Friday, January 8, 2021
#NYT - By The Editorial Board - Awe and Shock How the world reacted to the Trumpist mob that sacked the heart of American democracy.
#HazaraGenocide - 'Truly heartless': PM Imran draws ire for suggesting 'blackmail' by Hazaras
People from all walks of life criticise PM for "insensitive" remarks equating grieving protesters with corruption politicians.
Amidst countrywide protests, and with political pressure snowballing, Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday once again urged the Shia Hazara community in Balochistan to bury the bodies of coal miners killed in a gruesome attack in the Mach area over the weekend.
This would have been just like appeals many other political leaders have issued to the grieving Hazaras— except the premier's choice of words today, suggesting the protesters were "blackmailing" him by refusing to bury their loved ones until he visits them, sparked a fresh social media storm.
"We have accepted all of their demands. [But] one of their demands is that the dead will be buried when the premier visits. I have sent them a message that when all of your demands have been accepted [...] you don't blackmail the prime minister of any country like this," the prime minister said while speaking at a ceremony in Islamabad and as calls for him to visit Quetta grew louder.
"Anyone will blackmail the prime minister then," he emphasised, adding that this included a "band of crooks" — an apparent reference to the opposition. "This blackmail has also been ongoing for two-and-a-half years."
Imran also asked the protesters to first bury the miners' bodies, saying he would visit them as soon as they do so.
The remarks quickly set off a furore on social media where analysts, politicians, journalists and citizens alike criticised Prime Minister Imran for being "insensitive" and "lacking empathy" for the Hazaras who are continuing their protest for the sixth straight day on Friday. Besides other hashtags criticising the government response, #ApatheticPMIK was the top trend on Twitter in Pakistan.
Accompanied by the coffins of the slain miners and braving the biting cold, the mourners, including women and children, have refused to leave Quetta's western bypass area until the premier visits and the killers are brought to justice.
Following are some reactions to the prime minister's latest comments:
Journalist Amber Rahim Shamsi said Prime Minister Imran after suggesting he was being blackmailed had "negotiated" with the Hazaras, asking them to bury their dead first.
"As if the most marginalised mourners should be told how to mourn, how to protest, how to seek comfort," she wrote on Twitter.
She also shared pictures of the distraught protesters, saying the premier had equated these "blackmailers" with leaders of opposition parties.
Journalist and Dawn Islamabad resident editor Fahd Husain termed the prime minister's remarks "a very poor choice of words".
"Such framing lacks empathy and insults those already devastated by tragedy. PM should take the words back," he said.
MNA Mohsin Dawar said he was shocked by the premier's "callousness", but not surprised. "The Hazara community has suffered a lot, They continue being targeted & killed & when they mourn their martyrs our PM calls them blackmailers," he said.
Senior journalist Hamid Mir commented that the people participating in the protest sit-in along with the deceased miners' coffins were "no less than corpses themselves", asking "how could they blackmail anyone?"
Referring to Prime Minister Imran's remark that he would visit Quetta only when the protesters buried the miners' bodies, lawyer and legal adviser Reema Omar said, "Going by this logic, [it] appears as if it is the PM who is 'blackmailing' the families of the martyrs and the persecuted Hazara community by making his visit to Quetta conditional upon the burial of the deceased.'
Author and columnist Nadeem Farooq Paracha said the government had suggested that "a besieged community asking for sympathy equals to it resorting to blackmail".
"What else has this community left — to be heard and seen — apart from refusing to bury its murdered members? Nothing."
Analyst and columnist Mosharraf Zaidi said the premier through his remarks had "[turned] the tables on the families of those killed in a terror attack".
"What great negotiating skills. What empathy," he wrote sarcastically.
TV presenter and journalist Saima Mohsin was also critical of Imran for suggesting the Hazaras were blackmailing him and for "aligning" them "corrupt politicians".
"Who is advising him and where is his own conscience? ill-advised," she tweeted.
Writer Sajjad H. Changezi said the prime minister had "insulted our bereaved mothers who have been sitting with the bodies of their sons whose throats were slit ruthlessly".
