Three Days Away from a Constitutional Crisis

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

And there is little public indication of what is going on. Who has contacted who, what is being done about it and what the steps are being done to avert it.

The new congress is set to swear in on Friday at Noon, and for the first time in my memory, the entire At-large class won't be able to take their seats.

The At-large are suppose to represent the people of the nation in the Senate and thus without them the "people at-large" are effectively being disenfranchised and deprived of their constitutional rights.

It would be one thing if things were proceeding apace and we had some idea of what is going on and how long the delay might be, but we don't.

The court case has been completely one sided with the Plantiff and a litany of third party briefs as well. However, there has been nothing from the DoFE, the Attorney General or any representative thereof, no guidance from the court on how to resolve this matter in the absence of action on the part of the defendant. No public indication of any involvement or concern from the President that his government is about to stumble into a constitutional crisis, and thus no way to know what has been said or done on his part to try and ensure legal representation for the DoFE.

Sure we made DoFE constitutionally independent to prevent his firing by the President, but that does not preclude ensuring representation or action in a court case pertaining to an election and the communication necessary to carry it out to avert a disaster of this magnitude.

I voted for my damn Senators, I want them to represent me beginning Friday.

The people deserve to know what the hell is going on. Not on discord, not in exclusive chat rooms and PMs, but here on the damn boards.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I have PMed the DoFE to ask if there are any issues with getting legal representation and also added the President as a secondary name getting the PM thereof.
Perhaps there should be a comprehensive list of Atlasia lawyers. Activity on this board is not great, but it might be good to have a running list.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I have PMed the DoFE to ask if there are any issues with getting legal representation and also added the President as a secondary name getting the PM thereof.
Perhaps there should be a comprehensive list of Atlasia lawyers. Activity on this board is not great, but it might be good to have a running list.

When was this PM sent?

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I have PMed the DoFE to ask if there are any issues with getting legal representation and also added the President as a secondary name getting the PM thereof.
Perhaps there should be a comprehensive list of Atlasia lawyers. Activity on this board is not great, but it might be good to have a running list.

When was this PM sent?

04:57:30 PM today, according to my forum clock.
(for comparison, now is 11:21:56 PM)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I have PMed the DoFE to ask if there are any issues with getting legal representation and also added the President as a secondary name getting the PM thereof.
Perhaps there should be a comprehensive list of Atlasia lawyers. Activity on this board is not great, but it might be good to have a running list.

When was this PM sent?

04:57:30 PM today, according to my forum clock.
(for comparison, now is 11:21:56 PM)

Why wasn't action taken last week?

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I have PMed the DoFE to ask if there are any issues with getting legal representation and also added the President as a secondary name getting the PM thereof.
Perhaps there should be a comprehensive list of Atlasia lawyers. Activity on this board is not great, but it might be good to have a running list.

When was this PM sent?

04:57:30 PM today, according to my forum clock.
(for comparison, now is 11:21:56 PM)

Why wasn't action taken last week?

My assumption was that the involved governmental bodies were in the process of looking for legal representation.
I now strongly suspect that simply there isn't a lot (or at least not sufficient enough) of attention being paid to this and your sounding the alarms is abjectly and completely necessary.
I did publicly urge the court to take expeditious action in a comment in the public comment thread. I do not think I realized the pace by which other moving parts in all this were moving, though.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I thought interaction between people was bad in 2013. Never would I have envisioned that it could be so much worse, especially with a glorified and dolled up chat room siphoning off so much activity and turning Atlasia into its two bit whore, and yet actual interaction is far less between positions of authority than it was in the era of the PM and AIM.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I thought interaction between people was bad in 2013. Never would I have envisioned that it could be so much worse, especially with a glorified and dolled up chat room siphoning off so much activity and turning Atlasia into its two bit whore, and yet actual interaction is far less between positions of authority than it was in the era of the PM and AIM.

I've hardly ever had to handle anything as AG. I did see something brewing but I did not expect it would escalate like this. I never expected the whole weight of a government response would rest on me.
For what it's worth, I guess I'll be forced to log onto Discord and send reminders in  DM. I rarely ever use Discord...
Should I create a thread dedicated to people of legal experience submitting themselves up for government counsel?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I thought interaction between people was bad in 2013. Never would I have envisioned that it could be so much worse, especially with a glorified and dolled up chat room siphoning off so much activity and turning Atlasia into its two bit whore, and yet actual interaction is far less between positions of authority than it was in the era of the PM and AIM.

I've hardly ever had to handle anything as AG. I did see something brewing but I did not expect it would escalate like this. I never expected the whole weight of a government response would rest on me.
For what it's worth, I guess I'll be forced to log onto Discord and send reminders in  DM. I rarely ever use Discord...
Should I create a thread dedicated to people of legal experience submitting themselves up for government counsel?

Sure, if you think it will get something moving try it.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

A good compromise would be to seat members of the at-large slate whose seats aren't disputed and who would win regardless of the outcome of the case.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I thought interaction between people was bad in 2013. Never would I have envisioned that it could be so much worse, especially with a glorified and dolled up chat room siphoning off so much activity and turning Atlasia into its two bit whore, and yet actual interaction is far less between positions of authority than it was in the era of the PM and AIM.

