How Alarmed Should We Be?

If what is wrong isn't immediately apparent, assuming you've read the entire article, then I can't help you.

 

“If Seifried is honest with them,” he will tell them they won’t see much, added Thomas. “There’s little to no history of election inspectors challenging people” based on qualifications to vote, and if they create chaos, “that’s just going to get them [the poll workers] thrown out.”

 

As has been done for decades by both parties -- ever since Bush v Gore.

 

That's too focused on recent history. It was not unusual in earlier eras.

 

The Supreme Court is about to rule on another scary voting rights case

The dispute in Ritter v. Migliori, an election case currently pending on the Supreme Court’s shadow docket, is beneath the dignity of a nation’s highest court.

It involves a fight over whether 257 ballots cast in a low-level state judicial race should be tossed out because of a very minor paperwork error. It also involves a fairly obvious violation of a federal law providing that voters should not be disenfranchised due to such errors.

And yet, this nothingburger of a case features legal arguments that target much of what remains of federal voting rights laws, after the Supreme Court spent the last decade taking a hatchet to those laws.

David Ritter is a Republican candidate for a judgeship on the Lehigh County Court of Common Pleas in Pennsylvania. Official tallies show him leading Democrat Zachary Cohen by 71 votes. Meanwhile, 257 ballots remain uncounted — enough to potentially flip the race from Ritter to Cohen.
https://www.vox.com/2022/6/3/23151943/supreme-court-voting-rights-ritter-migliori-pennsylvania

Given its past history of gutting voting rights I'm not optimistic.

 

Republican Cheney warns U.S. democracy remains under threat

WASHINGTON, June 5 (Reuters) - Republican U.S. Representative Liz Cheney warned that the nation's democratic system is threatened by ongoing efforts to deny the legitimacy of Donald Trump's 2020 election loss.

"People must pay attention. People must watch, and they must understand how easily our democratic system can unravel if we don't defend it," Cheney said during an interview broadcast on CBS Sunday Morning, days before Congress' official probe of the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol begins public hearings.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/re...us-democracy-remains-under-threat-2022-06-05/

Put simply, the threat comes from members of the POT.

 

Trump Drops a Truth Bomb On The Cheneys At Wyoming Rally: "Die-Hard Globalists And Warmongers"

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One bloody War after Another with these folks: "Liz Cheney hates the voters of the Republican Party, and she has for longer than you would know," Trump said. "Wyoming deserves a congressman who stands up for you and your values, not one who spends all of her time putting you down, going after your president in the most vicious way possible, and loving endless, nonsensical, bloody, horrible wars that never end -- they just never end."

But they love the Defense Lobby Cash: "The Cheneys are die-hard globalists and warmongers who have been plunging us into new conflicts for decades."

"Spilling American blood and spending American treasure all over the world."

"The Cheneys have never met a war they didn't like. That's why Liz Cheney voted no on bringing our troops home from Syria, where they didn't even want to have us. I mean, it is so crazy. We go to countries, they don't even want us there but we do it by habit. We lose people, it costs a very much money, but we lose people which is worse."

"That is why Liz Cheney is at the front of the parade trying to get us to go into wars with Russia or anyone else that wants to bite," he added. "You see it over and over, the stupidity of these people. And when I was there, we were respected, nobody was going to war with us."

That's right. No new wars with Trump. Not a War Monger.

 

How the Proud Boys Gripped the Miami-Dade Republican Party

MIAMI — At the iconic Fontainebleau hotel in Miami Beach, just after Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida rallied donors and activists to their feet during a well-attended April fund-raiser for the Republican Party of Miami-Dade County, a scuffle broke out by the valet parking station. Someone alerted the police. The next day, a woman who had been escorted out of the dinner renewed a request for a restraining order against one of the men involved in the dispute, writing in her court petition that he was part of a “Far Right Wing Extremist Cult.” She was referring to the Proud Boys, the far-right nationalist group that was at the forefront of the riot at the U.S. Capitol last year.