He also announced a hunger strike to protest the premier's remarks.
Journalist and TV host Zarrar Khuhro tweeted that Prime Minister Imran's comments reflected "not an ounce of empathy. Just narcissism it seems. What a fall from the strident tones of 2012."
Researcher and journalist Rabia Mehmood remarked that if Muslims in France or India had been targeted in an incident like the Hazara and demanded that French President Emmanuel Macron or Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visit them, Prime Minister Imran "by now, would have tweeted threads, issued statements [and] written to the UN over their refusal to go for condolence".
Academic and columnist Umair Javed said the prime minister could not "even feign empathy", terming his remarks "truly heartless".
Reflecting on the premier's remarks today, prominent religious scholar Allama Shahenshah Hussain Naqvi said: "Imran Khan has refused to budge against the oppressed."
Lawyer and activist Jibran Nasir in a tweet said: "The elder of a family is often awaited for the funeral of a deceased but the elder of our home is so ungenerous that he thinks of this wait as blackmail."
While commenting on the premier's choice of words, journalist and anchor Sana Bucha said: "The people who get blackmailed by lifeless bodies are those who are alive themselves."
Policy analyst and communications consultant Dawar Butt, while comparing Prime Minister Imran with New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who was widely praised for visiting Muslims in Christchurch soon after the 2019 mosque attacks in her country, wrote sarcastically: "Jacinda Ardern got blackmailed. We won’t!"
Filmmaker and journalist Hasan Zaidi in a tweet said the prime minister "can’t manage economy. Can’t do governance. Now he doesn’t even want to do empathy. What exactly is his selling point, remind me again?"
Stand-up comedian Shehzad Ghias Shaikh said Prime Minister Imran allegedly thought of Hazara protestors as blackmailers "because he never believed in any of the causes he protested for. Imran Khan always used his protests as a way to blackmail the government, so naturally he thinks everybody else does the same."
https://www.dawn.com/news/1600397/truly-heartless-pm-imran-draws-ire-for-suggesting-blackmail-by-hazaras
#HazaraGenocide #کچھ_تو_شرم_کھاؤ_عمران_خان #ImranKhan - PPP demands an apology from Imran Khan
Secretary General Pakistan Peoples Party, Syed Nayyar Hussain Bukhari has demanded an apology from Imran Khan for calling the bereaved families of Hazara martyrs blackmailers.
In a statement Nayyar Hussain Bukhari said that calling people in grief blackmailers represents the low mentality of Imran Khan. This statement of Imran Khan is height of insensitivity. He has shamed the entire Pakistani nation with his despicable personality. Imran Khan should ask for an apology from the Hazara community and the nation, Bukhari demanded.In a separate statement information secretary PPP, Faisal Karim Kundi has said that the egoistic Imran Khan should be ashamed of his words and he demands of Imran Khan to immediately take his words back. He said that treating a grieving community with such disdain represents a sick mind. It seems that the selected Prime Minister Imran Khan has embarrassed his selectors as well. The selectors must be reviewing their choice, he said. Kundi said that the Hazara community should not pin hopes with such a hopeless puppet prime minister. The entire nation is grieving and mourning the Machh tragedy but the egoistic person who suffers from illusory perception of himself is calling the mournful community blackmailers. Nothing could be more disgraceful than this narrative, Kundi said.