I've hardly ever had to handle anything as AG. I did see something brewing but I did not expect it would escalate like this. I never expected the whole weight of a government response would rest on me.
For what it's worth, I guess I'll be forced to log onto Discord and send reminders in  DM. I rarely ever use Discord...
Should I create a thread dedicated to people of legal experience submitting themselves up for government counsel?

Sure, if you think it will get something moving try it.

https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=548129.msg9060385#msg9060385
A thread has been made.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

Good morning... as the SoFE, I have posted in the relevant threads and I think I have made my position clear (I am not contesting one point but I urge to dismiss the others). I have not put forward a formal response because it seems unnecessary, and to be blunt the whole recourse to the Supreme Court seems unnecessary to me. In fact I've seen you have made considerations to a similar effect in the public discussion thread. Sorry for not being as explicit, I tend to be dry in this board.

For the record, I have spoken to the Attorney General multiple times whereas the President is nowhere to be seen.

[Joseph Cao]

There was and is no indication what the court wants to do, despite the nature of the case to begin with being a matter of urgency to handle before the new session. Now there isn't any more dispute between plaintiff and respondent so the ball is in the Court now to make a move on the certification.

to be blunt the whole recourse to the Supreme Court seems unnecessary to me.

There is precedent for going to the Supreme Court over a tabulation error, Sestak v. Peebs was right on a year ago. Peebs resolved it almost exactly the same way as you just did.

Unrelated but I feel like this is the third or fourth time I have brought it up and for some reason everyone has memoryholed it? There was very clear precedent for how to react to this kind of case.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

For the record, I have spoken to the Attorney General multiple times whereas the President is nowhere to be seen.

As Attorney General, I confirm this.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

In fact I've seen you have made considerations to a similar effect in the public discussion thread.

Is there any truth that this was required by statute? I recall this being circulated around Discord that once a certified count was made, only the court could change it.

And yes I have contrasted this with the Rpryor case in April 2017, when a voter was completely missed and that was resolved in a day or two without a court case.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Ok so this is dismissed.

I ask that this action be reversed. The Federal Electoral Act states the following:

Once the federal election authority is content that certification is complete, they shall post an official certification. This certification must clearly indicate its official status, and must be made in the department thread of the federal election authority. An official certification is completely final and may only be altered by order of the Supreme Court of Atlasia. Nothing in this clause shall be construed to prohibit the posting of unofficial preliminary certifications by the federal election authority provided that such certifications are not indicated as official.

Peebs stated that the old certification was the official one; thus once she corrects the certification this Court must order that the corrected one is now the official certification.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I am fairly certain that is why the suit was launched in the first place.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

I am fairly certain that is why the suit was launched in the first place.

Thanks for the clarification, in this case.

[Sestak]

I am fairly certain that is why the suit was launched in the first place.

I did explicitly write the statute that way, and I think I had decent reasons for doing so. That being said I think there are ways to correct these types of mistakes without a full-blown court case (will elaborate shortly).

[Sestak]

The new congress is set to swear in on Friday at Noon, and for the first time in my memory, the entire At-large class won't be able to take their seats.

I think some of you need a little more faith in us.

I was hoping to get this resolved 2-3 days before the swear-in; ended up falling short of that by a half hour. Could've been worse. If we still hadn't found a good resolution by now we would probably have at least put out some sort of emergency order.


I will say, I personally am not too happy with this state of affairs where the Department of Federal Elections has no legal representation before the Court. The Supreme Court set a deadline for briefs here for a reason. If we wanted to be firmer with it, the petitioner would have just won this case on all counts once that deadline was missed with no request for extension; if this is going to be a recurring thing we may indeed have to look at a stricter approach on deadlines.


 At the regional level, representing elections executives has often fallen to the regional Attorney General. Federally it's often been different (I represented Peebs as SoFE a few times but was never Attorney General) but I still feel like it's decently useful for the AG to be the 'default' options. Alternatively, we should actively search for someone (or, more likely, at least two people, to avoid partisan conflict of interest) who is willing to be on standby to defend DoFE in elections cases.

[windjammer]

I must admit that I'm being surprised about how you literally went ballistic against us. We really did everything we could to make sure the ruling would be posted before the senators swearing in

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

I must admit that I'm being surprised about how you literally went ballistic against us. We really did everything we could to make sure the ruling would be posted before the senators swearing in

You've literally taken months to decide a case. People went "ballistic" because they believed a situation could exist where duly-elected members- whose positions weren't even in dispute- wouldn't be seated for the entire session.

[windjammer]

I must admit that I'm being surprised about how you literally went ballistic against us. We really did everything we could to make sure the ruling would be posted before the senators swearing in

You've literally taken months to decide a case. People went "ballistic" because they believed a situation could exist where duly-elected members- whose positions weren't even in dispute- wouldn't be seated for the entire session.

Well sometimes justice takes time !

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I must admit that I'm being surprised about how you literally went ballistic against us. We really did everything we could to make sure the ruling would be posted before the senators swearing in

We are not here to protect your feelings, you are hear to protect our constitutional rights.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

And one more thing. You haven't seen me go ballistic.