Starting The Steal
The guardrails may not hold this time.
Today’s edition of the NYT The Daily podcast, “The Army of Election Officials Ready to Reject the Vote,” is alarming. There is not yet a transcription but it’s based on Jim Rutenberg’s 25 October NYT Magazine report of the same name. Like the podcast interview, it’s anecdote-driven:
When Clara Andriola took her seat at the Washoe County, Nev., commission meeting room on July 9, she looked out at a sea of angry faces. The commission is Washoe’s main legislative body, and Andriola, a longtime local business executive, was appointed to fill a vacancy on the five-person board last year. She had just won a Republican primary that would almost certainly allow her to keep that seat in the November general election. The commission was required by law to certify elections at every level, from local primary to presidential election. What came next should have been a simple administrative procedure.
But the restless crowd had other ideas. For three hours, they told stories of a primary gone wrong. Some raised concerns about small bureaucratic errors, like improperly addressed ballots. Others shared more exotic allegations, including an unsubstantiated rumor circulating on X about a Serbian scheme to manipulate voting machines. The stories did not add up to any clear theory about what happened or why, but the community had come to believe that democracy was threatened and that there was only one way to save it: They wanted Andriola to vote with her two Republican colleagues to deny her own victory.
Andriola took her legal duty to certify elections seriously, and the stakes of her decision reached far beyond Nevada. Like thousands of administrators around the country, Washoe County commissioners are charged with certifying elections not just at the commission level but also as the first step in the process of formalizing the presidential results nationally. And Washoe wasn’t just any county. It was a swing district in a swing state.
For that reason, Andriola’s hyperlocal primary had taken on national importance. Washoe County’s longest-serving commissioner, Jeanne Herman, was one of the first and only local commission members in the country to vote against certifying Biden’s win in 2020, “because the election was improper,’’ she told me. She was outvoted at the time by the four other commissioners. But in 2022, a local cryptocurrency multimillionaire named Robert Beadles and a growing movement of election denialists helped elect a second commissioner who expressed doubt about the 2020 results, Mike Clark. With one more like-minded Republican commissioner, the doubters would have a three-vote majority.
Andriola had touted her support of Donald Trump in her campaign ads, but she also said that elections “should not be a partisan issue.” She won the primary by a comfortable margin against several election-denying challengers, and her victory was affirmed even after Beadles financed a recount. (Technically the July 9 meeting was for a second certification, of the recount.)
Long story short, Andriola voted not to certify in the face of pressure from the crowd and an inaccurate charge from the district attorney that she could “vote her conscience” but ultimately certified the vote once she understood that this was incorrect.
But what’s crucial to understand here isn’t the single incident but the sea change that’s happened since 2020’s Stop The Steal movement. A concerted effort to persuade people that our entire election system is rife with fraud has spawned a grass roots movement to challenge every election result everywhere and, crucially, install people on local election boards prone to support these conspiracy theories. They have been quite effective.
The upshot is that, unlike 2020, where even Republican Secretaries of State in traditionally red states (with Georgia the most notable instance) did their duty in certifying the pro forma certification of local boards, we may have enough local boards out there who simply refuse to certify.
What struck me from the podcast version was the sheer earnestness of the movement. While I’m quite sure the leadership are a combination of cynics and cultists, the folks out there who have been organized come across as True Believers. A massive effort to find evidence of fraud has produced hundreds of micro-examples of suspicious behavior. And, while pretty much all of it has been debunked, those predisposed to believe fraud find the debunking to be further evidence that there’s a conspiracy. Defenders of the system are, in essence, forced to prove a negative, which is next to impossible.
Further, while my instinct throughout was that this was a Heads I Win, Tails You Lose situation—that is, a Trump/Republican win would be evidence that the election was not stolen while a Harris/Democrat win would be evidence that it was—-it’s actually worse than that. These folks have been so poisoned that they simply believe the entire edifice of our system—the voting machines, the tabulation process, the certification process, etc.—is flawed.
Elie Mystal lays out a pretty convincing argument that this broad movement to deny certification leads to Trump and Mike Johnson’s plan to steal the election.
After discussing how a contested POTUS election would work if it swung over to the House, he explains:
More at the link.
In other words we are screwed. And it can only lead to surrender or violence.
I think it’s important to recognize the role the Republican Party apparatus has played in cultivating this environment.
This poisoning–the undermining of trust in the entire system–has been going on for YEARS. I saw it back when I worked in GOP politics in the early 90s. I’d hear “Democrats steal votes” and whenever I’d ask for examples, they’d point to Chicago and the election of JFK. Nothing recent, which when pointed out would be met with the response “they’ve gotten better at hiding it.”
No amount of evidence, no detailed explanations on how it is nigh-on impossible for large-scale fraud to occur–NOTHING mattered.
In short, for decades Republicans have convinced themselves that Democrats cheat, so they get to too.
