect, disarmed him, took him into custody, requested emergency backup and rendered medical aid."

The suspect was arrested, and on Friday afternoon, the San Francisco Police Department identified him as 42-year-old David Wayne Depape of nearby Berkeley.

The San Francisco Police Department said Friday afternoon that Depape will be charged with attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse, burglary and several additional felonies.

San Francisco Police responded and were at the scene at 2:27 a.m. PT. Hammill also said Paul Pelosi, 82, is in the hospital and expected to make a full recovery. The Associated Press, citing two people with knowledge of the investigation, reported that Pelosi "suffered blunt force injuries in the attack."

The San Francisco police chief said the suspect was sent to the hospital as well.

Law enforcement sources say that it is too early to say definitively what the motive for the attack was, but the possibility that it was politically motivated has not been ruled out.

U.S. Capitol Police are assisting the FBI and San Francisco Police Department with a joint investigation.

U.S. Capitol Police said special agents with their field office in California also arrived on scene quickly, and a team of investigators was dispatched from the East Coast to help the FBI and local police with a joint investigation.

A senior congressional source familiar with the matter tells CBS News U.S. Capitol Police is considering additional protection for families of congressional leadership in response to the attack on Paul Pelosi. Congressional leaders travel with multiple officers from the Capitol Police's dignitary protection department, but their spouses and children do not, which is why there was no protection present when the assailant broke into the Pelosi residence Friday morning.

The Pelosis have been married since 1963, and have five children.

The top House Democrat will no longer attend an annual dinner Saturday for the Human Rights Campaign in Washington, D.C., the organization confirmed. She was supposed to be a featured speaker.

Lawmakers of both parties shared their responses to the attack on social media.

"I wish Mr Pelosi well & pray for a quick recovery Everyone deserves 2b respected & violence is never okay," Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley tweeted. And Democratic Rep. Jackie Speier, who represents San Mateo, about 20 miles from San Francisco, said in a tweet, "Thank God @SpeakerPelosi's husband Paul is safe after being attacked in their home by an assailant. While the motive is still unknown we know where this kind of violence is sanctioned and modeled."

A spokesperson for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said McCarthy "reached out to the speaker to check in on Paul and said he's praying for a full recovery and is thankful they caught the assailant."

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement that he had spoken with Pelosi and called the assault on her husband "a dastardly act." And Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he was "Horrified and disgusted" by the reports of the assault, and "Grateful to hear that Paul is on track to make a full recovery and that law enforcement including our stellar Capitol Police are on the case."

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said President Biden is "praying for Paul Pelosi and for Speaker Pelosi's whole family."

"This morning he called Speaker Pelosi to express his support after this horrible attack," Jean-Pierre said. "He is also very glad that a full recovery is expected. The president continues to condemn all violence, and asks that the family's desire for privacy be respected."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nancy-pelosis-husband-violently-assaulted-at-their-san-francisco-home/

San Francisco Police Chief William Scott identified the alleged assailant as 42-year-old David DePape.

In 5 key battlegrounds, most GOP state legislative nominees are election deniers, report finds

Experts warn that if enough are elected, Republican majorities in the state houses of these crucial battlegrounds could have the power to rewrite election laws.

Nearly 6 in 10 Republican state legislature nominees in five key battleground states deny the results of the 2020 election, according to an analysis by a group tracking the races.

Of those 450 Republican nominees — including incumbents running for re-election and nonincumbents — in Nevada, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan and Minnesota, 58% of them have echoed former President Donald Trump’s lies that the 2020 election was stolen from him, according to research shared exclusively with NBC News by The States Project, a left-leaning group that tracked state legislative races in battleground states.

Experts warn that if enough of these election-denying nominees are elected, Republican majorities in the state houses of these crucial battlegrounds could have the power to rewrite election laws and affect future elections, including in 2024 when Trump might run again.

“When election deniers are in control, they will do whatever they can to undermine free and fair elections,” said Daniel Squadron, The States Project's executive director.

“We know that the rules for elections and determining the winners are set through the legislative process, so what these folks do would have enormous impact” on “everything from who can register and who can vote to how the results are counted,” Squadron added.

Those five states (and many others) also feature election deniers as the Republican nominees in races for governor and secretary of state — offices that have the power to oversee, administer and certify elections. If election deniers in those races win, their ability to affect future elections could be made more robust by having cooperative election deniers in their state houses to help push legislation remaking certain election laws in those states.

“People who have such extreme views about the last election might push for changes to the voting process that would both make it harder to vote for eligible voters and make it much harder to administer elections,” said elections expert Rick Pildes, a New York University School of Law professor.

Pildes pointed to various proposals in states like Arizona and Nevada that would mandate counting ballots by hand and cut back on mail-in and absentee voting. Kari Lake, Arizona’s Republican nominee for governor, suggested last weekend that she would support efforts to curtail early voting if elected.

Since Jan. 1, 2021, lawmakers in 21 states have passed at least 42 laws that feature voting restrictions, according to the nonpartisan Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

Twenty-four bills that interfere with election administration have already been signed into law across 17 states in 2022, with hundreds more introduced, according to the nonpartisan States United Democracy Center. Many of the most severe proposals could allow state lawmakers to more easily overturn election results, like bills in Arizona, Pennsylvania and Michigan that would give legislators some or total control over election outcomes. Others would allow the partisan majority in a state legislature to conduct election audits or to have more power to submit their own electors (though experts like Pildes have suggested such proposals might be ultimately deemed unconstitutional).

