Being a legal analyst often makes you a killjoy at a party. As millions broke out in celebration over the calling of the election for Joe Biden (including most of my immediate family), I watched with a mix of shared excitement and silent apprehension. It does appear that Biden won this election and his speech last night was the perfect pitch and message for a divided nation. However, there are still legal challenges being filed in a half dozen, new affidavits containing troubling sworn allegations, and relatively close state contests. As someone who has covered presidential elections for networks going back to 2000, those challenges are like live torpedoes in the water – you do not know if one could actually hit below the water line. The issue for legal analysts is that, with the tabulations still occurring, there is little ability to judge allegations of voting irregularities.
We still do not know if there is evidence of systemic fraud or irregularities. Indeed, I am getting the feeling that the Trump campaign does not know. Thus far, the Trump legal team has not submitted hard evidence as opposed to heated allegations.
However, as millions celebrate at what they believe is the finish line, the greatest danger is a Rosie Ruiz election.
Forty years ago, Ruiz became an infamous figure when she was declared the winner of the 84th Boston Marathon in 1980 as the fastest woman. After all, she was seen crossing the finish line before any other woman. The problem was that eight days later, she was found to have crossed the finish line by way of the subway.
The difference between the Boston Marathon and the presidential election is that the latter is designed to avoid a short-cut president-elect. First there is tabulating of ballots, followed by the canvassing of ballots, and then certification of the results. Challenges can continue through the certification stage that should end on December 8th.
There is a certain Rosie Ruiz strategy that is used in elections, particularly in orchestrating a splashy finish and a victorious celebration.
That was the case in 1960 with the election of John F. Kennedy. Many historians believe that Kennedy actually lost the race to Richard Nixon. Instead he was declared the winner with 49.80% of the popular vote. Widespread voting fraud was reported in Illinois and Texas that put Kennedy over the top. Much of those allegations were hashed out after the media declared Kennedy the winner and the campaign set the narrative with celebrations and transition announcements.
After Bush led in Florida by only 1,784, his campaign rushed him out for a victory lap to create the image of the presumptive president elect. Thus, when the Democrats challenged the results and filed a flurry of lawsuits demanding recounts, they were viewed as fighting to reverse the will of the voters in seeking to strike ballots. The recount led to a change of only roughly 900 votes before, 41 days later, the election was effectively ended by the Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore.
What happened next is often overlooked. Multiple studies found that Gore likely won Florida. However, by that time, George Bush was already sworn in as the 43rd President of the United States. The point is clear. The important thing is not whether you were in fact victorious but whether you were victorious when you passed the line of certification.
Nevertheless, Mayor Kenney was demanding a concession “just as Al Gore did.” In reality, Gore did challenge that election and forced a recount that lasted 41 days. It turned out that the recount may not have identified the true vote count.
To the credit of Joe Biden, he showed admirable restraint in claiming victory. The question is whether he will now show even greater leadership in supporting a full and open review of key state races.
For its part, the Trump legal team will have to ramp up its game. Thus far, there has been a lack of focus and discipline . . . and a notable lack of real evidence. On Friday, a challenge in federal court in Las Vegas fizzled out for lack of such evidence in front of a clearly exasperated federal judge.
In fairness to the Trump campaign, it is difficult to produce evidence if you have not been allowed access to balloting or key records. Moreover, there is some skepticism over claims that this election was effectively flawless, even in cities with long and checkered histories with voting irregularities. We have never had an election based on such massive numbers of mail-in balloting and there are obvious concerns over authentication of ballots. The primary concern is not that tabulation workers are filling out ballots or burning ballots. Rather the concern is how mail-in ballots were sent out, authenticated, and processed. There are many accounts of people receiving multiple ballots, groups filling out ballots on behalf of voters, and even some cases of votes filed for deceased individuals.
In truth, the current allegations are more difficult to track than those in 2000. The Florida recount was largely mechanical and obvious. You had a bizarre “Butterfly ballot” and hanging chads on punch voting cards. The 2020 election involves questions of the authentication of ballots and calibration of tabulation equipment. If such standards are set too low, there would be virtually no instances of irregularity because the threshold standards are too low. We simply do not know and would not know until there is greater access to information.