https://www.ppp.org.pk/pr/24281/
وزیراعظم عمران خان کے بیان پر ہیومن رائٹس کمیشن کا شدید حیرت کا اظہار
ہیومین رائٹس کمیشن (ایچ آر سی) پاکستان نے وزیراعظم عمران خان کے بیان پر شدید حیرت کا اظہار کردیا ہے۔
اپنے بیان میں ایچ آر سی نے وزیراعظم کے کوئٹہ میں ہزارہ برادری کے دھرنے سے متعلق بلیک میل کرنے کے بیان پر شدید حیرت کا اظہار کیا ہے۔
ایچ آر سی نے مزید کہا کہ کوئٹہ کی ہزارہ برادری نسل کشی کی حد تک مظالم کا شکار ہے، ایسی مظلوم برادری کو بلیک میلر قرار دینا ہتک آمیز ہے۔
بیان میں یہ بھی کہا کہ ہزارہ متاثرین کا تحفظ اور ان کے مطالبات ماننا وزیراعظم عمران خان کے فرائض منصبی میں شامل ہے۔
ایچ آر سی کا کہنا تھاکہ ریاست ہزارہ برادری کے تحفظ اور آزادیوں کے لیے فوری اقدامات کرے۔
https://jang.com.pk/news/869616
Thursday, January 7, 2021
Biden decries Trump mob: 'Don't call them protesters. They were domestic terrorists'
Lauren Gambino
President-elect Joe Biden condemned as “domestic terrorists” the violent mob of Donald Trump supporters that stormed the US Capitol on Wednesday, calling the assault on the seat of American government “one of the darkest days in the history of our nation”.
“They weren’t protesters – don’t dare call them protesters,” Biden said in remarks from Wilmington, Delaware, on Thursday. “They were a riotous mob. Insurrectionists. Domestic terrorists. It’s that basic. It’s that simple.”
Biden spoke hours after Congress formally certified his victory in the November presidential election, a constitutionally mandated ritual that was disrupted by rioters seeking to keep Trump in power.
In his remarks, Biden blamed Trump for inciting the violence that had transpired in his name.
“For the past four years we’ve had a president who has made his contempt for our democracy, our constitution, and the rule of law clear in everything he has done,” Biden said. “He has unleashed an all-out assault on the institutions of our democracy.”
For hours, loyalists of the president roamed the halls of Congress as law enforcement struggled to respond. Some waved Trump flags, others carried Confederate flags. They broke windows and trampled through the Senate chamber.
As the events unfolded on Wednesday, Biden said he received a text from his granddaughter, Finnegan, with a photo of the police presence outside the Lincoln Memorial last summer when Black Lives Matter activists demonstrated against the police killing of George Floyd.
Pointing to the strikingly different response from law enforcement to Wednesday’s largely white mob, she wrote: “Pop, this isn’t fair.” Biden agreed.
“No one can tell me that if it had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesters yesterday, they would have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol,” Biden said, his voice swelling with indignation. “We all know that’s true. And it’s unacceptable. Totally unacceptable.”
In labeling the rioters “domestic terrorists”, Biden was reflecting his commitment to combating far-right extremism, a growing threat the current administration has largely ignored.His remarks came as he introduced his nominee for attorney general, Judge Merrick Garland, as well as three other officials to lead the justice department. Biden said the attorney general would serve as the “people’s lawyer” and that his nominees would help restore judicial independence to the department.
“Your loyalty is not to me,” he told his intended nominees. “It’s to the law, the constitution, the people of this nation, to guarantee justice.”
Garland, who currently serves as a judge on the US court of appeals for the District of Columbia circuit, said Wednesday’s assault on Congress was a reminder that “the rule of law is not just some lawyer’s turn of phrase. It is the very foundation of our democracy.”
Speaking after Biden, Garland recalled the history of the justice department, which was created in 1870 during the period of Reconstruction to protect the civil rights of newly emancipated Black citizens against the terrorism of the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups.
“These principles ensuring the rule of law and making the promise of equal justice under law real are the great principles under which the Department of Justice was founded and for which it must always stand,” Garland said, speaking after Biden.
“They echo today in the priorities that lie before us, from ensuring racial equity in our justice system to meeting the evolving threat of violent extremism. If confirmed, those are the principles to which I will be devoted as attorney general.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/07/joe-biden-trump-mob-domestic-terrorists
USA Today Editorial Board Calls For Trump To Be Removed With 25th Amendment
By Josephine Harvey
“Trump’s continuance in office poses unacceptable risks to America,” the editorial read.
The editorial board of USA Today called Thursday for President Donald Trump’s removal from office through the 25th Amendment, condemning him for inciting Wednesday’s violent assault on the U.S. Capitol.