The man was one of at least a half-dozen current and former Proud Boys who have secured seats on the Miami-Dade Republican Executive Committee, seeking to influence local politics from the inside. Their ranks include adherents who face criminal charges for participating in the Capitol attack: Gilbert Fonticoba has been charged with obstructing Congress. Gabriel Garcia, a former Army captain who says he has left the group, has been charged with interfering with law enforcement officers during the civil disorder on Jan. 6, 2021.

The concerted effort by the Proud Boys to join the leadership of the party — and, in some cases, run for local office — has destabilized and dramatically reshaped the Miami-Dade Republican Party that former Gov. Jeb Bush and others built into a powerhouse nearly four decades ago, transforming it from an archetype of the strait-laced establishment to an organization roiled by internal conflict as it wrestles with forces pulling it to the hard right. The conflict comes at a pivotal moment for Republicans nationally, as primary voters weigh whether to wrench the party from its extremist elements — or more fully embrace them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/02/us/miami-republicans-proud-boys.html

Proud Boys Leader, Four Members Charged With Seditious Conspiracy

A federal grand jury on Monday returned a superseding indictment charging Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio with seditious conspiracy over his alleged involvement in the Capitol insurrection.

Four other Proud Boys, including Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, Zachary Rehl, and Dominic Pezzola, were also charged.

The indictment represents the second instance of sedition charges being brought by federal prosecutors in the Jan. 6 investigation, after Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes was charged with the same crime in January 2022.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/proud-boys-leader-four-members-charged-with-seditious-conspiracy

 

And will be 4 years by 2024

 

Well, it's certainly true that yours in not in the sand, but you should try that instead of where it's at; it would be a big improvement for you and maybe in enough years, allow you to actually see some sunshine.

 

All performance aside and despite personalities, it would be a mistake for republicans to run Trump in 2024. They could run anybody else and win over anyone the democrats choose. The only chance the democrats have of winning the 2024 presidential election is to have Trump on the ballot. A toxic candidate is hard to get into office. But my money is on the republicans running Trump anyway.

 

Mine says- we need the kind of vision and actions of Trumps style, but the left has hung so much baggage on him that they would never allow him to be effective. We've already watched them attack great ideas totally on the basis of political hate, they would continue to sabotage his efforts. What's right wouldn't matter, it's where they are at.

So my money is on someone who might bring a similar set of values and drive to the office; I suspect the man out front on that would be Ron DeSantis. Between age and the potential for building a cooperative government, I think that Trump is willing to pass on running again, and use his influence to help others. The republican party will adjust to that.

The mid-terms will make changes, and should have great influence on the direction of the parties. What is desperately needed is a return to realism and real values. Instead of chasing liberal rainbows, Congress needs to pursue and restore fundamental values and deal with fundamental issues- Crime, educational focus and quality, inflation, solid and consistent logic in government. If the republicans in congress after the mid-terms show that objective, the next president will be the one who takes the same path.

 

Esp. in the South, for the obvious reason..

And look, they are trying to bring it back. Why am I not surprised..

 

The Republican party is a lot like a horror movie these days.

 

Republicans Are Plotting To Subvert Elections Right Before Our Eyes

While it is bad enough that Republicans are proactively recruiting and training thousands of volunteers to undermine our elections, they are also staffing up their legal teams en masse as the courts increasingly become the latest battleground for these post-election challenges.

In Michigan, which almost faced an unprecedented failure to certify its election results for president in 2020, the RNC’s election integrity director for the state told a training session in October that “We’re going to have more lawyers than we’ve ever recruited, because let’s be honest, that’s where it’s going to be fought, right?”

Right. In fact, we’ve already seen their efforts play out in courtrooms across the country.

