Senate Report Shows That Trump’s State Based Electoral Slate Strategy Remains The Mostly Likely Path To A Stolen ’24 Election
Systemic Risks Remain – Republicans Acting To Exploit
The Senate Judiciary Committee just released an important Report, see:
The Report is far too narrowly focused on the role of the Justice Department, as opposed to the applicable Constitutional procedures and the role of States. It also fails to expose what Republicans are currently doing to lay the groundwork to overturn the 2024 election results.
As a result, in general, the report over-emphasizes the “palace intrigue” drama, overstates the role and effectiveness of individual integrity and threats of resignation, and underestimates the serious systemic risks that remain and are actually getting worse.
Of course, the media has hyped the “palace intrigue” and threats of resignation at DoJ – echoes of Nixon’s “Saturday Night Massacre”.
In “Key Finding 3″ (begins on page 3), the Report exposes the most serious threat to a stolen election in ’24, but contextualizes and describes it in a way that subordinates it to “Trump’s potential offer to install [Clark] as Acting Attorney General” and thereby downplays and fails to adequately convey the scheme and its actual risk.
Here’s how the Report presents that systemic risk and what derailed it: (the heading of this key finding is similarly mis-focused)
Clark pushed Rosen and Donoghue to publicly announce that DOJ was investigating election fraud and tell key swing state legislatures they should appoint alternate slates of electors following certification of the popular vote. He did so following personal communications with Trump, including at least one meeting that Clark attended in the Oval Office without the knowledge of DOJ leadership.
On December 28, 2020, Clark emailed Rosen and Donoghue a draft letter addressed to the Georgia Governor, General Assembly Speaker, and Senate President Pro Tempore. The letter was titled “Georgia Proof of Concept” and Clark suggested replicating it in “each relevant state.” The letter would have informed state officials that DOJ had “taken notice” of election irregularities in their state and recommended calling a special legislative session to evaluate these irregularities, determine who “won the most legal votes,” and consider appointing a new slate of Electors. Clark’s proposal to wield DOJ’s power to override the already-certified popular vote reflected a stunning distortion of DOJ’s authority: DOJ protects ballot access and ballot integrity, but has no role in determining which candidate won a particular election.
Documents and testimony confirm that Donoghue and Rosen rejected Clark’s recommendation but that Clark—potentially with the assistance of lower-level allies within DOJ—continued to press his “Proof of Concept” for the next several days. Clark eventually informed Rosen and Donoghue that Trump had offered to install him in Rosen’s place, and told Rosen he would turn down Trump’s offer if Rosen would agree to sign the “Proof of Concept” letter. Clark’s efforts culminated in an Oval Office meeting where Rosen, Donoghue, and Steven Engel, the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, informed Trump that DOJ’s senior leaders would resign if Trump carried out his plans.
The Report tends to undermine the credibility and feasibility of this State strategy by essentially downplaying and dismissing it as an “audacious proposal”: (@ page 19)
Efforts to involve DOJ in Trump’s election subversion scheme continued on December 28, when Clark approached Rosen and Donoghue with an audacious proposal: DOJ should inform the legislatures of Georgia and several other states that it was investigating voting irregularities, and recommend that each state legislature call a special session to consider appointing an alternate slate of electors.
The “audacious proposal” is described thusly: (@ page 21):
The second “urgent action item” was a [Clark] proposal that DOJ send letters to the elected leadership of Georgia and other contested states, urging them to convene special legislative sessions in order to appoint a different slate of electors than those popularly chosen in the 2020 election. Clark explained his proposal in the email:
“The concept is to send it to the Governor, Speaker, and President Pro Tempore of each relevant state to indicate that in light of time urgency and sworn evidence of election irregularities presented to courts and to legislative committees, the legislatures thereof should each assemble and make a decision about elector appointment in light of their deliberation.“
Finally, the opening paragraph of the Report mentions the role of the Supreme Court (but does not adequately discuss the substance of such a legal attack):
On January 23, 2021, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had urged DoJ to file a lawsuit in the Supreme Court seeking to invalidate President Biden’s victory.
Here’s how that legal attack is summarized (and simply dismissed as a “discredited” legal argument):
The brief that Trump had directed Michael to share with DOJ was styled as a bill of complaint filed under the Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction and against the states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Nevada.[134] The proposed action asked the Court to declare that the six states administered the 2020 presidential election in violation of the Constitution’s Electors Clause and Fourteenth Amendment; declare that the Electoral College votes cast by the electors in the six states were in violation of the Electors Clause and Fourteenth Amendment; enjoin the states from using the 2020 election results to appoint electors; and authorize the states to conduct a special election to appoint new electors. In short, Trump asked DOJ to petition the Supreme Court to overturn the election results.
The Report – and apparently DoJ lawyers – dismissal of that legal brief relied on the fact that it was based on bogus factual claims, but they never really challenged the legal analysis. So, it could remain viable for deployment in ’24 under more competent and credible actors.
The Senate Report vindicates my concerns and predictions.
Back one November 3, 2020 (Election Day), I focused on exactly this State elector slate fraud scheme – and possible Supreme Court intervention:
I outlined two coup scenarios:
So, all that paves the way to 2 alternative coup scenarios:
1) The 12th amendment route: Swing States with Republican legislatures (e.g. Pennsylvania, et al) claim fraud, reject the vote counts for Biden, and select Trump electors. This results in neither candidate getting the necessary 270 electoral college votes, which throws the election to the House, where Republicans have 26 State delegations. TRUMP wins, and its all legal. (The Atlantic story outlined this scenario, while Greg Pallast has been warning about it for months). OR
2) Trump (using AG Barr, Republican Party lawyers, & loyal State Attorneys General & State officials) challenges state vote counts. The challenges wind up in the Supreme Court. Justice Kavanaugh has already laid the groundwork for relying on State LEGISLATURES over all other state powers (Courts, Governors). Chief Justice Roberts will defend the integrity and legitimacy of the Court, with Justice Barrett casting the deciding vote in a 5-4 decision. Trump wins, and it’s all legal.
The Senate Report also documented my prior concern about the corrupt role of AG Barr: (at page 11):
… two days after then-candidate Joe Biden was declared the Electoral College winner, Barr issued a memorandum authorizing and encouraging overt, pre-certification “election irregularity inquiries.”33 Barr’s November 9, 2020 memorandum directly contradicted DOJ’s longstanding policy against overtly investigating election fraud allegations before the election results are certified.
I now have little confidence that the Democrats and the media are adequately focused and engaged on this key systemic risk and are taking the necessary steps to prevent it from happening in a stolen ’24 election.
All the evidence I see points to how the Republicans are aggressively laying the groundwork for exactly this scheme to prevail in ’24.
Republicans are doing this in the media, in right wing activism, in all sorts of electoral fraud (from gerrymandering to voter suppression) and at the State level.
And that’s a huge problem.