The potential impact that state legislatures could have on elections moving forward could expand even further, depending on how the Supreme Court rules next year on a major elections-related case. The case, Moore v. Harper, primarily revolves around Republicans seeking to limit the power of state courts to review gerrymandered maps and restrictions on voting. But if the justices embrace a conservative legal theory — known as the independent state legislature theory — in their ruling, it could have the effect of granting to state legislatures the sole power to set elections rules and provisions in the states.

Trump’s supporters advocated that position during disputes over the 2020 presidential election, saying state courts had no authority to modify the rules for casting ballots by mail. Those arguments did not prevail, but at least four members of the U.S. Supreme Court found them to have some appeal.

The court is set to hear arguments in that case in December.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/20...9WDQSz6NLU54FPW4uofmbfFzOofYNpe537IT7DjE

We now know for sure.....

Pelosi attack suspect David DePape embraced hate speech, multiple conspiracy theories

SAN FRANCISCO -- The suspect in the attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, appears to have been an active online participant in multiple conspiracy theories, railing against perceived censorship and government control, and engaging in hate speech and antisemitism.

San Francisco police identified the suspect as 42-year-old David Wayne DePape, a Berkeley resident. DePape allegedly assaulted Paul Pelosi with a hammer early Friday during a home invasion of the couple's Pacific Heights residence. A source briefed on the attack told CBS News that before the assault occurred, the intruder confronted Mr. Pelosi shouting, "Where is Nancy? Where is Nancy?"

DePape was known for embracing multiple conspiracy theories on subjects such as voter fraud, climate change, and the COVID pandemic on different online forums. He also has posted antisemitic screeds and videos from "My Pillow" founder and Donald Trump sycophant Mike Lindell.

An Aug. 24 entry titled "Q," displayed a scatological collection of memes that included photos of the deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and made reference to QAnon, the baseless pro-Trump conspiracy theory that espouses the belief that the country is run by a deep-state cabal of child sex traffickers, satanic pedophiles and baby-eating cannibals.

"Big Brother has deemed doing your own research as a thought crime," read a post that appeared to blend references to QAnon with George Orwell's dystopian novel "1984."

In an Aug. 25 entry titled "Gun Rights," the poster wrote: "You no longer have rights. Your basic human rights hinder Big Brothers ability to enslave and control you in a complete and totalizing way."



In one of his recent posts about Donald Trump, DePape asserted, "Trump you NEEEEEEEED to make Tulsi your VP in 2024."

DePape's posts frequently fixated on the subject of government or tech company "censorship." One blog has subject tabs with such labels as "Pedophile normalization," Creationism," and "Facts are Racist."

Another website has categories such as "Climate Hysteria," "Da Jewbs," and "Groomer Schools." The web hosting service WordPress removed one of the sites Friday afternoon for violating its terms of service.

DePape also posted memes and conspiracy theories on Facebook about COVID vaccines, the 2020 election and the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol. Two of DePape's relatives told CNN that he was 'out of touch with reality," estranged from his family, and confirmed that the Facebook account - which was taken down by the social media company on Friday - belonged to him.

Governor Gavin Newsom's office issued a statement following the attack, saying it was "another example of the dangerous consequences of the divisive and hateful rhetoric putting lives at risk and undermining our very democracy and Democratic institutions."



Other local reports identify DePape as a former nudism activist. The San Francisco Chronicle reports DePape was tapped to be the best man in a 2013 wedding of famed nudist activist Gypsy Taub at San Francisco City Hall. He was also one of a number of nudist activists who took marched against efforts by current state Sen. Scott Wiener, at the time a city supervisor representing the Castro and Noe Valley areas, who successfully pressed for a ban on public nudity, the Chronicle reported.

San Francisco Police Chief William Scott said officers arriving at the home Friday morning found Paul Pelosi and DePape struggling over a hammer. DePape then pulled the hammer away and attacked Pelosi with it before officers tackled him and took him into custody, Scott said.

Both Paul Pelosi and DePape were taken to a hospital to be treated for injuries. Drew Hammill, a spokesman for Nancy Pelosi, said Paul Pelosi was expected to make a full recovery.

Scott said DePape will be booked into jail on suspicion of attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse, burglary and more alleged offenses.

The case is being jointly investigated by San Francisco police, the FBI, U.S. Capitol Police and federal and local prosecutors, Scott said.Scott said DePape will be booked into jail on attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse and other felony charges.

Scott later confirmed that DePape remained in the hospital. While he could not say anything about his medical condition, he assured reporters he would be booked on felony charges.

Scott also noted that the incident was not a random break-in and assault.

"We also know, based on our investigation at this point, that this was not a random act. This was intentional. And it's wrong. Our elected officials are here to do the business of their cities, of their counties, of their states and this nation," a visibly upset Scott said. "Their families don't sign up for this to be harmed, and it is wrong. And everybody should be disgusted about what happened this morning."

