The State of Texas filed a complaint in the United States Supreme Court against Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin and Michigan asking to enjoin [those state’s] use of the 2020 election results to appoint presidential electors and authorize those states to conduct a special election to appoint presidential electors or to direct such State’s legislatures to appoint a new set of presidential electors or to appoint no electors at all.
And it’s not just Texas. President Trump is attempting to intervene with his own complaint. Twenty-two other states are supporting the lawsuit as friends of the court. And lots of congressmen and state legislators too.
Basically, Texas and the other sycophants are saying that four other states’ presidential election results should be thrown out.
Really? Seriously? Seems a little drastic.
You probably don’t know this about me but I have been interested in the little details in the Constitution, for a long time; details such as the kinds of cases for which the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction, (meaning that’s where one files the case). I remembered that suits between states are one of those few kinds of cases. U. S. Constitution, Article 3, Section 2, Clause 2. (I didn’t remember the cite. I had to look that up.)
So I got the complaint from the Supreme Court’s website and I read it.
Texas claims that government officials “weakened ballot integrity” through “executive fiat” or “friendly lawsuits” and “flooded states with millions of ballots to be sent through the mail, or placed in drop boxes with little or no chain of custody and, at the same time, weakened the strongest security measures protecting the integrity of the vote . . ..” Complaint at pp. 1-2.
Okay, that’s crazy talk but, just for our purpose here, suppose it is true. What is the legal theory? What law gives the Supreme Court the authority to overturn election results in Pennsylvania?
Texas suggest that it is the U. S. Constitution’s Electors Clause, Article 1, Clause 2. I confess that’s a new one on me. The Electors Clause provides that “[e]ach State shall appoint, in such manner at the legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors . . ..”
So I guess the theory goes that the electors appointed, or soon to be appointed, in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin, were not appointed in the manner directed by the legislature, i.e., by executive fiat, friendly lawsuits and flooding states with millions of weak security ballots.
As we all know, the Federal Courts have been tightening up the notice pleading standard after Twombly. Plus, we’ve got Rule 9(b) that requires that fraud claims be plead with particularity.
So what in particular did the election officials do to appoint electors in violation of the manner directed by their legislatures? This is where the train leaves the Twombly tracks.
Let’s look at the actual allegations of fact about vote stealing:
Pennslyvania
Pennsylvania Supreme Court extended the deadline to accept non-postmarked ballots for three days after the election. ¶48.
Pennsylvania allowed people to cure defective mail in ballots. ¶50.
According to Republican legislators in PA, there were lots of ballot irregularities. ¶55-58.
Georgia
Authorized ballot processing before election day. ¶67
Court ruling made it far more difficult to challenge signatures. ¶70.
Michigan
Michigan secretary of state sent millions of absentee ballot applications to voters. ¶81-84
Michigan secretary of state allowed on-line absentee ballot applications.¶85
Wayne county didn’t stamp ballot return envelopes as verified. ¶93.
One guy, Jesse Jacob, was instructed not to look at signatures on ballot envelopes. ¶94
Lots of ballots were counted without a registration number for precincts in Detroit which meant ballots were counted multiple times. ¶97.
Wisconsin.
Wisconsin used unmanned ballot drop boxes. ¶110.
Wisconsin officials were letting indefinitely confined citizens register to vote without a photo ID. ¶116-126
One guy in Wisconsin said postal workers back dated ballots. ¶127.
That’s what you’ve got? And you want to disenfranchise tens of millions of voters in four states? You want to overturn a presidential election on this? I didn’t read anything about hundreds of thousands of discarded ballots or altered ballots. I didn’t read anything about more ballots than applications, or more fewer ballots than applications. It’s hard to steal votes. It’s really hard to systematically steal hundreds of thousands of votes in four states.
So good luck with that Texas?
But God help us all of the Trump appointees on the Supreme Court go along with it. I fear we’ll be going to the mattresses. We should all be holding our breath.
I would not want to be John Roberts today.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed the case. (website photo)