I wasn't sure where to put this... it goes beyond Trump and didn't seem right in the Trump thread.

GOP State Legislatures: Cowardice Under Fire

Republican lawmakers in the battleground states surrender without a fight.
David Catron

Despite the mendacious claims of the legacy “news” media, there is clear evidence that egregious violence was done to election laws in at least five states during the recent presidential contest. Sworn testimony from dozens of eyewitnesses, well-documented breaches of statutory ballot counting protocol, and damning security camera videos have been presented to legislators in these states. Republican lawmakers in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin have the constitutional power and the moral duty to rectify the resultant fraudulent outcomes. The only obstacle to reestablishing voter sovereignty in these five states is the inaction of the spineless GOP majorities that control their legislatures.

As I and others have previously noted, the Constitution reserves the sole power to select presidential electors and the method by which they are chosen to the state legislatures: “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress.” No other state official or judge can make this call without legislative consent. The pathetic excuses of the lawmakers themselves notwithstanding, they can restore election integrity in their states. Instead, they take positions similar to the “leaders” of the Michigan legislature, who offered this pusillanimous statement:

The Senate and House Oversight Committees are actively engaged in a thorough review of Michigan’s elections process and we have faith in the committee process to provide greater transparency and accountability to our citizens. We have not yet been made aware of any information that would change the outcome of the election in Michigan and as legislative leaders, we will follow the law and follow the normal process regarding Michigan’s electors, just as we have said throughout this election.

They are evidently “not aware” of clear violations of state law by Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who illegally gave private activist organizations access to voter rolls. Among the recipients of Benson’s disregard for this statute was the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), an organization controlled by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. They also failed to notice that Zuckerberg’s organization donated $350 million that paid for “election workers” whose activities were largely carried out in the very counties in which election canvassers at first refused to certify the election results due to serious irregularities. At length the latter acquiesced after being physically threatened, accused of racism, and doxxed.

The Amistad Project has filed a lawsuit with the Michigan Supreme Court asking the judges to direct the state legislature to conduct an investigation into the above-described violations as well as many others. As the director of the Amistad Project phrased it, “The pattern of lawlessness was so pervasive and widespread that it deprived the people of Michigan of a free and fair election, throwing the integrity of the entire process into question.” This lawsuit wouldn’t be necessary, of course, if the GOP legislature showed any inclination to conduct a serious inquiry. Unfortunately, their inertia is all too typical, as the following statement by the Republican Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives makes clear:

Rudy Giuliani, Jenna Ellis, and others representing President Donald Trump came to Arizona with a breathtaking request: that the Arizona Legislature overturn the certified results of last month’s election and deliver the state’s electoral college votes to President Trump…. Giuliani and Ellis made their case during a closed-door meeting at the State Capitol with Republican leaders from both chambers of the Legislature … the Trump team made claims that the election was tainted by fraud but presented only theories, not proof.

This claim will immediately be recognized by anyone who watched Arizona’s November 30 public hearings as an evasion of their constitutional oath and a betrayal of the numerous election workers who gave eyewitness testimony to Arizona legislators. Moreover, the closed-door meeting mentioned above almost certainly included information that was too sensitive to be revealed in public. Yet the GOP leadership of the Arizona legislature merely parrots the Democrat Party line promulgated in the media — that there was no proof. To mollify the angry GOP voters who helped them maintain the undeserved legislative majority, they will conduct a superficial audit of ballot counting and voting machines in Maricopa County.

Meanwhile, as the major lawsuit rendered inevitable by the transparent election skulduggery that occurred in Pennsylvania escapes the Democrat-controlled court system and awaits a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, the Keystone State’s legislators are showing some signs of life. A group of 64 Pennsylvania Republican lawmakers have signed a letter asking their congressional representatives not to certify the commonwealth’s electoral votes for Joe Biden. The seven-page letter lays out several instances in which the state’s Democrat Gov. Tom Wolf and various election officials “set about undermining the many protections” provided by a bipartisan election law passed three years ago, including the following:

The Pennsylvania Election Code requires that all mail-in ballots be received by 8 p.m. on Election Day; Governor Wolf ordered that this statutory deadline be waived.… The Pennsylvania Election Code prohibits counties from inspecting ballots prior to 7 a.m. on Election Day; Pennsylvania’s Secretary of State issued guidance encouraging counties to ignore this prohibition … The Pennsylvania Election Code prohibits the counting of defective absentee or mail-in ballots; the Department of State and some county boards of elections ignored this prohibition.