In Nevada, Republicans filed two lawsuits to expand the role of poll watchers to, among other things, allow them to stand within two feet of vote counting and to inspect voters’ individual ballots. While Republicans lost those lawsuits, they have made clear that they are not giving up. Just last week, a Republican state Senate candidate in Nevada filed a new ballot initiative petition that would impose a strict voter ID law in the state.
https://www.democracydocket.com/new...g-to-subvert-elections-right-before-our-eyes/

The POT's first impulse is to be anti-majoritarian.

 

Really more common in northern big city politics than southern Jim Crow. More common in contested elections.

 

Michigan widens probe into voting system breaches by Trump allies: report

Michigan State Police has warrants to seize voting equipment and election records across three towns and one county as it ramps up its probe into allies of former President Trump attempting to gain unauthorized access to voting systems, according to a new Reuters report.

The expansion of the investigation, which happened in the last six weeks, includes records such as search warrants and investigators’ memos that show the efforts of state authorities to obtain voting machines, poll books, data storage devices and phone records, according to Reuters.

Overall, there were at least 17 incidents across the country, including 11 in Michigan, in which Trump supporters gained or sought to access voting machines without authorization, Reuters added.
https://thehill.com/news/state-watc...oting-system-breaches-by-trump-allies-report/

Sometimes, the drip, drip, drip, as more information is revealed can make it appear less dangerous.

 

I imagine this will be treated as a badge of honor in the POT. For the rest of us it's another sign of a disturbing trend, loyal Trumpers trying to take positions of real authority.

Michigan Republican gubernatorial candidate Ryan D. Kelly was arrested Thursday on misdemeanor charges of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, siege of the Capitol, including a count of damaging federal property, the Justice Department announced.

A contender in the state’s crowded Aug. 8 primary, Kelley, 40, of Allendale, Mich., faces four counts punishable by up to a year in prison, including trespassing, disorderly conduct, committing an act of violence against a person or property on restricted grounds, and depredation of federal property, according to charging papers.

Kelley was set to appear before U.S. Magistrate Judge Sally J. Berens of Grand Rapids, Mich., on Thursday afternoon, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for Washington, which is prosecuting Capitol breach cases. His home in Allendale, Mich., was searched by the FBI on Thursday morning. Kelley’s attorney, Heath Lynch, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/06/09/ryan-kelley-arrested-michigan-jan-6/

 

GOP commission refuses to certify New Mexico primary vote

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico’s secretary of state on Tuesday asked the state Supreme Court to order the Republican-led commission of rural Otero County to certify primary election results after it refused to do so over distrust of Dominion vote-tallying machines.

Democratic Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Olive’s request came a day after the three-member Otero County commission, in its role as a county canvassing board, voted unanimously against certifying the results of the June 7 primary without raising specific concerns about discrepancies.

The commission’s members include Cowboys for Trump co-founder Couy Griffin, who ascribes to unsubstantiated claims that former President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. Griffin was convicted of illegally entering restricted U.S. Capitol grounds — though not the building — amid the riots on Jan. 6, 2021, and is scheduled for sentencing later this month. He acknowledged that the standoff over this primary could delay the outcome of local election races.
https://apnews.com/article/2022-mid...unts-general-54745f2169166e82090d0f7bc1ddc1b2

The POT solution to electoral loses of claiming fraud are becoming normalized.

 

Election Denier Becomes GOP Nominee For Nevada’s Top Election Official

Nevada Republicans’ nominee to be the state’s next top election officials thinks Donald Trump won the 2020 election and says he would not have certified Joe Biden’s victory in the state, even though the Democrat won with more than a 2% margin.

The GOP secretary of state nominee, Jim Marchant, a former state assembly member, lost by an even worse margin in his 2020 bid for the U.S. House of Representatives — nearly 5% — but nonetheless sued to overturn the results, and still claims to be a “victim of election fraud.”

The candidate — who told an audience in February that “Your vote hasn’t counted for decades” — called his primary win a “historic night on the road for election integrity.”
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/...gop-nominee-for-nevadas-top-election-official

Another glue sniffer who presents a threat to election integrity.........ironically running on election integrity.

