Voter suppresion/"stealing the election" megathread

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/joshtpm/status/1296661012163239937

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Mr. Trump and his Republicansfascists have a number of potential avenues available. I expect all of them to come into play.

First, you're going to have efforts to drive down Biden's vote count. selective poll closings (or re-locations) in red states where the GOP controls the government like Georgia, Texas. Efforts to stop likely Biden voters from voting by mail, or delaying those votes to make them ineligible. Lots of false information about voting launched at the public by both the GOP, their domestic appendages and their Russian allies. Voter intimidation efforts both by propaganda and actual Republicanfascist thugs at polling places. Trump may try declaring some sort of national emergency, but it's unlikely any governments not dominated by the GOP already will let him affect the election and he's winning all those states anyway.

Second, you're going to have efforts to manipulate the totals, and simultaneously disrupt the legitimacy of the election in various states. Expect cyberattacks in blue states that have electronic voting (espeically if it lacks a readily auditable paper trail) that may do everything from alter voter rolls to actually manipulate totals. Legal and public complaints and challenges anyplace Dictator Donald doesn't win, starting on election night. Complaints from the White House and the GOP's many mouthpieces that the election is "rigged" and "stolen" starting well before election night. Fake polls showing a Trump win that will be used as "evidence" of Democratic cheating. Outright fake ballots, stolen ballots, or destroyed ballots in areas where the GOP both has the ability and can make a difference. Accusations that Chy-na is stealing the election for Biden. Stirring up civil unrest (from either the left or the right) in order to disrupt voting counting also seems possible, especially where it's taking place in the days (and even weeks) after Election Day.


Third, efforts to steal (or deny Biden) electoral votes after the votes are in. Red states with Republican-dominated governments will likely do whatever is needed to get Donald their EVs - I think Florida and Georga in particular are unwinnable for Biden for this reason. (Enough swing states are not red-dominated, or Biden would have no chance at all.) Expect post-election procedural shenanigans in any blue state where there's a significant Republican presence, or in any red state Biden accidentally manages to win. Denying Biden EVs or even casting them into doubt is nearly as good as delivering them to Trump for the GOP. An endless stream of lawsuits against any vote Biden is winning, or might win. For both AZ and NE-02, governors could send an alternate slate of electors to Congress, which would be counted as valid as long as the Senate supports them (due to how competing slates  where the House and Senate don't agree are resolved). Attempts to disrupt the meeting of the Electoral College in Biden states, or to interfere with the offical records of the vote. (That last seems like it would be very difficult, but the regime of Dictator Don has a great deal of power to abuse to has show few qualms about doing so). When Congress counts the votes in joint session, I expect the Republicans fascists to object to every single EV for Biden, even if it won't accomplish anything. This will all be accompanied by a relentless drumbeat of propaganda on the illegitimacy of any result that doesn't leave Dictator Don in charge.

Assuming they cannot outright deliver a majority using the above tactics, the GOP will likely be content to drive the election into the House, where their control of 26 state delegations can save their hold on power. If even that fails, or becomes obvious that Biden will be the victor, expect Donald Trump to "joke" about various coup scenarios and see if he gets any positive feedback. A Mussolini-style "March on Washington" would doubtless fit his dreams of dictatorship, but the Trump fascists' baseline incompetence likely makes any outright coup fail, and probably prevents one from getting off the ground in the first place. (Although Trump and his criminal syndicate will doubtless taxi one or more down the runway).

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Mr. Trump and his Republicansfascists have a number of potential avenues available. I expect all of them to come into play.

...

Maybe I am being naive, but I can't see it coming to this.  If you are going to potentially go this far, why not just halt the election now?  

Let's say Trump gets 44% of the popular vote - I wouldn't suspect that ALL of those people would support these approaches.  Even if it is 30% of the voting public in support of Trump At All Costs, you have 70% that would be against it.  The rest of the world (with some exceptions) would likely not recognize the legitimacy of the Presidency.  It's one thing to stand behind a no-mask, open the economy message as an old time GOP governor, but to actively participate in what is essentially a coup - across multiple states?  Despite SCOTUS leaning right, Roberts and others are not all Clarence Thomases.

Will there be intimidation, suppression, "letter of the law" tossing of ballots - Yes.  This goes on all the time (by both parties depending on the time in US history).  Will it be so widespread and coordinated across all levels of government with a broad-based inter-state conspiracy - I really, really doubt it.