“By egging on this deadly insurrection and hailing the rioters (‘We love you, you’re very special’), the president forfeited his moral authority to hold the nation’s highest office, even for 13 more days,” the publication’s editorial board wrote.
“More urgent, he reinforced profound questions, and raised new ones, about his judgment and ability to fulfill his most minimal responsibilities to the country he is supposed to lead and protect. Trump’s continuance in office poses unacceptable risks to America.”
USA Today joined the editorial boards of other newspapers, including The Washington Post and Miami Herald, as well as many Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans, in calling for Trump’s removal through the 25th Amendment. The amendment allows the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet to declare a president unfit for office, allowing the vice president to assume presidential duties.
It would be a rare step; the amendment has never been invoked to remove a sitting president, though it has been used when presidents were temporarily incapacitated. Proponents argue that Trump’s behavior has indicated he is unfit to carry out his duties and poses an urgent threat to democracy.
On Wednesday, hundreds of Trump supporters breached the Capitol building after the president whipped them up with a speech falsely declaring the election was stolen from him and then encouraged them to march on the Capitol. At least four people died in the violence, including a woman who was shot.
As the disturbing events unfolded, Trump did little to stop them. He called for peace but then told the rioters he loved them and that they were “special.”
“People close to Trump say his mental state is fragile,” the USA Today board noted.
“Even though he committed early Thursday to an orderly transfer of power, who knows what pardons he might grant, what orders he might issue as commander in chief and what other desperate measures he might take before Jan. 20?” the editorial said.
Democratic leaders in Congress indicated earlier Thursday that if Trump is not removed via the 25th Amendment immediately, they are prepared to move forward with impeachment.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/usa-today-remove-trump-25th-amendment_n_5ff78006c5b6214c5518c6f1
In Pakistan everything has become expensive but people’s blood is cheaper, Chairman PPP Bilawal Bhutto Zardari
The PPP Chairman said that there has been a lot of injustice with the Hazara community, of which more than two thousand people have been martyred, but not a single one has received justice. “How is it fair that you are a laborer, a student, or a traveler, then you are killed by looking at your identity card,” he said.
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that he appealed to the state to give justice to the most patriotic people of the country. “I am not demanding justice for Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto or Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. I demand justice for the poor workers.
The PPP Chairman said that the state had promised that the National Action Plan (NAP) would be implemented, adding that the state had promised to the children of APS that terrorism would be completely eradicated from the country. “But sadly, the backbone of terrorism has not yet been broken. We don’t want to hear that this is a foreign conspiracy and it is behind it. If such foreign conspiracy succeeds, it is your failure,” he added. “Unless the state assures the citizens that their lives are safe, the security of the country and the federation will remain in jeopardy,” he warned.
Former Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, PPP Balochistan leaders Ali Maddad Jattak, Iqbal Shah and others accompanied the Party Chairman.
https://www.ppp.org.pk/pr/statement/24277/
Wednesday, January 6, 2021
Tuesday, January 5, 2021
Trump is trying to thwart democracy itself. But the problem is deeper than one man
David Daley
Republicans have carefully cultivated rot in the voting system. It didn’t start with Trump and it won’t end after he leaves.D
emocracy rots slowly. Sometimes its decay is perfectly legal, helped along by legislatures and embraced by the courts. It happens when elected officials deliberately tilt the game to their own advantage.
