Elector Defector Detector Director, Con't

Apparently there's just no appetite for GOP state legislatures in four of the five late-called states to simply declare Trump the winner through new elector slates, and it's not as if they could anyway. (Georgia apparently is going to go through that hand recount anyway, facts be damned.)

Republican leaders in four critical states won by President-elect Joe Biden say they won’t participate in a legally dubious scheme to flip their state’s electors to vote for President Donald Trump. Their comments effectively shut down a half-baked plot some Republicans floated as a last chance to keep Trump in the White House.

State GOP lawmakers in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have all said they would not intervene in the selection of electors, who ultimately cast the votes that secure a candidate’s victory. Such a move would violate state law and a vote of the people, several noted.

“I do not see, short of finding some type of fraud — which I haven’t heard of anything — I don’t see us in any serious way addressing a change in electors,” said Rusty Bowers, Arizona’s Republican House speaker, who says he’s been inundated with emails pleading for the legislature to intervene. “They are mandated by statute to choose according to the vote of the people.”

The idea loosely involves GOP-controlled legislatures dismissing Biden’s popular vote wins in their states and opting to select Trump electors. While the endgame was unclear, it appeared to hinge on the expectation that a conservative-leaning Supreme Court would settle any dispute over the move.

Still, it has been promoted by Trump allies, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and is an example of misleading information and false claims fueling skepticism among Trump supporters about the integrity of the vote.

The theory is rooted in the fact that the U.S. Constitution grants state legislatures the power to decide how electors are chosen. Each state already has passed laws that delegate this power to voters and appoint electors for whichever candidate wins the state on Election Day. The only opportunity for a state legislature to then get involved with electors is a provision in federal law allowing it if the actual election “fails.”

If the result of the election was unclear in mid-December, at the deadline for naming electors, Republican-controlled legislatures in those states could declare that Trump won and appoint electors supporting him. Or so the theory goes.

The problem, legal experts note, is that the result of the election is not in any way unclear. Biden won all the states at issue. It’s hard to argue the election “failed” when Trump’s own Department of Homeland Security reported it was not tampered with and was “the most secure in American history.” There has been no finding of widespread fraud or problems in the vote count, which shows Biden leading Trump by more than 5 million votes nationally.

AP makes it very clear here that the magical bullshit that is Chief Justice William Rehnquist's opinion in Bush v. Gore that state legislatures, not the voters, are final arbiters of the Electoral College slates of electors, is complete hogwash, because it is. It deserves to be mocked as Federalist Society fish wrapping.

And again, Trump would need more than just Georgia to win, he'd need Arizona and Wisconsin as well at a minimum. It's not happening because Biden won those states. Even setting aside Georgia's hand recount, Biden has 290 electoral votes, a clear victory.

This isn't up for debate.

Does that mean we're safe from Supreme Court making arguably the worst decision since Dred Scott? Not 100%. But that would be the Supreme Court destroying the country, not Biden losing the election. There's a difference. Biden won the election, that's not in doubt.

Now we'll find out if that means he will be president.