In the Supreme Court, Justice Samuel Alito is awaiting Pennsylvania’s response to the Trump administration’s petition pursuant to these violations, and Alito moved the deadline for their answer to the December 8 safe harbor date, when all election disputes in the states are to have been resolved. Regardless of what is decided in that case, Pennsylvania’s 20 votes are not enough to flip the election. Moreover, despite Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp’s refusal to call a joint session of the legislature to consider the state’s electoral votes, new testimony seen by legislators increases the possibility that representatives of the Peach State may visit SCOTUS. On Sunday, Attorney Alan Dershowitz raised the issue:

Clearly state legislators have the power before the voters vote to pick the electors. The unanswered constitutional question is do they have the powers, the legislatures, to pick electors after the voters vote if they conclude that the voters’ count has been in some way fraudulent or wrong. That is a constitutional question we don’t know the answer to, and the Supreme Court may get to decide that question if a state legislature decides to determine who the electors should be, and changes the electors from Biden to Trump.

Finally, according Trump attorney Rudolph Giuliani, Wisconsin is among the states whose election losses he hopes to reverse. During a Sunday interview he said, “I think our best chance is in Wisconsin, Georgia, Michigan, and Arizona. I would say Wisconsin in the courts … Georgia, Michigan, and Arizona in the legislature.” But late Friday the Wisconsin Supreme Court rejected another appeal. In the end, it must come down to the legislatures. As Giuliani said to Arizona lawmakers last week, “Your political career is worth losing if you can save the right to vote in America.” It isn’t clear that our state Republican legislatures have the courage to make that choice. Ironically, that means they’re guaranteed goners.

https://spectator.org/gop-stat...tures-2020-election/

I too have been totally dismayed by the complete moral cowardice displayed by Republican legislators in these 5 States. I never thought that the Republicans as a whole would be so spineless, even those who are not committed anti-Trumpers.

An increasing number of Republicans are very angry, livid with the people they have campaigned for, fought for and elected. The State legislatures have a duty and a responsibility. They sit and do nothing while our country descends into crisis.
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It's particularly infuriating to me that the easiest, or at least the clearest most obvious recourse in all of this is the GOP-controlled state legislatures doing their duty by invoking Article II and awarding their electors to President Trump. Failing that, they can or at least should refuse to certify their elections and throw it to the House of Representatives. But with a combination of fear of physical violence against them and their families or worse, collusion with the Chinese-controlled Democrat-Enemy, they are trying to fob off their duty on someone else. They swore the same oath to the Constitution that anyone in uniform does, and it carries with it every bit of the same weight. I don't give a flying fig about what BLM and Antifa might do to them or the Democrat shit-holes that caused this situation. Your duty is clear. Your moral failing and cowardice even clearer.
http://ace.mu.nu/

I saw some amazing parallels the other night, in a show on the African Savannah where the entire plain was full of thousands of cud chewing Rs being terrorized by a gang of 5 hungry cheetahs, intent on feasting another day. What I had here-to-fore considered 'survival of the fittest' now took the mantle of 'another day in the DC plains' as most of the Rs, instead of trampling their oppressors, will continue with their grazing while hungry predators will continue without opposition.

The GOP has become a joke, the one man who has made inroads into minority voters, advanced the economy to levels never seen before, energized the party, and except for a handful of congressmen and senators, has done nothing to help him. Most would not be where they are except riding in on his coat tails. Where are they trying to help the President ? At least the Dems fight for their own people, ours sit on the sideline, and at this point don’t seem to mind losing. A local congressman who I had hopes of really being an up and comer, wrote after the election if Trump loses, he loses, and more defeatists crap. Where were our pols when they had the MAGA March in DC ? Nowhere to be found, it was only Trump Supporters, locally we still have Trump supporters on the streets on the weekend flying his flags and holding his signs. Either we dump the GOP, and start our own, or, primary these useless politicians, and put in a new lineup that wants to win and has a fire in their belly. These status quoe pols will be more than happy to watch the country crash and hand it over to the Chinese.