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisc...cy-pelosi-attack-san-francisco-berkeley/

Murica! Good times.

More right-wing domestic terrorism, who knew? But we shouldn't demean all republicans, just ALL MAGA, regardless of what else they call themselves. This is MGT, Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Trump, Desantis, Abbott, and so on. Deplorables.

I've always pointed out the difference. Maybe you should be talking to the guy who claims every Republican and moderate are like Satan?

Since trump came to politics the quantity of violent attacks has increased.

Most of these acts of violence have come from white supremacists who believe trump will save them.

He has promoted violence and it is now being viewed as acceptable behavior.

It has damaged this country immensely. If I were younger and trying to raise a young family I would move to Canada.

Just to escape school shootings and what I see that as become acceptable behavior toward different groups of people.

Less than a decade ago the things Trump has said and done would have been widely rejected and disavowed by the Republican party and by Republicans in general. Now they elect it as president. It's a sad state for a once great party. No, I didn't always agree with all of their policies but their intentions were sincere as it pertains to the best interests for the nation. Now it's nothing but a crap show.

The two party system was ideological. Based mostly upon economic ideas on how best to serve the country.

It has become way deeper. Race, religion, nationalist, political hatred.

Jan 6th, the big lie, have proven that violence for political ends has no morals.

Patriotism has been replaced by trumpism. It is replulsive.

trump remains silent on Pelosi attack. Perfect example.

and between now and 2024 it is going to get worse, a lot worse

I've always wondered what that full quote was.....

Well, I offered it as more of a sarcastic joke in this thread, but it seemed to be pretty straightforward to me when I reread on Politifact (Politifact.com). Maybe I'm off.

Justice Department says ‘vigilante ballot security efforts’ in Arizona are likely illegal

The Justice Department on Monday waded into a closely watched election lawsuit in Arizona where several civic groups have accused right-wing activists of intimidating voters at ballot drop boxes.

The allegations “raise serious concerns of voter intimidation,” the Justice Department wrote, adding that “vigilante ballot security efforts” and “private campaigns to video record voters” likely violate the federal Voting Rights Act.

“Citizen-led election monitoring activities are more likely to put voters in reasonable fear of harassment, intimidation, coercion, or interference with their voting rights,” DOJ added.

The department did not take a formal position on what the judge should do.

The lawsuit pits the League of Women Voters against several right-wing groups that have promoted false claims about voter fraud and the 2020 election. The group accused the groups of sending vigilante poll watchers, including some with guns and wearing tactical gear, to videotape and intimidate voters at drop boxes.

In a related case brought by separate groups, a federal judge declined to issue a court order prohibiting the right-wing activists from gathering near drop boxes or photographing voters near drop boxes. District Judge Michael Liburdi, who is overseeing both cases, said there were legitimate concerns about the conduct but there wasn’t enough evidence at this stage to restrict anyone’s First Amendment rights.

The League of Women Voters is still pressing for a court order to specifically ban, among other things, armed vigilantes from congregating near the drop boxes. A hearing is slated for Tuesday.

Representatives from the right-wing groups involved in the case – Yavapai County Preparedness Team, Clean Elections USA and Lions of Liberty – did not comment for CNN’s previous coverage of the lawsuit. An attorney for Clean Elections pushed back against the allegations brought in the earlier case at a hearing last week, and their website says their goal is to ensure that “every legal vote must be counted” and to make sure no “illegal votes are added to the mix.”

The Justice Department filing dovetailed with some of the arguments put forward by the League of Women Voters, specifically claiming there aren’t constitutional protections for election vigilantism.

“Much like a citizen’s refusal to pay taxes does not become protected speech because she is attempting to express disapproval of the IRS, photographing a voter’s license plate does not become protected speech whenever the photographer seeks to express disapproval of drop-box voting,” the Justice Department said.

The Justice Department further bolstered the civic groups’ arguments by saying in its filing Monday that the First Amendment’s right to assembly doesn’t allow people to assemble for the purpose of coercing voters.

Last week, Attorney General Merrick Garland spoke out, saying the Justice Department “will not permit voters to be intimidated” during the midterm elections.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/31/poli...v8KLSBSzU_fyoTTF9jYOSyEz6RwCHF6LgfacgYsg

Texas County Asks for U.S. Election Monitors as State Plans to Send Inspectors

Judge Lina Hidalgo, a Democrat who is the top official in the Harris county, which includes Houston, called the Texas government’s timing “suspicious” over its oversight plan.

Officials from Harris County in Texas on Thursday requested federal election monitors from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division after the State of Texas confirmed this week that it would send a contingent of election inspectors there during the midterms in November. The state’s move added a layer of scrutiny tied to an active examination of vote counts from 2020 that former President Donald J. Trump had sought.

But that step quickly drew criticism from some officials in Harris, Texas’ most populous county, which includes Houston. They accused the state of meddling in the county’s election activities as early in-person voting is about to begin on Monday in Texas.

Christian D. Menefee, the county’s attorney, said in a statement on Thursday that the state’s postelection review was politically driven and initiated by Mr. Trump. Still, he said, the county would cooperate with the inspectors.