All elections have such problems even without the use of tens of millions of mail-in ballots. The question is whether such irregularities are systemic or merely episodic. The current margins in states like Pennsylvania are not likely to be overcome by aggregating small pockets of challenged ballots.
The Democrats have sought to present recounts or judicial review, the opposite position taken in 2000. The concern is that we still have had no meaningful access to the underlying evidence and, while the odds are not high, it is still possible that challenges could find traction in the courts. If there proves to be a real problem in a key state, the massive celebrations could change in character dramatically.
Again, there is currently no evidence of systemic fraud in the election but there is ample reason to conduct reviews. Biden himself should tell the Democratic Party to support such scrutiny and transparency now that the initial tabulations are being completed. That is not easy for any politician, but it would be the ultimate presidential act by the presumptive president-elect. Biden is no Rosie Ruiz. Biden has shown a respect for the process and this was a hard fought victory. He can cross the line without mass transportive assistance. This is the way to show it.
Follow the money has always been a very good method to get evidence of crimes. If you follow what Democrats assert, you can take it to the bank that they know the evidence proves the opposite.
So what are they asserting? The election had no consequential voting irregularities. Biden is the President-elect. Justice Barrett is illegitimate. If the election was on the up and up, then there would be no concern over investing claims and no need for the media to rush to call it. The claim about Barrett is a blatant lie, but also the tell that all of this will end at the Supreme Court.
Unless you live in a one party system, 85+% turnout in some states might cause one to be slightly suspicious.
No states had 85+% turnout.
Where’s the Democrats screaming Russia, Russia, Russia? Who investigating the deepstate FBI? How, why did they hide Joe Biden son laptop for close to a year?
Shouldn’t there be a serious look into China Biden interference?
Turley suggests the Trump legal team needs to ramp up its game because so far they have shown no evidence.
The reason they have shown no evidence is that there is no evidence. This is a time when a good lawyer would be telling his client he does not have a case, and it will be a waste of money and time to file a lawsuit. Trump cannot get a good lawyer to file frivolous lawsuits so he has to find bad ones to do it.
There is no there there. Turley admits well down in his piece he has seen no evidence of systematic election wrongdoing but somehow he thinks there is some cloud that needs to be lifted here.
And if we got thought this process and nothing is found, will then The Trump cultists agree that he lost fair and square? Or will they start railing about how this or that court is unfair, the Republican Supreme Court are all really secret Democrats. I mean, we have seen Trump and his cult unable to accept reality for four years now. Some of them believe Trump is fighting a Democratic pedophile ring. These are not people who are going to be convinced by facts.
“The reason they have shown no evidence is that there is no evidence.”
And you know that how? Divining rod? Ouija board?
Sam, Harrison won SC and if Graham wasn’t afraid of the truth, he’d ask for an investigation. There are similar suspicion about all the republicans who won Senate seats. We must clear their names.
“The reason they have shown no evidence is that there is no evidence.”
Which is why the “Russian Collusion” narrative went nowhere.
Oh, wait…
The Russian collusion is a fact established by the details of the Mueller report and the GOP led Senate Intel Comm Report issued 3 months ago. Want to read it?
Can you handle the truth?
https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/report_volume5.pdf
Turley is presumably unbothered by Trump relentlessly accusing Democrats of massive systematic voter fraud for the past 4 years. Turley is seemingly unperturbed that yesterday Trump proclaimed “I won the election by a lot!” Trump simply echoed his public decree in 2016: “I won the popular vote if you deduct millions of illegal votes.” Turley presumably didn’t notice any ongoing pattern developing when Trump once again levelled massive voter fraud charges after Democrats won control of the House in the 2018 midterms. Trump claimed millions of Democrats voted multiple times wearing disguises.
Turley remained dead silent last month when Trump said he wanted Amy Coney Barrett quickly confirmed to the high court to provide him with a 6-3 Supreme Court advantage to rule on a contested election. In the past few days, Trump reiterated the role he foresees the Supreme Court playing to confirm his massive victory once they throw out 5 million Biden ballots.