Republicans drew themselves similarly friendly maps for Congress and state legislatures in Texas, Ohio and Florida. Then these gerrymandered legislatures – with the blessing of a US supreme court that has gutted the 1965 Voting Rights Act – have tried to make it harder for Democrats and minorities to cast their ballots, by using surgically targeted voter ID bills, shuttering voting precincts, or eliminating days of early voting.Then, when large majorities of citizens, from both parties, come together to make voting fairer for everyone, these legislatures often run right over them. When Floridians, for example, overwhelmingly voted to restore voting rights to former felons in a 2018 constitutional amendment backed by almost two-thirds of voters, it was hailed as the largest expansion of the franchise since the passage of the voting rights act. An estimated 1.4 million citizens who served their time won back their voice in civic affairs. In any functioning representative democracy, that resounding vote should have been the last word. However, this is Florida where, in 2011, Republicans ignored a state constitutional amendment that banned partisan gerrymandering and locked themselves into such advantageous districts that the will of the people hardly matters at all. And so the Florida legislature not only replaced the voters’ judgement with its own, but turned the amendment on its head. If voters sought to end restrictions designed after the civil war to limit black voting power, the legislature substituted another reminder of those days: a poll tax. Republican legislators insisted that formerly incarcerated people pay all fines and fees related to their sentence – often amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars – before reinfranchisement. As suppressors of the vote well know, poll taxes are extraordinarily effective. Last fall, ProPublica, the Miami Herald and the Tampa Bay Times cross-referenced the voting rolls with a list of those released from prison over the past 23 years, and found just over 31,000 of those 1.4 million former inmates had been able to register to vote. Trump carried this perennial swing state by just 370,000 votes. This is the time bomb that threatens American democracy. The threat only grows more urgent. Republicans’ gerrymandering strategy, known as Redmap, was executed in 2010. The supreme court undid the voting rights act in the Shelby county case in 2013. These efforts came long before Trump descended a Trump Tower escalator and announced his campaign. They may even grow more virulent after Trump leaves, as 2024 presidential hopefuls such as Josh Hawley, the senator from Missouri, decide that doubling down on “fraud” claims is the best path to claiming the Trump vote, and as red state legislatures use those false fraud assertions to justify new voting restrictions. These efforts are already underway. In Pennsylvania, the new legislature hasn’t even been sworn in yet – but lawmakers are already seeking co-sponsors for a restrictive new voter ID bill, as well as a repeal of no-excuse absentee voting that was expanded due to Covid-19. And that’s not the only chicanery. In 2018, the Pennsylvania state supreme court struck down a congressional map so gerrymandered that Republicans consistently won 13 of the state’s 18 US House seats even when they won fewer statewide votes. Now, on the verge of the next redistricting cycle, Republicans’ gerrymandered state legislative majorities are looking to take revenge – by gerrymandering the courts, essentially creating judicial districts that can then be gerrymandered by the already gerrymandered legislature. Minority rule begets more minority rule. Texas, already one of the most restrictive states in the nation for voting, is readying a raft of new measures. In Georgia, Republican senators have indicated their support for an end to drop boxes as well as no-excuse absentee voting. A movement is also underway to require voter ID for mail-in voting. Many Republicans, meanwhile, frustrated that Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, has stood up for the integrity of Biden’s win of the state, have sought to make his position one appointed by the legislature rather than elected by the people. The practice of state legislatures ignoring the will of their own voters is not limited to Florida. Several states worked to make it harder for voters to reform their government via direct democracy. Others brazenly undid the citizens’ efforts and ignored their will. In Missouri, where more than 60% of voters voted for an independent redistricting amendment, Republican lawmakers pushed, and won, a 2020 amendment that masqueraded as campaign finance reform but actually unwound the redistricting effort. Utah’s Republican legislature also worked to undermine an advisory commission that voters enacted in that conservative state in 2018. The conservative political establishments in Arkansas and North Dakota used the courts to knock qualified initiatives off the 2020 ballot that would have opened up the closed primaries that make it easier for them to maintain power. Arizona’s independent redistricting commission remains, but Republicans there stacked the appellate court personnel commission, which vets applications and selects the five finalists for its nonpartisan chair. Their selections include a lobbyist and a gun store owner whose shop hosted a Trump rally and a shooting event for the president last fall. So, yes, Trump will leave the White House in less than three weeks. Democracy teetered but held. Some Republicans played important roles in making that happen, and their bravery should be noted. But Trump did not unleash this anti-democratic fever inside the Republican party. It’s worth noting that two of the other people on that brazen audio obtained by the Post were veteran Republican election lawyer Cleta Mitchell – heard teaching Republican state legislators how to gerrymander and duck legal discovery in leaked audio from a 2019 Alec conference – and Mark Meadows, the Trump chief of staff who first won office – running as a birther who would send Obama “back to Kenya” – from one of those gerrymandered congressional districts in 2012. Trump was created, in part, by the preceding years of gerrymandering and voter suppression that put the most extreme voices in control. They’re not going anywhere. They remain in power. They have not been chastened. There will be a next time. Our democracy may not be so lucky.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jan/05/trump-is-trying-to-thwart-democracy-itself-but-the-problem-is-deeper-than-one-man
Opinion: Can Only Republicans Legitimately Win Elections?