“We’re going to grant them the access the law requires, but we know state leaders in Austin cannot be trusted to be an honest broker in our elections, especially an attorney general who filed a lawsuit to overturn the 2020 presidential election,” Mr. Menefee said. “We cannot allow unwarranted disruptions in our election process to intimidate our election workers or erode voters’ trust in the election process.”

The Justice Department did not immediately comment.

The skirmish over the inspectors, who will arrive as votes are being counted, highlighted the recurring tensions between Republicans who hold power at the state level and officials in Harris County, which Democrats control and which Joseph R. Biden Jr. carried by 13 percentage points in 2020.

The opposing forces previously clashed over the county’s expansion of voting access. Republicans in Texas enacted restrictions last year that included an end to balloting methods introduced in 2020 to make voting easier during the pandemic, like drive-through polling places and 24-hour voting. Both were popular in Harris County.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/20/us/politics/election-inspectors-harris-county-texas.html

“Candidate promises Republicans can take permanent control of Wisconsin”

Hinting at his plans to overhaul how elections are run, the Republican running for governor of Wisconsin this week said his party would permanently control the state if he wins.

“Republicans will never lose another election in Wisconsin after I’m elected governor,” construction executive Tim Michels told supporters Monday at a campaign stop.

Michels is seeking to unseat Gov. Tony Evers (D), who over his four years vetoed a string of Republican-backed bills that would have changed voting rules in a battleground state that Donald Trump narrowly won in 2016 and narrowly lost in 2020.

Michels has promised to sign similar legislation and has said he would restructure the state’s bipartisan elections commission. He has never spelled out what specific changes he would make to the commission, which is run by three Democrats and three Republicans.

https://electionlawblog.org/?p=132813

That's not fascist at all. These election deniers will kill democracy in 22 or 24 if not taken out like the stinking ass garbage they are.



MORE ARTICLES:

Evers campaign: ICYMI: Tim Michels admits he will tilt elections in favor of Republicans if elected

MADISON, Wis. — Earlier today, Tim Michels made it clear he will do anything in his power to tilt elections in favor of Republican candidates if he’s elected governor.

Speaking at a campaign stop in Jefferson County, Michels vowed that “Republicans will never lose another election in Wisconsin after I’m elected governor.” Michels has made clear he would be willing to overturn free and fair election results if he doesn’t get the outcome he wants — even in future elections.

Tim Michels and his radical agenda are a threat to our democracy. Michels will not protect Wisconsinites’ right to vote — and when asked about illegally decertifying the 2020 election, Michels said that it would be “on the table” if he’s governor. And he has backed Trump’s election conspiracy theories.

Tim Michels wants to eliminate the bipartisan elections commission, and “get partisanship out of the election integrity board.” Yet, his “WEC 2.0” plan represents “a way for Republicans to maintain control of the state’s election apparatus for at least the next decade.”

Tim Michels has said he would sign the bills Gov. Evers has vetoed. Gov. Evers has vetoed over a dozen bills that would have made it harder for people to vote and have their voice heard. These bills would disproportionately impact communities of color, senior citizens, and those living with disabilities.

Tim Michels’ positions on elections are dangerous and could restrict the right to vote in future elections — he is radical and wrong for Wisconsin.

Gov. Evers will continue to do whatever it takes to ensure every eligible voter is able to participate in elections and that Wisconsin elections continue to be accessible, secure, and fair.

https://www.wispolitics.com/2022/ev...tions-in-favor-of-republicans-if-elected





Trump-backed Wisconsin GOP candidate and 2020 election denier claims Republicans will 'never lose another election' in the state if he gets voted into office

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-backed-wisconsin-gop-candidate-011711549.html

Imagine thinking it's ok to say red states will be permanently red after 2022... Think about that.

Don't forget Maxine Waters who encouraged people to go into businesses and confront Republicans. All of the Democrats that supported the riots and bailed criminals out of jail in 2020 like your vice president. The rhetoric goes both ways.

None of that stuff matters bro!

Yeah, that's the same thing as rigging our elections. That's the same as overthrowing the election process. You really need to stop pretending that "confronting" someone is violence or that bailing someone out of jail is violence. BTW- did she bail those who were looting or committing arson out of jail?

You're right, I'm wrong. I did a drive-by because I saw someone bringing contrast to a thread (one of many) that very seldom has any.

I'll openly admit that I haven't read more than 50 words in this thread and don't intend to.

My apologies -- carry on.

Refusing to read things is what keeps people from being informed. You haven't said a single thing about election deniers who plan to undermine our elections. That seems like a non issue for you.

I'm not obligated to read all your trash. I apologized for the drive-by, you can pound salt.

Furthermore, I have commented on election deniers... Don't you remember crying like a four-year-old over anyone that mentioned the queen of election deniers??

Pffftt...

Yeah you keep acting like that's the same thing. Those being elected have the power to do something to interfere in elections and many have already tried. Hillary has no power to do anything but talk about it and you try to make a comparison there as if that's the same thing. BTW- Hillary conceded when she lost. Let me know when trump does the same. And it's not "my trash". It's actually what's going on with elected officials that are election deniers and what that can do, even what they're saying they will do in regards to interfering with our elections. But I know that is something you will never call out because you know, Hillary said something.

Speaking of pounding salt.