A low-mid 330's level EC win by Biden with an ~8% popular vote margin (my CURRENT take) gets a bunch of Twitter bellyaching by Trump (unfounded theories, etc.), no actual concession (there doesn't need to be), and a hamfisted transition period with Trump not attending the inaugural.  Then years of Trump tweets attacking Biden/Harris and guest spots on FoxNews.  

Like I said, I could be very wrong - and I hope I am right - but I can't see the situation as you describe playing out.

For whatever it is worth, I very much hope that I am very wrong and you are the accurate prognosticator.

The reason to not just declare an emergency and halt the election now is basically the parable about the frog in boiling water. It is easier to kill our Republic with a thousand cuts than a single coup de main. It doesn't need to be any sort of organized conspriracy. All it takes is individual Republicans in key  places choosing Donald Trump over rule of law and each doing what they can to sabotage the election in Donald Trump's favor. I don't find that difficult to imagine.

Donald Trump and his fellow American fascists have already taken  - with little effective oppositon - a series of actions that were utterly unthinkable a mere four years ago.

Blackmailing Ukraine to smear Biden.

Letting a pandemic ravage America because it was mostly in states that voted Democratic.

Openly sabotaging the Postal Service.

Flagranty celebrating an epic violation of the Hatch Act.

And on and on and on.

Perhaps all Trump supporters wouldn't support what I describe if it were all laid out in front of them. (Although I'm not nearly so confident as you.) But it's not going to be. I doubt Trump will declare himself dictator in the weeks after November, no matter what the outcome. (I'm not quite so confident about the weeks before the election...) But, like our democracy, a Biden victory will be dealt the death of a thousand cuts. And most voters will only see a handful of those, accompanied by an incessant bombardment of Trump saying variations of "It's a fraud, I really won".

As with most of his charades, the goal is to leave viewers overwhelmed, numbed and confused as to what's really happening when Donald Trump formally claims the victory he's been insisting is his for two months. The courts will be ignored when possible, dismissed when they can't be ignored. If the Robert's court does somehow manage to rule that Biden becomes President? Trump will claim it "doesn't count" for some trumped-up reason. Maybe one of his babysitters will even managed to get him to repeat Andrew Jackson's quote. (Perhaps during his inaugural address?)


There are two routes I can see to stoping it. One is a Biden victory big enough that it can't be stolen like this, or that fear of the consequences of stealing it leads MoscowMitch and his ilk to abandon Donald and seek protective camouflage as dedidicated public servants. The other is that it's fought out in courts and elsewhere enough to let Biden get and keep an EC win. Then, I think you're right that Trump basically raves and gets ignored until the inaguration.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Trump's Intel Chief Ends Election Security Briefings To Congress

The nation’s top intelligence official has informed Congress that his office will no longer give in-person election security briefings on Capitol Hill, a move that raised concern among lawmakers Saturday about the public’s right to know about foreign interference in the upcoming presidential election.

President Donald Trump said National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe made the decision because the administration “got tired” of intelligence about election security leaking from Congress.

“They leaked the information ... and what’s even worse, they leaked the wrong information and we got tired of it,” Trump told reporters while attending a briefing on Hurricane Laura in Orange, Texas. He didn’t offer details to support his statement.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/JF991/status/1300678700606935040

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/JF991/status/1300678700606935040

Uh, so what are the implications of this?

Not much? In many (most?) states, the voter files are publicly accessible, usually for a relatively small fee.

From the (translated) article:

They contain the following lines: name, date of birth, gender, date of registration, address, postal code, e-mail, voter identification number and polling station number, Kommersant was convinced. According to the author, the data is current for March 2020. The InfoWatch Group of Companies "Kommersant" confirmed the authenticity of this database, specifying that it initially "leaked" at the end of 2019

Such leaks can be used for political purposes: to study the preferences of voters, aim them at one or another choice, or even persuade them to protest, says Andrey Arsentiev, head of analytics and special projects at InfoWatch. But more often, he said, the databases serve primarily as valuable information for scammers, since the voter lists contain all the basic information about people. Vladimir Dryukov, director of the Solar JSOC monitoring and response center at Rostelecom, suggests that the hackers themselves, who initially took possession of the databases, have already "obtained all the commercial benefits" before they are made publicly available.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/BillKristol/status/1301473293430652929

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://mobile.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1301645711910400001

They're getting even less subtle. (Amusingly, my ISP flags armyfortrump.com as malicious.)

