We’re entering the final stages of the 2020 race. It’s not what we expected. It’s not good news for the country. Joe Biden is on the cusp of being the president of the United States. We do have scores of allegations of voter fraud, including the illegal backdating of mail-in ballots. GOP election officials were hamstrung at polling locations. There was a lot of funny business going on during this race. We discussed the ‘hail Mary’ plays we have left here. The invalidation of 50,000 or so ballots totals from close states like Wisconsin, Arizona, and Georgia could flip these three to Trump leading to a 269-269 tie in the Electoral College. That means this race heads to a contingent election in the House of Representatives, where the GOP holds the majority of the state delegations. Yet, there’s another way to make things interesting, which former Clinton aide Graham Allison wrote about in The National Interest—the state legislatures sending a competing slate of electors.
Larry Schweikart had a lengthy thread about the challenges Team Trump faces regarding the lawfare over this race. Yet, he also threw cold water on the notion that a judge will toss ballots and questioned whether Trump's legal crew has the focus to get what needs to be done...done.
1) The challenge is not to show there was fraud. Anyone with a brain knows this.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
2) The challenge is to prove it in such a way in our electoral process that one of two things happen: either a judge removes ballots gained illegally from Biteme's total, or
2) contd . . . a state legislature is so convinced that the overwhelming fraud resulted in an election so deeply flawed it would have had a different outcome beyond a reasonable doubt.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
3) The first is incredibly difficult. Judges do not take votes off the board.
4) Recounts can. But usually not many. In Bush v. Gore the recount process actually ADDED to Bush's total. Other recounts have had similar results.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
Worse, a recount only recounts fraud.
5) So now you're down to hoping to convince a judge to stipulate a strict series of remedies, including a re-canvassing, a hand-recount, and throwing out specific types of ballots (no signatures, for ex).
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
Sorry, I just don't see this happening.
6) What I'm saying is that while there may be a very clear strategy by Trump's team, I'm not seeing how they plan to remove about 300,000 votes from Biteme's total.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
7) The PA case will not do that. It may take 10,000.
8) Even if judges "think" the giant computer fraud case has merit, they are limited in the remedies, and therefore I think (hope I'm wrong) you'd need a dozen judges basically all going the same way.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
9) In short, I think evidence abounds and yet I am skeptical that Trump's team has a way to focus it like a laser into actually getting Biteme's fraudulent votes off the board.
— Larry Schweikart (@LarrySchweikart) November 15, 2020
Hope I'm wrong. Clock is ticking.
Regarding how a judge will rule on this stuff, Schweikart was not hopeful.
“Even if judges ‘think’ the giant computer fraud case has merit, they are limited in the remedies, and therefore I think (hope I'm wrong) you'd need a dozen judges basically all going the same way,” he wrote.
“In short, I think evidence abounds and yet I am skeptical that Trump's team has a way to focus it like a laser into actually getting [Biden’s] fraudulent votes off the board,” he added.
He did also say he hopes he’s wrong, but time is running out.