Federal judge curbs Arizona group's ballot box actions

A federal judge in Arizona issued a temporary restraining order against activists who have been gathering around outdoor drop boxes for mail-in ballots and monitoring voters in the state.

Why it matters: The activists claim they're trying to prevent purported voter fraud, but there have been complaints of voter intimidation by these self-appointed poll watchers since early voting for the midterm elections officially began on Oct. 12.

Elections officials in Maricopa County reported "two armed individuals dressed in tactical gear were onsite at a ballot drop box" in the Phoenix suburb of Mesa last month — prompting sheriff's deputies to provide security at the two locations, AP notes.

The big picture: U.S. District Court Judge Michael Liburdi last week declined an injunction in one of the two cases he's overseeing in the matter on grounds that the monitoring groups had First Amendment protections.

However, the Trump-appointed judge said in his order Tuesday evening he had since "heard evidence that we did not hear last week ... of individuals being harassed and intimidated."
The Department of Justice weighed in on the lawsuits in a filing on Monday, noting that the First Amendment "does not protect individuals' right to assemble to engage in voter intimidation or coercion, nor does it transform an unlawful activity for one individual— voter intimidation."

Of note: Liburdi said he found the evidence to be "much stronger" in the latest case — filed by the League of Women Voters of Arizona against Clean Elections USA, which has promoted allegations from a discredited movie that made baseless claims of "ballot harvesting" in Arizona and other swing states in 2020.

Details: The order prevents Clean Elections USA "and other persons in active concert or participation with" the group from filming, photographing or following anyone within 75 feet of a ballot drop box or the entrance to a building that has one.

The monitoring groups are prevented from openly carrying firearms, posting information about voters online or "making false statements" about election laws under the order.
Activists are also prohibited from yelling or speaking with anyone returning ballots to drop boxes unless that person has done so first.

The bottom line: "It is imperative we balance the defendants' right to engage in First Amendment-protected activity with the plaintiffs' right to act without intimidation or harassment," Liburdi said.

https://www.axios.com/2022/11/02/ju...b86SS_r8deaJ4dEOC_RKuUXfYPi-JVonKgb9dDCU

These Republicans Have a Plan: Rig Things So They “Never Lose Another Election”

Putting election deniers in charge of statehouses will not end well for democracy.

It is no secret that much of the Republican advantage in the 2022 midterm election cycle is based on gaming the system to favor the Grand Old Party.

From gerrymandering to voter suppression laws to intimidation schemes, the GOP has pulled out all the stops to make it easier for the party’s candidates to win than would be the case in a free and fair election.

But even after all the electoral self-dealing, races across the country remain close. So close that the fight for statehouses is very much up for grabs as November 8 approaches.

What happens if the Republican Party wins big this election cycle? Democracy advocates warn that Republican governors and their legislative allies would rig election processes to favor the GOP.

Should voters take that dire prediction seriously? Absolutely.

Who says? Republicans. Take Tim Michels, the party’s nominee for governor of Wisconsin. Polls show that Michels, a multimillionaire who has financed his campaign with family money, is running even with Governor Tony Evers, the mild-mannered Democrat who saw the state through the worst of the coronavirus pandemic and has ushered in an era of high employment, improved services, increased funding for education, and balanced budgets.

Michels is running a wildly dishonest campaign that has earned “pants-on-fire” ratings from fact-checkers. But it looks like he’s decided to tell the truth about his intent to end nonpartisan election oversight in the state. During a campaign stop in Jefferson County, a swing region between Madison and Milwaukee, Michels declared, “Republicans will never lose another election in Wisconsin after I’m elected governor.”

That’s a bold statement, considering the fact that Wisconsin voters have elected Democrats in eight of the last nine presidential elections. Democrats also hold every statewide constitutional office—governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, and state treasurer—as well as one US Senate seat, three US House seats, and 50 seats in the state legislature.

But Michels has a plan. He wants to replace the Wisconsin Elections Commission—which is currently organized with an eye toward guaranteeing nonpartisan management of voter registration, voting, election counts, and recounts—with what by every indication would be a partisan oversight board. Under the scheme Michels is proposing, a new commission would be made up of appointed representatives from the state’s eight congressional districts.

Because of gerrymandering, Republicans already dominate five of the eight districts, and could win a sixth district in November.

Michels, who told a radio interviewer that the 2020 presidential election was “maybe” stolen, has according to the Associated Press “been unclear about whether he would accept 2024 results.” The question of certification of election results has been a big deal in contests across the country this year, as Bloomberg noted in an August article headlined, “Five US States Will Decide If the 2024 Election Can Be Stolen.” The battleground states referenced in the article feature front-running candidates who falsely claim that “Donald Trump was the true winner” of the 2020 election (Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake), that Trump won a state that he actually lost by 155,000 votes (Michigan gubernatorial candidate Tudor Dixon), that 2020 election results were “compromised” (Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano), that the last election was “rigged” (Nevada Senate candidate Adam Laxalt), and that “illegal ballots” were cast (Michels in Wisconsin).

“Trump and his loyalists are supporting people who deny the results of the 2020 election for governor in five key states this fall, more than enough to tilt a close 2024 presidential race away from the duly elected winner,” noted the Bloomberg assessment. “Tight races this November in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada and Wisconsin, and a possible Republican win in Pennsylvania, will determine who is in charge of making election decisions in states where the White House is won or lost.”