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/vermontgmg/status/1301552865920466945

This is a recap of stuff that's already been posted in this thread, but nicely sets out how the Trump Administration appears to be demonstrating a pattern of acting against US election security in the run-up to the election.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

More (very incoherent) commentary from Donald Trump on judges, ballots and the election. (The summary makes it sound more coherent than it is.)

https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1308533347245871105

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://thenib.com/author/tom-tomorrow/

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

This seems to be the most appropriate thread for this.
https://twitter.com/FBI/status/1313494766387105794

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/mjs_DC/status/1314318053883211778

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Take with a huge grain of salt, but 4chan claims to have discovered a exploit for the OR and WA mail balloting systems:
https://twitter.com/Perpetualmaniac/status/1317695488565665793

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/Sifill_LDF/status/1317960894018670592


I take it all with a little salt, but it seems plausible.

Short version: They're counting on an early surge in votes that will put Trump ahead in key swing states, at which point Trump will declare victory from the Oval Office in a nationally televised address.

The horrifying but hilarious part: they don't understand how vote counting and early returns work, and their planned-for lead likely won't materialize on their timeframe.

Or to put it another way, Donald Trump is likely planning a coup, but it stands a very high chance of failing to even start because he's an idiot surrounded by idiots. (What to do if he does try this is a whole different and very fraught discussion - one that hopefully Democratic leadership is already well-prepared for.)

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Uniformed Miami cop spotted wearing pro-Trump mask near voting site will be disciplined

A uniformed Miami police officer was photographed sporting a protective mask with a pro-Trump slogan while on duty and voting at Government Center Tuesday morning.

The backlash from his department was swift.

Miami’s police chief, after seeing the photo posted on social media, said Officer Daniel Ubeda would be disciplined. Though exactly how had not been determined. The mayor also called the officer’s actions “inappropriate,” even if he was there to cast a ballot.

“It’s a violation of departmental orders. A police officer is supposed to be impartial,” Miami Mayor Francis Suarez said from City Hall Tuesday afternoon. “Irrespective of who the person was, whatever sign it would have been, it would’ve been problematic.”

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/benjaminokeefe/status/1320042905655009281

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/ALT_uscis/status/1321644910068568064

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

My prediction is that Trump loses but stays in power via the Supreme Court.

I'm actually less worried about this now than I was three months ago.

Prior to Ginsburg's death and McConnell stealing her seat, a Supreme Court ruling that handed a disputed election to Trump with a 5-4 decision would have been seen as legitimate. Much like 2000, Democrats would have been unhappy, but would have ultimately done little of consequence and President Trump's second term would have been seen as legal, even if unwelcome. The impetus would have been towards winning future elections in order to reform the system and take back the Court.

But now? Moscow Mitch and the Republicans have destroyed both their own legitimacy and that of the Supreme Court. If the Court attempts to hand the election to Donald now, it's going to end in a civil war. As is often the case with evil, the Republicans' lust for power has destroyed their ability to actually gain anything. The most they can accomplish is destroying the country along with themselves. (That would be terrible for all Americans, and good only for their Russian owners.)

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/johnkruzel/status/1323033729338658817

(The judge in question is Judge Sullivan, who has also been overseeing the case against Gen. Flynn.)

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/JimDMiller/status/1323360161587777536?s=20

I can't imagine Team Trump would ever make it to the Superbowl. Ability and results matter in football, while BS gets you nowhere. There's a reason Trump was a failed businessman and reality tv star before he became the GOP's cult leader.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Some of "King" Donnie's less cowardly nursemaids should explain to him how American elections actually work (along with the fate of law-breaking would-be monarchs).
https://mobile.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1324108200141082624

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/unionveterans/status/1324123712342425600

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/atuntoo/status/1324175106642464768


Note that no matter what Donnie Dumb**** or his criminal lackeys or stacked courts claim, this would be very clearly illegal:
https://twitter.com/steve_vladeck/status/1324172575229005825

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/GadiNBC/status/1324187296984231936


I'm starting to think that Republicans call themselves that because they want to see American follow the same trajectory as it's Roman predecessor.