 

The Ohio Redistricting Mess

As we outlined in our “Redistricting Rundown: Ohio,” voters overwhelmingly approved two amendments to the Ohio Constitution to curb partisan gerrymandering in response to the maps approved by Ohio Republicans after the 2010 census. The amendments created new rules and procedures for dividing up the state.
https://www.democracydocket.com/news/the-ohio-redistricting-mess/

Subsequently, OH's Repub controlled legislature drew up a number of unconstitutional maps which were thrown out by the OH Supreme Court. Repubs then refused to comply with the court's order to draw the maps according to the rules in the amendments. It's a naked power grab plain and simple.

 

Trump says he would look ‘very, very seriously’ at pardons for Jan 6 defendants if reelected

Former President Trump said on Friday that he would look “very, very seriously” at pardoning those charged in connection with storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, if he ran for and became president again.

Speaking during a Faith and Freedom event in Nashville, Tenn., Trump said the defendants charged in the Capitol riot were “having their lives totally destroyed and being treated worse than terrorists and murderers,” claiming that most had been “charged with parading through the Capitol.”

“And if I become president, someday if I decide to do it, I will be looking at them very, very seriously for pardons. Very, very seriously,” he added.
https://thehill.com/homenews/admini...at-pardons-for-jan-6-defendants-if-reelected/

I don't think Trump has a snowball's chance in Hell of being re-elected. But if he is, I'd be very concerned if I were Liz Cheney. Because he will go on a four year revenge tour.

 

Texas Republicans declare Biden election illegitimate, despite evidence

WASHINGTON, June 19 (Reuters) - Republicans in Texas formally rejected President Joe Biden's election in 2020 as illegitimate and voted in a state-wide convention that wrapped up this weekend on a party platform that calls homosexuality an "abnormal lifestyle choice."

The party's embrace of unfounded electoral fraud allegations in a bedrock Republican state came as a bipartisan congressional committee seeks to definitively and publicly debunk the false idea that Biden did not win the election.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/te...ion-illegitimate-despite-evidence-2022-06-19/

Repubs are becoming less reluctant to come right out in the open about their affiliation with the Crazy.

 

Bowers: Eastman Asked Me To Take A Vote To Decertify
Arizona House speaker Rusty Bowers testifies that conservative attorney John Eastman called to ask him to “to overthrow — I shouldn’t say overthrow, that we would decertify the electors and that because we had plenary authority to do so.”

Bowers said he refused Eastman’s request.

“Just do it and let the courts sort it out,” Eastman said, according to Bowers.

Bowers’ recollection of Eastman’s remarks follows his claim earlier that Giuliani said during a meeting with Arizona lawmakers that he and associates insisted they have “lots of theories, we just don’t have the the evidence.”

Afterwards, “we kind of laughed about it,” Bowers said.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/live-...our-magalands-pressure-campaign-on-the-states

The coup plot had many aspects.

 

Indicted MAGA Clerk Tina Peters Loses GOP Race For Top Election Spot

Tina Peters, the Trump-supporting county clerk facing multiple federal charges for allegedly compromising the security of her own election office, lost her bid to be Colorado’s next secretary of state Tuesday.

Peters faced off against Pam Anderson, a former county clerk who chaired the state’s county clerks association and called for a “return to professionalism,” and Mike O’Donnell, who’s promised to “clean” Colorado’s “dirty” voter rolls and asserted without evidence that bad actors have likely exploited weaknesses in voting machines.

The AP called the race shortly after 8 p.m. local time. With 95% reporting, Anderson was leading with 43.2% of the vote, and Peters trailed in third place with 28.3%.

“This is not over,” Peters reportedly told supporters. True to form, Peters called the results into questions, calling them fraudulent.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/...a-peters-loses-gop-race-for-top-election-spot

Good news, the MAGAnut lost. Bad news, more signs of Repubs invoking fraud instead on conceding in an election that wasn't close.