Rigging the election for Dear Leader
And Trump and his henchmen are lying about it:
Former President Donald Trump picked up a phone to pressure a Nebraska state senator to revive a winner-take-all system of awarding its Electoral College votes for president, sources told the Nebraska Examiner on Friday.
Trump, the sources said, called State Sen. Tom Brewer, who chairs the State Legislature’s Government, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee, and urged him to take action to get a winner-take-all bill up for debate in the waning days of the 2024 session.
Four working days remain in the 60-day session.
Brewer, the sources said, responded that it doesn’t work that way. The deadline is past to vote a bill out of a committee and get it passed this year. In addition, the Speaker of the Legislature on Friday said it’s also too late to amend a bill into another bill.
Trump then reportedly told Brewer, who is term-limited this year, that his political career was over.
Brewer, 65, is a decorated military veteran who represents Nebraska’s Sandhills area.
When asked about the call Friday evening, Chris LaCivita, the co-manager of the Trump campaign, said Trump “absolutely, 110% did not speak with anyone in the State of Nebraska in the last six weeks.”
Brewer, when asked about the call initially, told the Examiner that it was a private conversation and he would not comment. Later, when told a news story was going to be posted, the senator texted that he would deny there was a conversation.
Three state senators said they had heard the story of the call directly from Brewer. They spoke to the Examiner only on the condition that they not be named for fear of reprisals.
The call was the culmination of a weeklong pressure campaign by Republicans, fueled in large part on social media from a conservative talk show host, to persuade Nebraska lawmakers to throw out the state’s 33-year-old law to award electoral votes.
They’re all in on it:
Gov. Jim Pillen joined the arm-twisting effort Tuesday, calling on the officially nonpartisan Legislature to take up a bill to return to winner-take-all, which is the system used in 48 states. Trump followed that with a post on social media, praising Pillen.
“Governor Jim Pillen of Nebraska, a very smart and popular Governor, who has done some really great things, came out today with a very strong letter in support of returning Nebraska’s Electoral Votes to a Winner-Take-All System,” Trump said on social media platform Truth Social. “Most Nebraskans have wanted to go back to this system for a very long time, because it’s what 48 other States do – It’s what the Founders intended, and it’s right for Nebraska. Thank you Governor for your Bold leadership. Let’s hope the Senate does the right thing. Nebraskans, respectfully ask your Senators to support this Great Bill!”
They aren’t going to quit:
LaCivita, the Trump campaign manager, said the former president is still “100% committed” to getting Nebraska law changed, though the opportunity to do that during the regular 2024 session is “diminishing.”
“But a special session is a possibility,” he added. “It’s what a vast majority of Nebraskans support.”
I think it’s obvious LaCivita is lying. This is exactly what Trump has done in the past (Zelensky, Raffensperger etc.) and there is no reason to believe he didn’t do it this time since a whole bunch of people said the recipient of the threatening call told them about it right after it happened. That man is a coward for failing to come forward especially since he’s term limited out. But then Trump’s cult members are aggressive and sometimes dangerous so he knows that it’s risky if he wants to maintain the status in GOP circles that he has had. Nonetheless, this ex-marine is no longer a patriot no matter what he once did in the service.
Hopefully there will not be the appetite to hold a special session to fulfill Dear Leader’s rigging scheme.
I saw John Kasich, an MSNBC contributor, say last week that while he doesn’t agree with doing this so late in the game, it’s also true that Democrats changed the rules in 2020 so… both sides are wrong. You may recall that the reason states changed some election rules was to allow people the ability to vote during the deadly pandemic without killing themselves. They certainly didn’t change any of the electoral college rules which the Trump people did after the election and continue to attempt today. But hey… both sides, amirite?