Quote:
Originally Posted by edslunch
Surely there still has to be some legal basis to decide an election in the courts. It can’t just be we pick our guy with no justification. I would hope the court has some shred of integrity.
Having said that, I’m not familiar with the Bush v Gore decision, what the rationale was and whether it held any water.
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Bush v. Gore
https://cdn.loc.gov/service/ll/usrep...srep531098.pdf
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-949.ZPC.html
Here's a
good summary of what happened and how it could be just part of the Republican playbook going forward.
"The Bush v. Gore debacle tore apart the country in 2000, a considerably less polarized time. On election night, Florida’s 25 electoral votes were up for grabs, and the race was determined too tight to call that night. For the next five weeks, the country was seized in a war of ballots, election laws and the courts. The final decision by the Supreme Court determined that the recounts must stop, as the process for assessing the contested ballots varied too much from county to county. This disastrous decision was seen as deeply partisan.
If this new legal approach succeeds, not only would it legitimize Trump’s unfounded attacks on vote-by-mail, but it would also inevitably catalyze more Bush v. Gore-inspired litigation. Joan Biskupic, CNN legal analyst, wrote “As Trump continues to challenge mail-in voting, it is not difficult to imagine more Bush v. Gore-inspired litigation and even a possible replay of the milestone case in the guise of Trump v. Biden.” The Trump campaign is claiming that New Jersey and Nevada have made unconstitutional decisions to increase voter turnout in their states. Like in Bush v. Gore, if Trump’s legal argument wins over the courts, hundreds of thousands of votes could be discarded this November."
So, the Republicans stacking of the courts all over the country is another hedge to maintain their power. And what constitutes an argument is up to that court. Obviously there has to be some legal grounds, but the Republicans have been sowing those grounds for sometime so they can make those exact cases.