An understanding of the 2024 stakes was one of the reasons so many Wisconsinites were alarmed by the “Republicans will never lose” comment from Michels.

If the balance of power on the election commission were tipped to the GOP, and additional voter suppression schemes were launched by a new governor and his allies in the legislature, Michels’s claim would seem a good deal more plausible.

Unsurprisingly, Donald Trump has endorsed Michels, who has echoed the former president’s Big Lie about the 2020 presidential race. Famously, it was Trump who announced during the 2020 campaign that if fair and responsible election reforms were implemented—same-day registration, more early voting, and easier models for voting by mail—“you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”

No wonder Governor Evers labels Michels “a danger to our democracy.” And no wonder Wisconsin state Representatives Mark Spreitzer, Lisa Subeck, and Jodi Emerson—Democrats who serve on the state Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections—say, “It is clear that Tim Michels will use all of the powers of the Governor’s office to rig elections for Republicans.”

With Trump-aligned election deniers topping GOP tickets in states across the country—19 gubernatorial nominees like Michels, 10 in races for attorney general, and 12 for secretary of state—the threat to democracy is not limited to one state. What distinguishes Wisconsin is only that the Republican candidate for governor is now saying the quiet part out loud.

https://www.thenation.com/article/p...38ulzBbohHLc55_mwTt3fDNj7EInsYVv_YNCs6bw

Jesus said you must be born again.

I think you need to be addressing the crowd that claims they are.

Avalanche of early lawsuits could pave way for disputes over Tuesday’s election results

Scores of pre-election lawsuits have been filed in battleground states ahead of Tuesday’s election, signaling the possibility of even more high-stakes and contentious court fights as voting wraps up and local officials start counting ballots.

Much of the current litigation focuses on the processes surrounding how votes are cast and counted – with some lawsuits seizing on the same debunked conspiracy theories about election fraud that propelled the court efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

In all, 120 cases surrounding voting had been filed as of November 3 – more than half of which have sought to restrict access to the ballot– according to the Democracy Docket, a liberal-leaning voting rights and media platform that tracks election litigation. By comparison, 68 election lawsuits had been filed before Election Day in 2020, the group said.

“What we saw in 2020 was this effort to undermine the elections, but, for the most part, it happened after the elections,” said Sylvia Albert, director of voting and elections at the organization Common Cause, which advocates on democracy issues. “This time what we are seeing is the prep beforehand.”

Some of the cases have been brought by the same fringe legal groups that sought to bolster former President Donald Trump’s bid to overturn his 2020 electoral loss.

But a significant portion of the pre-election litigation – about 1 in 5 of the cases that seek new restrictions – have been brought by state GOP committees or the Republican National Committee, according to Democracy Docket. The RNC has sought to build out its operations around monitoring elections after being sidelined from that work with a court consent decree that expired in 2018.

RNC officials say they are trying to ensure that their party has robust representation in how Tuesday’s elections are run and the votes counted.

The court fights over the midterms may play a pivotal role in determining the winners in this week’s elections and even, perhaps, the balance of power in Washington. They also could set the ground rules for the 2024 presidential election, as the parties and outside groups test their strategies for when Trump – whose lies about a stolen 2020 election have shaped the current legal environment – could be on the ballot again.

Fights over whether certain groups of ballots should count

A major focus of the pre-election litigation has been whether entire classes of ballots should be tossed, with many of the lawsuits alleging that ballots missing some information should be deemed invalid.

The most prominent case is a GOP-backed lawsuit in Pennsylvania, where Republicans targeted absentee ballots with missing or improper dates on the container envelopes. Last week, the state Supreme Court ordered those ballots to be kept out of the count, but deadlocked on the underlying legal question about their validity, leaving it unresolved. Over the weekend, local election officials in Pennsylvania began posting to their websites the names of thousands of voters whose mail ballots were now at risk of being rejected because of missing or incorrect dates.

“My concern is that the number of those undated mail ballots could exceed the margins in some of those races, which could create real problems,” said David Becker, a former attorney in the Justice Department’s voting section who now leads the Center for Election Innovation & Research. “It’s better to resolve those disputes before you know the results and the margins. Once the margins are clear, that could create a political axe to grind.”

RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said in a statement after the state Supreme Court ruling that it was a “massive victory for Pennsylvania voters and the rule of law” and a “milestone in Republicans’ ongoing efforts to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat in Pennsylvania and nationwide.”

Elsewhere in the country, disputes over the rules for counting certain ballots have played out in court.

In Wisconsin, a Republican lawsuit secured an order blocking state election guidance that told local officials that they could fill or correct certain information that was missing from absentee ballot certifications.

In a separate case, conservative activists say that they are asking for a court to segregate military ballots from the state’s count, after a Milwaukee election official successfully requested ballots in the names of fictitious military members and sent them to a state senator. The lawsuit is being brought by lawyers who were involved in the push to reverse the 2020 election and whom continue to promote conspiracy theories about Trump’s loss.

In Michigan, the Republican candidate for secretary of state is requesting that a court to throw out a large swath of absentee ballots in Detroit – where the state’s largest Black population lives – on the claim that any absentee ballot not requested or returned in person to the clerk’s office is unlawful.