We will soon conclusively learn whether a conservtive law professor made the right choice to deliberately discount Trump’s well-documented history of massive voter fraud accusations against Democrats without ever producing any supporting evidence.
Stage 5 senile joe charges out the starting gate in a false start implementing a permanent national lockdown by having as the landmark for return to normalcy an impossible goal, the complete eradication of covid-19.
Then he lays down the premise for the round ups by criminalizing the First Amendment in calling for unity and making unity i.e. absolute submission and surrender to the New Fourth Fourth Reich/Stalinism combo of US governance, a pivotal necessity for a secure United States against….🚨CAUTION, STRATOSPHERIC HYPOCRISY ALERT
Grab your vomit bag🚨….IT’S ENEMIES BOTH FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC!” and promelgating the premise that any dissent is dangerous to national security and must be suppressed by any means necessary from censorship to prison time for the greater good.
How convenient for him that the dangerous dissenters have already readied themselves for the round ups by self identifying when they outed themselves by voting for Trump and supporting him as President. Not to worry joe. your devoted disciples on your staff and karl’s zealous democrats in Congress are already on the case and have been busy little bees on the look out for anything that could put a damper on the $0r0$/gates/united nations depop clubs mission of seizing absolute power and ginning up the justification for mass nation wide genocide. All is well with just a few minor loose ends to be tied up like the abolition of the Constitution and taking care of the last vestiges of those pesky nay saying justice types that are still resisting Utopia with their pathetic crazy talk of Rights, Rule of Law and That bullsh!t Equality Under The Law Fairytale those stupid delusional pieces of recalcitrant state property sh!t believe in, are devoted to and zealously adhere to like some kind of religion….which by the way brings us to emperor joes next Fiat Edict.
Wow, bravo! I haven’t seen trolling this magnificent in ages!
👏👍👏
Thank you.
👏👍👏
Thank you very much,
but I prefer the original term, if you don’t mind.
Resistance Fighter
The same party that spent the last 4 years trying to convince America that the last Presidential election was riddled with interference and corruption is now saying there’s no way the vote count could be rigged. 🤷🏾♂️
There’s a difference between the election and the vote.
The DNC did not spend the last 4 years trying to convince America that the vote count was rigged in the 2016 election.
Russia interfered in the last election in other ways, such as hacking and releasing DNC emails and running troll farms to discourage people from voting for Clinton.
Election interference is not the same thing as election rigging. 🙄
In this case rigging is about ballots and tallies. Interference is about unlawful assistance like Russia running anti Clinton or pro Trump ads on social media
Hear hear Jonathan, and to remove the cloud hanging over their elections let’s similarly have recounts of all elections which Republicans won to the Senate Tuesday. Surely McConnell will agree in the interests of public confidence.
By the way, like the 2016 election Trump won by a hair, there are no questions about the Senate races the Democrats won this year.
(Is that how this works?)
I would ask Mr. Turley what set of circumstances would allow Biden and the networks to proceed as if Biden is President-elect. It can’t be just whether Trump concedes that he lost. It is just not in Trump’s character to concede that he lost anything in us life. It is in his nature to make baseless allegations of cheating by the other side, and to send sycophantic lawyers to file frivolous lawsuits which will ultimately fizzle. But as we survey the landscape of the election results – Biden clearly won the popular vote in a margin that will probably approach 7 million when all the ballots are counted in a couple of weeks. His electoral college wins will be equal to what he won by last time. The margins in the key states which put Biden over the top will exceed those that caused Hillary to concede pretty immediately four years ago. Margins of this magnitude are almost never overturned by a court. There would need to be several states overturned to change the results of the Presidential election.
Remember Trump has made baseless allegations is voter fraud before. He has made baseless allegations that his hired investigators in Hawaii had damning information on Obama’s birth certificate and “you would not believe what they are finding.” He never told us what they found. Anyone who has watched Trump knows he just makes stuff up and he is making up these allegations of voter fraud now. The courts have been dismissing his lawsuits em masse because he can’t back them up with any evidence and they are generally small potatoes things that occur in every election. Trump has lost. Trump is lying. The only reason Trump has not conceded is that he is a sore loser, a character flaw which should be obvious to the casual observer.