By Jamelle Bouie
Trump and many of the G.O.P.’s leaders seem to think so, with ominous consequences for the future.Of the many stories to tell about American politics since the end of the Cold War, one of growing significance is how the Republican Party came to believe in its singular legitimacy as a political actor. Whether it’s a hangover from the heady days of the Reagan revolution (when conservatives could claim ideological hegemony) or something downstream of America’s reactionary traditions, it’s a belief that now dominates conservative politics and has placed much of the Republican Party in opposition to republican government itself. It’s a story of escalation, from the relentless obstruction of the Gingrich era to the effort to impeach Bill Clinton to the attempt to nullify the presidency of Barack Obama and on to the struggle, however doomed, to keep Joe Biden from ever sitting in the White House as president. It also goes beyond national politics. In 2016, after a Democrat, Roy Cooper, defeated the Republican incumbent Pat McCrory for the governorship of North Carolina, the state’s Republican legislature promptly stripped the office of power and authority. Wisconsin Republicans did the same in 2018 after Tony Evers unseated Scott Walker in his bid for a third term. And Michigan Republicans took similar steps against another Democrat, Gretchen Whitmer, after her successful race for the governor’s mansion. Considered in the context of a 30-year assault on the legitimacy of Democratic leaders and Democratic constituencies (of which Republican-led voter suppression is an important part), the present attempt to disrupt and derail the certification of electoral votes is but the next step, in which Republicans say, outright, that a Democrat has no right to hold power and try to make that reality. The next Democrat to win the White House — whether it’s Biden getting re-elected or someone else winning for the first time — will almost certainly face the same flood of accusations, challenges and lawsuits, on the same false grounds of “fraud.” It’s worth emphasizing the bad faith and dishonesty on display here. At least 140 House Republicans say that they will vote against counting certain electoral votes on Wednesday. Among them are newly seated lawmakers in Georgia and Pennsylvania, two states whose votes are in contention. But the logic of their objection applies to them as well as Biden. If his state victories are potentially illegitimate, then so are theirs. Or take the charge, from Ted Cruz and 10 other Senate Republicans, that multiple key swing states changed (or even violated) their election laws in contravention of the Constitution. If it’s true for those cases, then it’s also true of Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, unilaterally expanded voting, however meagerly. And yet there’s no drive to cancel those results. The issue for Republicans is not election integrity, it’s the fact that Democratic votes count at all. That said, not every Republican has joined the president’s crusade against self-government. Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas shares the presidential ambitions of Cruz and Josh Hawley and others who want to disrupt the electoral vote count. But where they see opportunity, he sees blowback. Here he is in a statement released by his office: If Congress purported to overturn the results of the Electoral College, it would not only exceed that power, but also establish unwise precedents. First, Congress would take away the power to choose the president from the people, which would essentially end presidential elections and place that power in the hands of whichever party controls Congress. Second, Congress would imperil the Electoral College, which gives small states like Arkansas a voice in presidential elections. Democrats could achieve their longstanding goal of eliminating the Electoral College in effect by refusing to count electoral votes in the future for a Republican president-elect. So do seven of his Republican colleagues in the House, who similarly argue that this stunt will undermine the Republican Party’s ability to win presidential elections: From a purely partisan perspective, Republican presidential candidates have won the national popular vote only once in the last 32 years. They have therefore depended on the Electoral College for nearly all presidential victories in the last generation. If we perpetuate the notion that Congress may disregard certified electoral votes — based solely on its own assessment that one or more states mishandled the presidential election — we will be delegitimizing the very system that led Donald Trump to victory in 2016, and that could provide the only path to victory in 2024. But even as they stand against the effort to challenge the results, these Republicans affirm the baseless idea that there was fraud and abuse in the election. Cotton says he “shares the concerns of many Arkansans about irregularities in the presidential election,” while the House lawmakers say that they “are outraged at the significant abuses in