Senator Josh Hawley Announces Intent to Challenge Electoral Vote Count

[JRCF29 8,230]

47 minutes ago, MOT said:

As a non-American I know nothing about this, but I am interested in it. May I ask what was the basis of the Democrats' objections in 2017 ?

Also, I understand that Hawley and co have no chance of succeeding because they don't have the numbers in the house, but was that also the case in 2017 or was there an actual possibility that they would overturn ?

There were a couple reasons given by the objecting parties: voter suppression at a specific precinct in (I think) Georgia, violation of state statute governing the appointment of electors, and references to Russia. 

 

Republicans are already further in the process than Democrats got in 2017. Joe Biden ruled each objection "out of order" because it lacked support from a member of the Senate. Senator Hawley's objection along with any one Representative's will be enough to kick off a fairly short (by Congress' standards) period of debate and vote in each chamber.

Senators will go to the Senate floor, explain why they support or oppose sustaining the objection, and after two hours have gone by the entire body will vote; House members will go to the House floor, explain why they support or oppose sustaining the objection, and after two hours have gone by the entire body will vote. In both cases, a majority of votes to either sustain or overrule the objection would be binding. 

 

There is no limit on the number of states that can be subject to objection, so if Republicans wanted to they could file objections to every state that Joe Biden won (and possibly D.C, although this might not be consistent with the rules as it is not a state), and force a total of 50 hours of debate*, and 25 separate votes in each chamber. 

 

The last time this happened was in 2005, but only one state was challenged and the objection was overruled nearly unanimously. It is not unheard of for a Representative to object to results on some grounds or another, but getting a Senator to join the cause is rarer. My point is that Republicans aren't taking a step that has never been taken before by objecting here. 

 

*Vice President Mike Pence, who serves as President of the Senate and therefore is responsible for presiding over this joint session, is scheduled to fly to Europe after proceedings to take care of some final diplomatic business. There has been some chatter that Pence would prefer not to put himself in the middle of the sure-to-be chaotic proceedings, and so he could use this as cover ("I have to be in Europe, I can't be here for 50 hours.")

 

 

 

 

[MOT 3,616]

21 minutes ago, JRCF29 said:

There were a couple reasons given by the objecting parties: voter suppression at a specific precinct in (I think) Georgia, violation of state statute governing the appointment of electors, and references to Russia. 

 

Republicans are already further in the process than Democrats got in 2017. Joe Biden ruled each objection "out of order" because it lacked support from a member of the Senate. Senator Hawley's objection along with any one Representative's will be enough to kick off a fairly short (by Congress' standards) period of debate and vote in each chamber.

Senators will go to the Senate floor, explain why they support or oppose sustaining the objection, and after two hours have gone by the entire body will vote; House members will go to the House floor, explain why they support or oppose sustaining the objection, and after two hours have gone by the entire body will vote. In both cases, a majority of votes to either sustain or overrule the objection would be binding. 

 

There is no limit on the number of states that can be subject to objection, so if Republicans wanted to they could file objections to every state that Joe Biden won (and possibly D.C, although this might not be consistent with the rules as it is not a state), and force a total of 50 hours of debate*, and 25 separate votes in each chamber. 

 

The last time this happened was in 2005, but only one state was challenged and the objection was overruled nearly unanimously. It is not unheard of for a Representative to object to results on some grounds or another, but getting a Senator to join the cause is rarer. My point is that Republicans aren't taking a step that has never been taken before by objecting here. 

 

*Vice President Mike Pence, who serves as President of the Senate and therefore is responsible for presiding over this joint session, is scheduled to fly to Europe after proceedings to take care of some final diplomatic business. There has been some chatter that Pence would prefer not to put himself in the middle of the sure-to-be chaotic proceedings, and so he could use this as cover ("I have to be in Europe, I can't be here for 50 hours.")

 

 

 

 

Ok, so if you separate this from everything else that's been going on, there are precedents for it, and it is more of a political gesture than a serious attempt to overthrow, and that is all it has been in the past as well. It arguably doesn't deserve the coverage it's getting in that case.

[JRCF29 8,230]

23 minutes ago, MOT said:

Ok, so if you separate this from everything else that's been going on, there are precedents for it, and it is more of a political gesture than a serious attempt to overthrow, and that is all it has been in the past as well. It arguably doesn't deserve the coverage it's getting in that case.

There is precedent for it, yes, and that is what @PunkTheFunk and I continue to refer to (not the sum total of all actions by all members of a political party in the entire post-election period, which is why it's extraneous for the purposes of this discussion to talk about Hillary Clinton- no one said Hillary Clinton encouraged objections or didn't concede; what was said was that the objecting Democrats specifically, in 2017, cast doubt on the legitimacy of the vote by literally saying so in their objections, in the same way that Republicans are casting doubt now, but many of the same objecting parties have criticized Republicans for it now.)

It will amount to a political gesture next month, but the goal of going through the process would be to disqualify electors from a state. So even though this won't go anywhere, the statute was written so that if Congress wanted to, it could block certification of the votes. 

 

[MOT 3,616]

10 minutes ago, JRCF29 said:

There is precedent for it, yes, and that is what @PunkTheFunk and I continue to refer to (not the sum total of all actions by all members of a political party in the entire post-election period, which is why it's extraneous for the purposes of this discussion to talk about Hillary Clinton- no one said Hillary Clinton encouraged objections or didn't concede; what was said was that the objecting Democrats specifically, in 2017, cast doubt on the legitimacy of the vote by literally saying so in their objections, in the same way that Republicans are casting doubt now, but many of the same objecting parties have criticized Republicans for it now.)

It will amount to a political gesture next month, but the goal of going through the process would be to disqualify electors from a state. So even though this won't go anywhere, the statute was written so that if Congress wanted to, it could block certification of the votes. 

 

Thanks for taking the time. I've learned a lot about American politics over the last couple of months. It has been incredible to watch from across the Atlantic.