In 1988 then senator Biden had to drop out of the democratic presidential primary because the unbiased media held him to account for fully plagiarizing 5 speeches, Robert Kennedy’s among them, and lying about his 3 law degrees. After 47 years in politics at least he has held consistency in character. What is his plan? “Good paying American jobs.” Seems like I heard that 4 years ago from the incumbent in the Whitehouse.
If Biden believes that he won fair and square, he should not object to recounts and he should insist on Trump’s right to go to court to settle claims of serious irregularities.
Turley is right. The process must not only be free and fair, it must appear to be free and fair. Unfortunately, the widespread use of mail-in ballots and the high number of individual complaints give the impression that the process may have been badly flawed, To leave half the country with that impression risks a serious loss of faith in the electoral process, not a good outcome for the country, nor for the Democrats, who surely want to be perceived by all voters as having won the election legitimately.
Has Biden objected to recounts?
Has Biden said that Trump has no right to go to court?
The widespread use of mail-in ballots does not give any impression that the process may have been flawed. Mail-in ballots have been used for many years, and widespread use during a pandemic is very logical.
But Biden has not objected to the Georgia re-count. In Wisconsin Trump is yet to pay the costs of the re count.
But why do we just ignore the fact that Trump had always said the election is rigged and would be determined by the Supreme Court. His strategy was to cry fraud from the very beginning.
In the end it shall be up to Trump becoz once he loses in court he will cry deep state and will never accept any finding contrary to his perceived victory.
My original post was based on the principle that elections should appear to be fair and honest. I was not asserting anything other than that. Whatever Trump may have said is irrelevant. If he cannot prove that the election was flawed, he cannot.
In 2020, 500,000 mail-in votes were rejected before the presidential election, and up to 1.5 percent in elections before 2020. That would suggest that in the presidential election, 1.2 percent should have been rejected at a minimum.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/750000-mail-ballots-rejected-2016-2018-matters/story?id=73645323
But that did not happen in Pennsylvania, where the state Supreme Court ruled that not only could ballots which arrived after November 3 be counted, ballots without postmarks could be as well. That ruling gave the appearance of partisanship and raised questions about the integrity of the process. The SC split 4-4, enabling Pennsylvania to go ahead and count everything that arrived in a mail bag, regardless of when it was posted. That is tantamount to telling voters they can cast their votes after November 3.
Mail-in voting is not the same as absentee voting; there is no request for a ballot; they are simply mailed out. In states like Washington, which have used the system for years, the assumption is that they have checked addresses to assure that ballots are mailed to the correct person. That was not the case this year; they were simply mailed. So, again, the appearance of a flawed, if not corrupt, system is present.
The argument that there have been no cases of massive mail-in fraud is disingenuous because there has never been an election in which tens of millions of ballots were returned and counted.
Anecdotal evidence is abundant that there were irregularities, and the claim that 6,000 votes in one country in Michigan were miscounted due to a software error needs to be follow up, given that the same software was used in 47 counties, and given the mess that software made of the Democratic primary in Iowa this election cycle. Even if these claims prove to be false or misleading, they again present the appearance of a flawed process, and in a country which prides itself on its democratic principles, it is essential that the electoral process not be seen to be flawed. We are not the Ukraine or China, at least not yet.
As for my reference to Biden, he now represents the Democratic Party , so he is the one who symbolically should acknowledge the right of the loser to a recount in close states and he should support careful vetting of accusations of misdoing.
It is a question of appearances and of fair play, things I was raised to value. It is not a partisan issue. I also though Hillary had a right to a recount in Wisconsin four years ago and had there been questions regarding the election, I would have supported the DNC/Clinton.
If we agree on nothing else, we should agree that the electoral process needs to be, and be seen to be, above reproach.