Swing State GOP Legislatures’ Appointment Of Trump Electoral Slates Is Not Only Right For The Republic, It’s Good Politics, Too

Lew Uhler, Peter Ferrara and Joseph Yocca

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
— Edmund Burke, Irish statesman, 1729-1797

Each day since Nov. 3 reveals more and increasingly disturbing revelations about the outrageous and disgusting attempts in six key swing states to corrupt the presidential vote and fraudulently hand the election to three-time loser Joe Biden.

Not that you would learn much about these election crimes from the mainstream media, who are busy shielding the truth so their candidate of choice can complete the steal. But the current state legislative hearings on the election in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin are uncovering mountains of outrageous examples of vote dumping, fraudulent votes and attempted coverups to make even the most hardened con man blush.

And that doesn’t even begin to factor in the sheer misfirings of groups such as the Never-Trumper Lincoln Project and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, whose candidate slaughters nationwide point to a total repudiation of any kind of vote opposed to President Donald Trump. Some blue wave, indeed.

Republican controlled legislatures in five of these disputed states should seize the moment and protect the will of the people — and the integrity of the highest election in the land — by assuming the power granted to them by the U.S. Constitution and slate their own electors for the actual winner, Donald Trump, before Dec 14. But will they rise to the occasion?

Sorry if this bursts your fairytale, but Republicans aren’t generally elected to do much. Rather, they are chosen chiefly to stand up against those in our ruling class who would do unto us. They are installed as a bulwark against the natural excesses of those in government who intend to swell their power through heightened taxation and expansive regulation.

Moreover, Republicans are elected to ensure the public trust, that the U.S. Constitution is protected and obeyed. What the people who vote for Republicans want is very simple — they want an America as good as it’s promise.

But too often Republicans fall short of meeting those expectations, choosing to genuflect to the illusion of public opinion as projected by cable news, the New York Times and Washington Post, et al. whose masters — the Democrat Party — own the script. Time and again, this has brought utter electoral ruin to the GOP as it continually fails to recognize its one paramount role and the mandate behind it.

This time, however, there is so much more at stake, and a recent election upon which our Republican friends in those critical statehouses can and should use as their lodestar.

In addition to impressive Republican wins in the House of Representatives and the complete absence of any blue wave to hand the Senate to Democrats, the November election reported historic gains in statehouses for the GOP from sea to shining sea. Despite being dramatically outspent by the Eric Holder-Obama leftist initiative to flip state legislatures (which failed to achieve even one single success) Republicans added several state chambers and another governorship to their majorities.

Critically, without exception, these wins by Republicans were due to the strength of their allegiance to the president. No GOP candidate we found ran a campaign centered on distancing from Trump and won. The president’s coattails were long and sturdy.

So why would Republicans in these states not sprint to protect the rightful reelection of the president for whom they not only owe their recent electoral success, but also need to stand with to protect the central institution of our republic: fair and free elections? Does it occur to any of them that you can’t possibly have such coattails without also electing the coat? There is no way a majority of electoral votes were achieved by Basement Biden. But there is much to lose if he is able to get away with the electoral crimes in these key states.

And what do these key state Republicans think would happen to them in the next election cycle if they fail in their sacred duty today? They have the legitimacy and the rightful authority to stop this theft. They may also be the final remaining opportunity to stand faithful to the republic and its highest ideals.

But if Biden is allowed to become president after all these (and likely ever more) revelations of exposed corruption, do any of those key state Republicans not clearly see the GOP primary in their future? Led by opponents endorsed by Trump, all will be running on one simple yet powerful question: Where were you, Mr. GOP State Legislator, when your country needed you most and how could you have failed?

https://issuesinsights.com/202...s-good-politics-too/

quote:

But if Biden is allowed to become president after all these (and likely ever more) revelations of exposed corruption, do any of those key state Republicans not clearly see the GOP primary in their future? Led by opponents endorsed by Trump, all will be running on one simple yet powerful question: Where were you, Mr. GOP State Legislator, when your country needed you most and how could you have failed?

This is where the author is dead wrong. These GOP state legislators know damn well if this election fraud is allowed to stand it's not the voters in some so called next election they have to fear it is the vote counters they have to appease. By going along with the plan now they hope to hold their position by the benevolent grace of the vote counters.

Rather than having to stay in the good voting graces of thousands of constituents they only need to stay in the good graces of the few who hold the levers of power. I shake my head in wonderment when people talk about who is going to suffer the consequences of the "people" by virtue of the next election. Confiscating the power of the vote is not much different than the confiscation of our guns.