For those keeping score, the Republican Party on Tuesday declared in a series of actions it has abandoned democracy. The announcement was not unexpected. Erstwhile George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum predicted in The Atlantic in January 2018, “If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.”
And in the fullness of time, it came to pass.*
Frum neglected to mention what they would substitute. American brownshirt supporters of Donald J. Trump brawling in the streets of the nation’s capitol on Saturday provides a dark glimpse.
A Pennsylvania judge on Tuesday had to school former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, attorney for the lame duck president, in the basics of law. Giuliani struggled to explain why his election fraud case was not alleging election fraud and why the judge should invalidate more than 6.8 million votes.
In Michigan, meanwhile, the Wayne County Canvassing Board (two Democrats, two Republicans) deadlocked along partisan lines on certifying the results in the predominantly Black county. The outgoing president, RNC chair Ronna McDaniel, White House Press Secretary Kaleigh McEnany, and a Trump campaign attorney among others celebrated the action as a huge win (over democracy).
Appearing on CNN AC360 with Anderson Cooper, Election Law Blog’s Rick Hasen declared Giuliani’s performance “an embarrassment.” Hasen added, “That was probably the worst lawyering I’ve heard in an election law case in my life.” He predicted the Republican blocking of vote certification in Wayne County would not stand.
Indeed, about the time Hasen appeared on CNN, under tremendous public pressure (including a walk through one Republican board member’s Facebook posts) the board voted a second time to certify the results. This time unanimously. The Detroit News reported the board asked “the Secretary of State’s office conduct a “comprehensive audit” of precincts with unexplained out-of-balance tallies.” No fraud alleged.
The pressure on the GOP needs to keep up, Hasen tweeted, “because Trump by not conceding and his enablers like Lindsay Graham are feeding into this very dangerous bullshit in an attempt to disenfranchise voters. The reason it doesn’t work is because enough people are vigilant (Not panicked).”
In a less-conspicuous story, the Arizona Republican Party asked a judge to delay certification of election results in Maricopa County until the judge rules on the GOP demand for a (second?) hand-count of ballots:
The GOP made the request Monday night after the county revealed officials planned to approve the returns on Thursday or Friday.
A judge is scheduled to hear arguments in the lawsuit Wednesday afternoon. The county faces a Nov. 23 deadline for certifying its results.
The lawsuit focuses on an audit of a sampling of ballots that is required to test the accuracy of tabulated results. The county has already completed the audit and said no discrepancies were found.
Not content to attempt sabotaging election results, the outgoing president fired cybersecurity chief Chris Krebs on Tuesday via Twitter:
Krebs had declared the 2020 election “the most secure election in American history.” He added there “is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.” Trump was not having any of it. (He lost.)
The New York Times reports:
The firing stirred an immediate backlash in the national security community and on Capitol Hill.
“Of all the things this president has done, this is the worst,” said Senator Angus King, independent of Maine, who led a commission on improving cyberdefenses. “To strike at the heart of the democratic system is beyond anything we have seen from any politician.”
He said Mr. Krebs was one of the most competent people he had met in the government. “In this administration, the surest way to get fired is to do your job,” Mr. King said.
Through its collective Tuesday actions, Republicans validated Frum’s concerns. In the same way Bush White House counsel Alberto Gonzales declared Geneva Convention limitations on prisoner treatment “quaint,” the Republican Party has forsaken its commitment to government deriving its “just powers from the consent of the governed.”
“To put it simply, we are headed for an era in which America may well have a Democratic Party and an Anti-democratic Party.” — Jeremy D. Rosner (12/23/18), former Special Adviser to Pres. Clinton and senior staff member National Security Council
“To put it simply, we are headed for an era in which America may well have a Democratic Party and an Anti-democratic Party,” wrote Jeremy D. Rosner, former Special Adviser to Pres. Clinton and senior staff member National Security Council.
Responding Tuesday to the Wayne County events, Marcy Wheeler (emptywheel) recalled how she canvassed in Jackson, Michigan for Barack Obama in 2008. She visited the stone marking the founding there of the Republican Party as an anti-slavery party.
*A Twitter user suggests Frum was wrong in part: “they’ve abandoned democracy AND conservatism. All the principles are gone. It’s all just power and grift now.”