Not all of the lawsuits have been successful. But even the cases that have failed to produce the orders that the challengers were seeking could be a source of post-election litigation, particularly if the margin of an election is close enough that the group of disputed ballots would make the difference.

Jeff Loperfido, a senior counsel at the civil rights group the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, pointed to a lawsuit where North Carolina Republicans failed to block state election board guidance barring the use of signature matching to verify absentee ballots.

Loperfido sees the potential that their allegations could lead to post-election challenges, brought through the state’s administrative process for challenging ballots, alleging the ballots are invalid because the signatures don’t match.

“Laying the foundation for citizen or organizational mass challenges is definitely something we have been keeping an eye on,” Loperfido said.

The Republicans’ lawyer in the in the case declined to comment.

Scrutiny of election officials and poll workers

This year, the Republican National Committee has engaged in a major drive to recruit Republican poll workers. And national and state GOP parties have gone to court to demand proof they are being hired. The fights have centered on the requirements imposed on poll workers and what records Republicans can obtain about the workers’ identities, while other lawsuits have taken aim at the policies for poll observers.

Through litigation in Clark County, Nevada – home to Las Vegas – Republicans secured information and party affiliation of the workers staffing polling places, but their bid for a court order requiring that the county bring in more GOP workers was rejected.

In Virginia, meanwhile, a judge last week ordered officials in Prince William County to appoint more Republicans to top election spots in individual precincts – following legal action by the state and county GOP.

And in Michigan, Republicans say they’re appealing the dismissal of a case they brought against election officials in Flint, Michigan, alleging that the officials had not hired enough GOP poll workers for the election.

“Flint has over 80% Democrat inspectors, and over 90% Democrat inspectors for the Absentee Vote Counting Boards,” said Michigan GOP spokesperson Gustavo Portela, who called the ratio “unacceptable.” He pointed to a state law requiring that the party breakdowns for those workers to be as close to equal as possible.

In Maricopa County, Arizona, meanwhile, the poll worker litigation is two cases: one demanding more records one about poll workers hired and the county’s efforts to increase the number of Republicans working voting sites; and a second challenging county requirements for poll workers that the GOP alleges is impeding the hiring of Republicans to staff election sites.

Bill Gates, chairman of Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors and a Republican himself, called the GOP legal effort a “political stunt.”

“We have bent over backwards, and we were extremely responsive,” Gates said. “And for some reason, there’s certain people out there – and I hate to admit it but Arizona Republican Party [Chair] Kelli Ward is one of them — who’s more interested in creating concern, distractions and disruptions in this election process.”

CNN has reached out to the Arizona Republican Party, the lawyer representing the party and Ward for comment. More broadly, the RNC has defended the push in court as an effort to ensure that their party has robust representation in how Tuesday’s elections are run and the votes counted.

“We are filing, and mostly winning, these lawsuits because counties in various states are violating the law, plain and simple,” the RNC said in a statement to CNN. “Every decisive victory is a win for transparency at the ballot box.”

Albert, of Common Cause, said that the demands around the country that more Republican workers be hired could be a precursor for attempts after the election to attempt to toss out ballots from election sites in dispute.

She said she’s worried that Republicans “are going to basically say, ‘If an election wasn’t run exactly perfect – if we didn’t have an even split of poll workers – then, all of those ballots don’t count,’ which is absolutely ridiculous and nonsensical. An election has never run perfect in the history of the world.”
Disputes over hand-counting and voting machine software

Western battleground states have become the sites of disputes over the technology that is used for voting, where outlandish theories about fraud in the 2020 election have manifested in pushes to conduct aspects of the midterm elections by hand.

A lawsuit in Oregon – brought by an assortment of activists, GOP candidates for local office and affiliates of a county Republican party who claimed “a very organized criminal syndicate is intent on manipulating” the election – unsuccessfully sought a court order that would have allowed the plaintiffs to access county voting software.

In Nevada and Arizona, disputes have erupted over efforts by Republican-led counties to take on what critics say is the cumbersome task of hand counting the general election ballots. The moves come after some Republican officials in these states – including the GOP nominees for secretary of state – have expressed distrust of electronic vote-tallying machines and have pledged to end their use.

The Arizona Alliance of Retired Americans, Inc. and a Democratic voter recently filed a lawsuit against officials in Cochise County, challenging the county’s plan to hand count ballots as an audit of the electronic tabulators.

Cochise County, in southeastern Arizona, has more than 80,000 registered voters, and the county’s actions come on the eve of the high-stakes election with competitive races for governor, a US Senate seat and the state elections chief on the ballot.

Cochise County Recorder David Stevens, one of the hand count’s proponents, did not respond to a CNN request for comment. During a court hearing Friday, Stevens said he believed the county had the authority to proceed and said the count would involve about 40,000 ballots, according to The Arizona Republic.

In neighboring Nevada – another state where Republicans hope to flip a Senate seat and control of the governors’ office – GOP Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske’s office recently halted hand counting in rural Nye County. The action came after the state Supreme Court sided with the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada’s contention that volunteers reading aloud the votes each candidate received within ear shot of public observers violates state law, barring the early release of election results.