I agree. There should be fear in the evidentiary of truth regardless of partisan politics. It can be done quickly & will allow for the inauguration ceremony to maintain the dignity & honor it is given.
I think the DNC and their allies have already proven they are not interested in such scrutiny, surely the professor jests. I am in awe at some people’s continued projection of ethics onto these individuals, particularly after the past four years. We can only hope that Georgia in January is held to Constitutional standard, but I am not holding my breath. The virus will perhaps miraculously hang on until the runoff so voting restrictions can remain in place before disappearing in a puff of smoke early next year. I’m not upset if winners win legitimately from either side of the aisle, but there was nothing ‘ok’ about this election and going forward it is all tremendously concerning.
We can hope the virus infections drop precipitously in January, but unfortunately pandemics do not follow politics.
The American version does. The way it only hunts its prey in particular situations and only for particular individuals in America is quite miraculous.
I have no idea what you mean. All parts of the country and world are affected and continue to be affected by COVID.
The American version apparently isn’t a threat during riots, protests against anything non-Democrat, Democrat politicians getting their hair done, anywhere woke millennials gather. But hey, if you’re there as a non-Dem to count votes at a supposedly bi-partisan polling place and you move your mask a centimeter, you’re asked to leave because – VIRUS! If you want to go to church, watch out – the virus lurks in the pews. Heaven forbid you want to attend a rally for an opposing political party – MAXIMUM RISK.
The virus itself doesn’t follow politics, but politics can affect our response, and hopefully Biden will respond more effectively than Trump has.
Your ability to elude sarcasm is almost – almost – as sneaky as the virus. Watch for the virus to magically no longer be considered a serious threat early next year, and you’ll believe it because grandad Joe and the WHO told you so.
When you try to tell me what I think, it’s a clear indication that you’re a troll, James.
That was also sarcasm. You are certainly free to think what you wish. I would not be at all surprised to see virus recede long enough to boot the economy, only to magically resurge in 2022 around November. If the Dems were truly evil, and they just might be, they’ll just keep the restrictions going all the way *through* 2022. I still believe they are smart enough to know the economy would never recover, but I also know better than to underestimate the blind depravity that is TDS. I don’t give a toss that Biden was elected. I care about *how it happened*.
Sorry to double dip, but incidentally, I felt the same way about Bush v Gore. And I would never presume to instruct *anyone’s* thinking. We used to call that ‘friendly jibing’, and there is no ill intent. I’m a little concerned you csn’t tell the difference, though.
Another possible scenario: Georgia alone must shut down because Trump super spread the virus at a rally, even though our protests, which were larger, were immune! Amazing!
Just watched JT on Fox. Why does a scholar waste his time giving his opinion in a 5 minute segment? He should go on C-SPAN where there is enough time to provide a serious presentation. The Fox interviewer interrupted him mid-sentence because Turley’s point was too arcane. Like many guests on Fox, their purpose is merely to reinforce the prevailing opinion of the host/program or to be a liberal shill to present the counter-argument. But the liberal is always outnumbered as in the “The Five” program where there are 4 conservatives and 1 liberal- hardly “fair and balanced!” Turley is simply out for the remuneration (I am saddened to say) because there can be no *meaningful* legal discussion in 5 minutes or less. It is very disheartening to watch.
Does CNN have an equivalent to FOX’s The Five, where they have an unapologetic conservative spewing the party line 100% of the time?
I do agree that far too often a good guest speaker doesn’t have enough time, whatever the network. That’s why I have shifted to youtube and watch long form interviews.
CNN has had people like Rick Santorum, who is an unapologetic conservative spewing the party line 100% of the time.
Who are you talking about as an unapologetic liberal spewing the party line 100% of the time on Fox?
Juan Williams.
Yep
“He should go on C-SPAN where there is enough time to provide a serious presentation.”
That’s a good idea. He should also consider Joe Rogan or have his own podcast. Heck, Eric Weinstein talked with Douglas Murray for nearly 5 hours. I still haven’t finished it (getting to listen in short bursts running errands or doing chores goes slowly). Plenty of time to develop ideas and more fully answer questions on both podcasts.