These people are living in an alternate reality and it scares me.
@Neil Hudelson:
I’m pretty sure if they tried that, a court would compel submission by the deadline. A state can’t just say “fuck the law” without any reason.
I don’t think even the current SCOTUS would go along with that.
Not possible. I’ve been assured that Top. Men. that voter fraud is impossible.
If you’re telling me that it’s happening NOW, how do you expect anyone to believe that it DIDN’T happen in 2020?
Yeah, I know – “It’d different this time/when WE do it!
Way back in 2000 during the Florida recount, someone described Rehnquist as the most powerful example of a cop who pulls you over, smashes your taillight, and then writes you a ticket.
American law and order has been 50% this cop. That’s what the Republicans will be doing if Harris wins.
@alanstorm:
Because it’s not a matter of just accusing the other side – it’s a matter of proof. GOP has no proof that voter fraud happened in 2020 or is happening now. And all the foot-stomping, whining and insulting in the world isn’t changing that.
@alanstorm: And these are not claims of voter fraud. Did you read the post?
It is about people who believe lies and being willing to then subvert a legally held election.
@Not the IT Dept.:
The thing is that it’s really difficult to cheat at a local level with actual ballots. It’s not like a dictator changing the count at the end point. The allegation is that there are tens of thousands of fake ballots out there in different states. You have to make that happen.
Biden won Georgia by around 12K. If they cheated, how did it happen? I’ve never read any account of how this would have occurred. Not only do they have evidence, but there’s never any admission that it would be extremely difficult to add this many voters (or change their votes, I guess). And because it’s difficult and requires a conspiracy, you could at least try to figure out how it happened. Christ, there are several plausible JFK conspiracy theories. Show me one for the voter fraud determining the 2020 election.
C’mon now, Dr. Taylor, you’re moving the goal posts on him.
See, THIS is a perfect example of how these clowns think.
It is NOT impossible. There ARE cases of people either attempting to fraudulently vote, or actually casting double votes.
The thing is, BECAUSE OF THE PROTECTIONS THAT EXIST, THIS IS VANISHINGLY RARE.
Every ballot cast must be tied to a voting district. In some cases, that’s a precinct. In other cases (like my lil’ ol’ town in New Hampshire) it’s the whole town.
The state knows how many ballots are cast down to the smallest political subdivision. In my town, there are ~5K residents, and around 3,800 or so registered voters. Could one or two people claim to be new residents and cast provisional ballots? Yes, but that is why they are provisional. They have to go and confirm that these people are indeed residents before the ballots are counted.
Now, could a substantial number–enough to matter in even a state rep election–lie and get away with it? NO. It’s just too easy to track with small numbers. And this exists on EVERY ballot in EVERY state.
Furthermore, because of the way voting jurisdictions are set up, even the partisanship of the totals matters. If a traditionally red area gets 80% Democratic votes, THAT SENDS UP A FLARE.
I hate that this even needs to be explained. It’s the “if it ever happens even once the whole thing is sus” that is so, so stupid. It’s like saying if you get the wrong change back at a convenience store, the entire company’s books are cooked. IT’S DUMB.
SURGEON GENERAL WARNING: Rational Arguments do not work on the living brain dead.
@Jen: Thanks.
To my mind, this is worth articulating because for every person who is vocal, hardheaded and unmovable there are maybe several others who just wonder, and for whom a description like this might mean something. There are always more people listening.
Then the rational response would be for
the garbagethe Trumpers to decline to vote at all. If it’s all rigged, why bother? Win-win for everybody.@alanstorm:
Tell us you didn’t read the post without telling us you didn’t read the post.
Or worse yet, tell us that you read and DIDN’T UNDERSTAND the post without telling us you read and didn’t understand the post.
The thing is, even if you are shitposting, neither isn’t a good look for you. Nor is the third option that you read the post, understood it, and still posted that anyway.
Along these same lines James, Lawfaire did a deep dive into teaching sessions run across the US by former law professor David Clements training citizens to pressure local election officials NOT to certify results.
https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/david-clements–the-evangelist-of-election-refusal
Just like Republicans have had at least 10 years to formulate their Obamacare replacement – but haven’t gone beyond a “concept of a plan” – Donald Trump has had almost 4 years to produce evidence the 2020 election was rigged, but hasn’t done so. If there is the abundant evidence he claims, why hasn’t he tasked his army of lawyers (that his supporters are paying) with producing a comprehensive brief that lays out the case? Wouldn’t that be step one if his argument was being made in good faith? Isn’t the lack of such evidence behind the disbarments and/or license suspensions of Ken Chesebro and John Eastman and Jenna Ellis, and the $148M judgment against Rudy Giuliani? It would be nice if the media started taking note of this fact – that Trump can’t or won’t produce any supporting evidence – every time he makes the patently false and outrageous claim that the 2020 election was not legitimate.