Last updated on December 28, 2020
Trump is once again asking the Supreme Court (PDF) to overturn the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s multiple rulings on the mail-in ballots in the election. Rick Hasen on Election Law blog said that the petition was ridiculous, that John Eastman should be ashamed of himself, and that the petition’s citing to Epoch Times made him “laugh out loud.”
But then he updated the report, saying that someone had called his attention to the accompanying motion to expedite (PDF), which contains some VERY disturbing language:
Finally, if this matter is not timely resolved, not only Petitioner, but the
Nation as а whole may suffer injury from the resulting confusion. Indeed, the intense
national and worldwide attention on the 2020 Presidential election only foreshadows the disruption that may well follow if the uncertainty and unfairness shrouding this election are allowed to persist. The importance of а prompt resolution of the federal constitutional questions presented by this case cannot be overstated. [emphasis added]
The Supreme Court is not even scheduled to meet again until January 8, two days after Congress counts the electoral votes. Trump sat on this motion until the Court recessed, so his complaints about timeliness are specious to start with (well, so is everything else about this). But now he is threatening the Court by telling them if they don’t do what he wants and do it NOW, who knows what might happen. Nice country you got there, huh, Justices? Be a shame if anything happened to it because you took off for the holidays.
Trump really does think that because he put three justices on the Court, they owe him for that.
Maybe this is pure coincidence, but Sidney Powell was spotted leaving the White House this evening, presumably shortly after the motions were filed. (Her name is not on either motion; John Eastman from Anaheim CA is the counsel of record.)
Sidney Powell back at the White House Sunday night
Attorney Sidney Powell, who has repeatedly pushed baseless conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, was spotted leaving the White House late Sunday evening just days after a heated Oval Office meeting with some of President Donald Trump's advisers.
She was spotted by CNN leaving the residence side of the White House shortly before 9 p.m. ET.
This could be related to instructions from the Trump campaign legal team ordering the campaign to preserve all memos and correspondence relating to Powell and Dominion Voting Systems.
The memo, viewed by CNN, references a letter Dominion sent to Powell last week demanding she publicly retract her accusations and instructs campaign staff not to alter, destroy or discard records that could be relevant.
As I say, it could be coincidence. But Powell’s client is Michael Flynn, and she and Flynn started that shouting match in the Oval Office about how Trump should declare martial law. Now Trump is warning of disruptions — disruptions that could become a pretext for invoking just that.
I’m not a fan of conspiracy theories, and this isn’t one. For one thing, every previous call Trump has made hinting at violence has fizzled. But I still want an explanation for what Trump thinks he’s doing by putting the arm on the Supreme Court.
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