Nye County spokesman Arnold Knightly said officials there still hope to revive the hand counting if the secretary of state signs off a new plan in which volunteers tally the results in silence. Like Cochise, Nye still plans to use electronic tallying machines in this election.

About 33,000 registered voters live in Nye County.

Critics of these parallel counts say they could, if allowed to proceed, set the stage for dueling results – feeding further distrust of the election among some voters and the county officials charged with certifying the general election results in the weeks ahead.

Nevada counties must certify their results by November 18.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/07/politics/election-lawsuits-midterms-challenges/index.html

Conspiracy theories are predictable. Here are some of the ones you’ll see on Election Day

In 2016, a machine apparently blocked a vote for Donald Trump. In 2018, a video supposedly showed votes being switched. In 2020, a video purported to show ballots being burned.

All wound up being false, and none of them showed what they claimed to show – but on those previous Election Days and the days after it, they cumulatively clocked up millions of views, clicks, and shares across social media.

This Election Day – when tens of millions of people vote across a continent and its territories overseas, not everything can go smoothly.

However, the overwhelming majority of Americans will perform their civic duty and vote without a problem. But in the age of social media and a concerted effort by some to undermine faith in American elections, it’s the irregularities that often get the attention.

There are different kinds of falsehoods that go viral on Election Day – this is where the difference between misinformation and disinformation comes into play. Misinformation is false information that the creator or sharer doesn’t necessarily know is false. Disinformation is the deliberate creation and sharing of false information.
Misinformation

An example of misinformation is a 12-second video that was shared widely on Election Day 2016. A man in Pennsylvania tweeted a video he said showed a voting machine not allowing him to vote for then-candidate Trump – it showed him repeatedly pressing a button for Trump, but the selection on the machine still read Clinton.

The video spread like wildfire on Twitter – being held up by some as evidence of a widespread issue of anti-Trump fraud in Pennsylvania. But it wasn’t. (Incidentally, Trump won the state)

CNN spoke to the man who posted the video. He explained the problem he was having with the machine was quickly resolved when he asked an election worker for help.

Election judges in another part of Pennsylvania explained that people who might have accidentally hit the button for one candidate first, would have to press that button again to deselect the candidate before choosing another one.

That’s exactly what appears to have happened to this man. As his tweet blew up and became the talk of the internet, he posted, “Everybody keep tryna tell me I said the machine was rigged & I never said that, it was just weird how it happened.”
Disinformation

Then there’s the more cynical stuff. Not simply a confused voter posting on social media and inadvertently causing more confusion.

On Election Day 2020, a video emerged online purporting to show a person setting fire to a bag full of ballots marked for Trump.

The video was a hoax and had been debunked by fact-checkers on Election Day, but it continued to circulate online and the following day the then-president’s son Eric Trump retweeted a version of the video that had about 1.2 million views.

While Eric Trump probably didn’t know the video was fake, the people who created and staged the video were engaging in the production of disinformation.

What to do?
Take a breath

The old maxim: “A lie can travel around the world and back again while the truth is lacing up its boots” is never more apt than on Election Day.

Videos, tweets, Facebook and WhatsApp posts alleging all kinds of stuff are going to pop up, and in a super-charged political environment we might want to believe them, even share them.

There’s going to be lots of false claims about the vote count process too. Some will say the fact that not all results are reported on election night is evidence of something fishy going on – election officials have repeatedly warned that in some cases the count process can take days, not hours.

Newsrooms will be on-hand to sort fact from fiction, but that can take time. When CNN looked into the Pennsylvania machine that supposedly wouldn’t allow a vote for Trump in 2016, we had to figure out where the video was filmed, try to talk to the election officials who work at that polling location, talk to state election officials, and talk to the person who posted the video themselves. All the while, the video was clocking up thousands of views.

What is different between 2016 and now? There is a far more sophisticated machine in place designed to undermine your trust in American elections. Thus, we might see a lot of disinformation this Election Day.
And remember …

None of this is to say there won’t be some irregularities and attempted fraud. This Election Day, CNN has literally hundreds of people dedicated to investigating voting issues.

When election officials mess up, we will report on it (like we did on Saturday in Georgia). When there are serious reports of fraud, we’ll report on that too (like we did on Thursday in Wisconsin).

The American election process is imperfect. There are tens of thousands of different cities, counties, and townships across the 50 states and multiple territories that play a role in administering elections, most of them do things a little differently. There are different machines to cast and count ballots, there are different local election laws and procedures. There is going to be confusion, there are going to be mistakes.

But there are also thousands of dedicated election officials and volunteers who work tirelessly to ensure our elections are free and fair. Don’t let a few viral videos undermine your trust in them.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/06/poli...RqrVS_7gnOh_ad2_xWUSLRnOeYJDDFxIlpNpJKig

The best way to solve all of this is to have early voting for 1 week and go to paper ballots.

No mail-in's. Absentee would still be allowed. All the efforts to make it easier to vote also open up easier ways to cheat.

So without any evidence of cheating the best thing is to limit voting to what you want?

Why is absentee voting safe and legitimate but mail-in voting isn't?

jc

voted early today. really glad to have the option to do so, and not just ONLY Election Day. Don't vote, don't complain.