[Dion]

It’s already too late for Trump

Again, these are critical documents. As the National Archives’ explainer of the process puts it, “a set of electoral votes consists of one Certificate of Ascertainment and one Certificate of Vote.” The certificate of vote is the documentation of how the electors voted. The certificate of ascertainment is what is signed by the state validating the electors. It’s a package.

But it’s important, too, because in the event of competing slates of electors, the electors who have the stamp of approval from the state’s executive are the ones whose votes will count. We’re getting into the weeds a bit here, but it’s worth summarizing our past, lengthier looks at this.

In short, it is possible that both Biden and Trump electors could meet in their states on Dec. 14 to cast their votes for president. Both sets of electors could transmit those votes to Washington. The House and Senate, when opening the votes on Jan. 6 — the final step in determining the winner — would then have two slates of electors from, say, Wisconsin. The House and Senate would vote on which slate to accept. Given the composition of each body, it’s possible that the House might pick the Biden electors and the Senate the Trump ones.

If things got that far (which isn’t likely), the Electoral Count Act of 1887 has a tiebreaker: “The votes of the electors whose appointment shall have been certified by the executive of the State, under the seal thereof” are the ones that count. In other words, if there’s such a split on Wisconsin, it’s the Biden electors who are supposed to win.

As it stands, the vote has been certified in about half the states. There are a lot more electoral votes for Biden in states that haven’t certified their votes than there are for Trump, but there’s no real question that the largest — California, Illinois, New Jersey and New York — will certify for Biden. Biden has a lead among the states that have already transmitted their certificates of ascertainment to D.C.

But, again, those states include most of the ones that Trump is currently fighting to overturn. He wants to claim he won Arizona — but the certificate of ascertainment already indicates under the governor’s signature and with the state seal that the electors go to Biden. Same with Pennsylvania and Michigan and Georgia. Biden not only won those states, he has the backup documentation he needs in case Trump really starts to take things sideways. And with those states alone, he passes the 270 electoral-vote mark.

It’s over. It’s been over for nearly a month, of course, but now it’s over over. Biden is going to get the electoral votes he needs to be president, and even if there’s a dispute in Washington when those votes are counted, his votes will be counted in the states where Trump has been most fervent about alleging fraud.

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/polit...?ocid=msedgdhp