Trump as IMPOTUS*-for-life could still happen
Another election could be stolen, but only if the results are close. GOTV.
Trump remains furious at his son-in-law Jared Kushner, whom he blames for the campaign’s dismal poll numbers. Axios reported this week that Trump complained privately that Kushner’s advice on criminal-justice reform damaged Trump politically. But because Kushner is family, sources say it’s unlikely that Trump will formally strip him of authority.
Kushner’s vast sway over West Wing decisions has become a flashpoint between him and Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, sources say. The two have been engaged in a cold war over control of the campaign. Meadows pushed Trump to replace campaign manager Brad Parscale, a Kushner ally, the Republican close to the White House said. Kushner wasn’t happy that Meadows is close with Kushner’s adversaries Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie. “Meadows is in real shit. He went to war with Jared and tried to get Brad out,” the Republican, briefed on the internal debate, told me.
“The left wing mob and those practicing cancel culture are engaging in totalitarian behavior that is completely alien to American life – and we must not accept it.”
— Raw Story (@RawStory) July 3, 2020
— Frank Figliuzzi (@FrankFigliuzzi1) July 3, 2020
It is increasingly looking as if Joe Biden can beat President Donald Trump in November. The president seems more and more out of step with the national mood, from his handling of the pandemic to his response to racially biased policing, not to mention a wide array of other issues. Even in key swing states, Trump is losing ground that will be difficult for him to make up.
For Trump, there are two broad pathways to maintaining power.
- First, we can already see very clearly a strategy designed to suppress voter turnout with the purging of registration rolls of large numbers of mostly urban voters; efforts to suppress mail-in ballots, which are more necessary than ever, given COVID-19; a re-election apparatus that is training 50,000 poll watchers for the purpose of challenging citizens' right to vote on Election Day; and significant efforts to make in-person voting in urban areas as cumbersome as possible in order to have long lines that discourage people from exercising their voting rights.
- The second pathway to subverting the election is even more ominous—but we must be cognizant of it because Trump is already laying the groundwork for how he can lose the popular vote, and even lose in the key swing states necessary for an Electoral College victory, but still remain president.
- The Electoral College meets, and without the electors from those four states being represented, neither Biden nor Trump has sufficient votes to get an Electoral College majority.
- The election is thrown into the House of Representatives, pursuant to the Constitution. Under the relevant constitutional process, the vote in the House is by state delegation, where each delegation casts one vote, which is determined by the majority of the representatives in that state.
- Currently, there are 26 states that have a majority Republican House delegation. 23 states have a majority Democratic delegation. There is one state, Pennsylvania, that has an evenly split delegation. Even if the Democrats were to pick up seats in Pennsylvania and hold all their 2018 House gains, the Republicans would have a 26 to 24 delegation majority.
- This vote would enable Trump to retain the presidency.
— VoteVets (@votevets) July 3, 2020
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) July 3, 2020
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