our election system resulting from the reckless adoption of mail-in ballots and the lack of safeguards maintained to guarantee that only legitimate votes are cast and counted.” Even as they criticize an attempted power grab, they echo the idea that one side has legitimate voters and the other does not. It’s hard to say how anyone can shatter this belief in the Republican Party’s singular right to govern. The most we can do, in this moment, is rebuke the attempt to overturn the election in as strong a manner as possible. If President Trump broke the law with his phone call to Brad Raffensperger, the secretary of state of Georgia — in which he pressured Raffensperger to “find” votes on his behalf — then Trump should be pursued like any other citizen who attempted to subvert an election. He should be impeached as well, even if there’s only two weeks left in his term, and the lawmakers who support him should be censured and condemned. There’s no guarantee that all this will hurt the Republican Party at the ballot box. But I think we’re past that. The question now is whether the events of the past two months will stand as precedent, a guide for those who might emulate Trump. The door to overturning a presidential election is open. The rules — or at least a tortured, politically motivated reading of the rules — make it possible. Moreover, it is a simple reality of political systems that what can happen eventually will happen. It may not be in four years, it may not be in eight, but if the Republican Party continues along this path, it will run this play again. And there’s nothing to say it can’t work.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/05/opinion/trump-georgia-senate-elections.html
#USElections - Trump Says Pence Can Overturn His Loss in Congress. That’s Not How It Works.
By Michael S. SchmidtThe vice president plays a crucial but largely ceremonial role in formalizing the election results in Congress. Here’s how the election tally actually works. President Trump on Tuesday escalated his efforts to force Vice President Mike Pence to overturn President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory, falsely asserting that Mr. Pence had the power to unilaterally throw out electoral votes on Wednesday when Congress meets to certify the election results. But there is nothing in the Constitution or the law that explicitly gives a vice president that power, and aides close to Mr. Pence, who concede that he is facing a politically perilous moment, are convinced he will follow the normal procedures and confirm Mr. Biden’s election. Still, most agree that Wednesday promises to be a long and confusing day on Capitol Hill — and a potentially agonizing one for Mr. Pence — as Mr. Trump’s Republican allies move to challenge Mr. Biden’s victory and force at least three votes on the matter, all expected to fail. The proceeding will test what had long been considered little more than a paperwork exercise in American democracy: the official count by Congress of electoral votes. The vice president’s role is to be the master of ceremonies rather than arbiter of the outcome, declaring the winner based on who has the most electoral votes. But despite Mr. Trump’s clear loss to Mr. Biden, the president and a group of loyalist House and Senate Republicans are plotting to upend the process by objecting to the certification of several states. Lacking the votes to prevail, Mr. Trump is now pressuring Mr. Pence to take matters into his own hands to delay the vote tabulation or alter it in Mr. Trump’s favor. “The Vice President has the power to reject fraudulently chosen electors,” the president tweeted on Tuesday. That’s not how it works. Pence has a basic, if unappealing, job: Count the votes. Three weeks ago, the Electoral College formally cast its votes for president, affirming Mr. Biden’s victory. But under the Constitution, there is one more step before the result is final: the certification by Congress of the electoral votes, to be conducted by the president of the Senate. That is the vice president. “The president of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall then be counted,” according to the 12th Amendment. Envelopes with the certified votes from the Electoral College are brought in two mahogany boxes to the Capitol, and the vice president presides over a joint session in which the certificates are examined to determine they are authentic, with clear instructions for declaring a winner. “The person having the greatest number of votes shall be the president,” the amendment goes on, unless there is a tie or nobody has secured a majority, in which case the House decides. The job has occasionally been unpleasant for vice presidents. In 1961, the state of Hawaii sent two slates of electors and the vice president, Richard M. Nixon, who had just lost the election to John F. Kennedy, moved to count the Democratic electors, which expanded his own margin of defeat. Forty years later, Al Gore was in a similar spot, burdened with overruling objections from his fellow Democrats and declaring the victory of George W. Bush — and his own defeat — after a drawn-out Florida recount that was ended by the Supreme Court. And in 2017, Mr. Biden, then the vice president, had to reject a Democratic challenge to Mr. Trump’s victory. But no matter how distasteful it is, J. Michael Luttig, a former judge for the United States Court of Appeals and leading conservative legal scholar, said that Mr. Pence had no choice but to simply count the votes. “No president and no vice president would — or should — consider either event as a test of political loyalty,” Mr. Luttig said. “And if either did, he would have to understand that political loyalty must yield to constitutional obligation.” Members of Congress can object, though their bids this time are expected to fail. Under the Electoral Count Act of 1887, which was passed after the contested election of 1876 in which several states sent rival sets of electors, it is up to Congress to settle any disputes about state certifications. If at least one member of the House and Senate raise an objection about a state’s results, it must be considered, immediately halting the joint session so members can return to their respective chambers and debate the challenge for up to two hours. Then a vote — decided by a simple majority — is held to determine whether to throw out that state’s results. That has not occurred since the Reconstruction Era, and with Democrats controlling the House and many Senate Republicans opposed, it will almost certainly fail. Still, Republicans plan to force at least three such votes, perhaps more. Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama has said he will move to contest the results from as many as six states; three Republican senators — Josh Hawley of Missouri, Ted Cruz of Texas and Kelly Loeffler of Georgia — plan to back at least one of those. Dozens of House members and 11 senators have said they plan to vote against certifying Mr. Biden’s victory. Given that Mr. Trump and his supporters have contested the results in several states that Mr. Biden won — including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — there could be as much as 12 hours of debate on Wednesday, and a half-dozen votes. Trump wants Pence to unilaterally disqualify votes for Biden. House Republicans, with support from Mr. Trump, have argued in court that Mr. Pence has the right to move unilaterally to eliminate electoral votes from any state that he chooses. But a federal judge appointed by Mr. Trump on Friday tossed out a lawsuit the Republicans brought to force the vice president to do so. “The only responsibility and power of the vice president under the Constitution is to faithfully count the Electoral College votes as they have been cast,” Mr. Luttig said. “The Constitution does not empower the vice president to alter in any way the votes that have been cast, either by rejecting certain votes or otherwise.” Despite no evidence of widespread voter fraud, Mr. Trump and his Republican allies in Congress have claimed that the results from battleground states that voted for Mr. Biden must be invalidated. “I hope Mike Pence comes through for us, I have to tell you,” Mr. Trump said at a rally in Georgia on Monday night for two Republican incumbents who face runoff elections on Tuesday that will determine which party controls the Senate. “Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him as much.” If Mr. Pence were to throw out enough votes for Mr. Biden, it could prevent both candidates from reaching the threshold of 270 votes needed to secure an Electoral College victory. At that point, under the Constitution, each state’s delegation in the House would receive one vote. This could favor Mr. Trump, as 26 states have majority-Republican delegations. If Pence were to give Trump what he wants, the country would truly be in uncharted territory. Aides to Mr. Pence insist he will not do what Mr. Trump is asking. But congressional Democrats and Mr. Biden’s transition team are taking no chances and are preparing for a range of outcomes, including possible legal action, if Mr. Pence goes off script. The problem, Democrats concede, is that there is little precedent because no vice president has ever tried to use his position to overturn an election. The law in this area is untested and has never been litigated in court. But legal experts said the fallout could be highly damaging to the country. “The prospect of the vice president and members of Congress trying to overturn the will of the people rather than duly counting governor-certified votes would be unconstitutional and calamitous,” said a longtime Washington lawyer, Alan Raul, adding that it would set an “exceptionally dangerous precedent.” “If the sedition caucus in the House and Senate goes forward with their utterly unprecedented attack on the 2020 election, abetted by the vice president, it would torque our democracy for years to come,” he said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/05/us/politics/pence-trump-election.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage
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