Biden won but Trump and his Republican ganz are dead set on attacking his win with frivolous claims and they are convinced that the way they have packed the Court means that they will be able to over turn the will of the people. I think it’s time to fire up the sanctions for frivolous law suits. The voters have voted in bigger numbers than ever before despite the armed “poll watchers” and the voter suppression and the destruction of the post office.. You know Biden won but you pretend that you are just a neutral commentator on the law. You know the claims are frivolous but, hey, still in it for the grifter. I’ve learned a lot about you over the last year. I have been deeply saddened by what I’ve learned
There are many laws that have been broken by Republicans and the members of of the Trump cult. There were actually instances of armed men ready to attack counting facilities. Steve Bannon was threatening Fauci with beheading. The people have repudiated the policies and ideologies that fed these people. When Ford pardoned Nixon he opened the door to the lawlessness of certain Republican Presidents and Trump has taken advantage of the President “can do no wrong” BS. It’s time to shut that door and lock it. No more unitary executive twaddle. Trump has a lot of legal issues coming his way, I wonder whose side you will be on when that happens.
The people have voted.
“Evidence” is a slippery concept. There is plenty of evidence of improper conduct in the counting process, not only in PA but in other states as well. Direct (witnesses that proper poll watching was interfered with) and circumstantial (hundreds of thousands of ballots arriving in the middle of the night all for Biden). Will that be enough? I doubt it since the Democrats demand “evidence” that is impossible to provide; i.e., that enough illegal ballots were actually counted to provide Biden’s margin. But a courageous Supreme Court could declare that we don’t need “evidence” of the fire; evidence of the smoke is enough to invalidate all late-arriving ballots. Since the spineless Chief Justice will inevitably join the Lock-Step Liberals, the entire matter will be on Justice Barrett and I predict she will not have the guts to do the right thing and will join the Left. She knows that if she sides with Trump on anything she will be marked for life. Too high a price to pay for integrity.
Why do you believe bunk like “hundreds of thousands of ballots arriving in the middle of the night all for Biden”?
If there are witnesses saying that “proper poll watching was interfered with”, let them be questioned under oath. Trump’s lawyer admitted to a judge that there were Republican poll watchers in PA –
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8921209/Trump-tweets-election-observers-banned-polls-lawyers-admitted-let-in.html
Which state are you talking about?
The ballots arriving in the middle of the night was caused by a transportation snafu when the company contracted to deliver the ballots, which were in sealed containers, balked over a contractual issue.
Please provide a link that shows that the all of the ballots delivered during the night were for Biden.
https://newsla.localad.com/2020/11/05/watch-ballot-count-watcher-describes-at-least-130000-ballots-all-for-biden-arriving-in-three-vehicles-in-detroit-in-dead-of-night/
Democrats using stolen intelligence tools to rig vote
Hammer and Scorecard
https://noqreport.com/2020/11/04/hammer-and-scorecard-lt-gen-mcinerney-explains-the-election-hack-by-democrats/
–Saloth Sar
I thought most studies found that Bush did win a majority of the votes in Florida in 2000 under most vote-counting scenarios.
henrywray – you mean Gore tried to steal the election from Bush? Speaking of those vaunted “alternative facts.”
The one largest newspapers is South Florida, if not Florida at the time, the Miami Herald, sponsored a recount after the results were certified.
The recount showed that applying the rules ordered by the Florida Supreme Court, Bush would have increased his margin to 1,665.
There was some calculation that if Gore had been allowed to apply the standard he wanted, only recounting some counties in ways he wanted, he could have won by 393. The problem is that his desired method was struck down by a 7-2 SCOTUS ruling, so Gore’s standard could not have been applied.
There has been no recount by an serious entity that has shown Gore to be the winner.
Thanks Dr. Turley, for staying on top of this.
And if Trump is indeed on his way out, he certainly ought to pardon Snowden and that other guy.
Absolutely. He should have pardoned Snowden months ago – it would have been a great symbolic declaration against the deep state. Let’s hope he still does it.
How S I to know? She was with the Russians too!
How was…