Originally published at: Pennsylvania’s Mail-In Ballot System Has A Quirk That Trump Will Again Try To Exploit - TPM – Talking Points Memo
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at The Conversation. Mail-in voting in Pennsylvania will not begin on Sept. 16, 2024, as was previously slated. Due to ongoing court cases, the past is poised to repeat itself in the commonwealth in the upcoming presidential election. Legal…
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So when does Rudy book Four Seasons Landscaping for the Big Steal '24 Press Conference?
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If Trump loses Pennsylvania, it’s almost guaranteed that he loses the election. We should expect all kinds of efforts by the Trump campaign and Republicans to interfere with the vote there, both through lawsuits and the usual efforts of flyers and messages stating things like “Democrats can only vote on Wed. Nov 6th” in an effort to suppress Democratic turnout. I would not be surprised if there was a focus on using “vote watchers” to try to intimidate voters in Democratic areas, threatening violence is right up their alley. I also would not be surprised by lawsuits to stop the vote counts at midnight on election day, or throw out every mail in ballot as fraudulent, and other efforts to try to find a friendly judge to gum up the works long enough that Trump can declare the whole thing a cheat and that he won.
The plan is to make the election as fraught as possible so Republicans can declare “victory” in the press and force the system to go along with them. It will be uglier than the 2020 process (not including Jan 6th), and it’s unknown whether we’ll face another bout of violence like Jan 6th, possibly spread among the swing states where there’s a close result and counting happening in some Democratic city…if someone realizes that torching a vote counting center in Atlanta, Philly, Detroit, or similar could flip the election we might see that attempted.
I have no hope we won’t get through this cycle without violence of some kind, and little hope that things will settle down after the next president is sworn in. If Trump manages to win, he’ll attempt to turn us into a dictatorship, and that’s going to be met with huge protests that will probably face off against the military Trump has said he’ll deploy using the Insurrection Act. If Harris wins, it’s going to be the reaction to Obama on steroids, with claims about a fraudulent election heaped on top. It seems like we’re going to be cursed like this until the MAGA movement loses long or badly enough to fall out of favor with Republicans, and that may take a long while.
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Better do it soon. I hear they book up fast.
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I was extremely disappointed in the PA Supreme Court decision. The Commonwealth Court’s decision to have the Counties’ voter services departments accept and count ballots even if the ballot had 2042 written on the outer envelope was a good decision, but the PA Supremes’ just reversed that decision.
The outer envelope is superfluous to the returned ballot inside. We PA voters can only get mail-in ballots from our County voter services departments, and have to be returned by 8PM on election day, so it shouldn’t matter what date is on the outer envelope.
Trump and his goons are sure to contest any ballots with dates that are scribbled, or just wrong. It will be interesting, so PA’s final vote tally may be days or weeks out from election day, especially with a close vote.
I’m hoping Harris / Walz win by several hundred thousand votes, negating any effect that challenges to this silly outer envelope date issue.
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Thanks for the reminder. I have a retaining wall that needs repair and some new trees that need to be planted in my yard.
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That the Republican Party was the party of law and order and personal responsibility was always a G-damned lie. They have now embraced their Liar-in-Chief, and the MAGAts are taking their cues from him in the Lying Department. There is no bottom or limit to their mendacity.
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I have understand Rudy is looking for work, and he’ll do anything for a buck.
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Meanwhile, in Wisconsin
Ballot tabulation machines are used to count ballots and tabulate the final results. In Wisconsin, counties and municipalities are not allowed to process or tabulate absentee ballots before Election Day. That process takes time, which means that election results are often not finalized on election night. In fact, it can take more than a week after the election to complete the process.
When Absentee/Mail Ballot Processing and Counting Can Begin
Seven states and Washington, D.C., permit election officials to begin processing absentee/mail ballots on Election Day, but prior to the closing of the polls.
Alabama, District of Columbia, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
This is all despite annual attempts at legislation to permit this - often sponsored by the GQP. Some don’t like “some aspects” of the bill, but never specify exactly what it is.
The most recent efforts go back to at least 2018. Yes,before the pandemic, before ballot box issues, after TFG won and before the whole stolen election claims of 2020.
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I’ve said this before. The Republican Party is now filled with anarchists.
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I’ll pay him Pennsylvania’s minimum wage: $7.25 per hour. High enough of a wage to keep workers in poverty. 2,080 (full-time) hours per year = $15,080.
It’s a crime.
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Aren’t mailed-in ballots date-stamped by the post office anyway?
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My next door neighbors, who have supported Trump in the past, got a mailer from the Trump campaign encouraging mail in voting. We live in NE Philadelphia, which has the highest concentration of Republican voters in Philadelphia.
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Just another GQP lie, designed to suppress Democratic votes. It’s absolutely disgusting, yet completely unsurprising. They can’t win fairly, so they cheat.
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Yep, that was my experience in Wisconsin when I helped count the mail-ins. We started at 10a and I think we were done by 2 or 3p. The clerk was very happy. Without our help, she said she would never have finished before 2am.
Of course this will all lead to arguments over election falsity by the GQP. Why don’t we know the counts five minutes after the polls close???
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Not if they are dropboxed.
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Note that this is exactly the playbook followed by almost every authoritarian regime (or would-be regime) to steal elections.
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What saved us in 2020 from what you are predicting in 2024 was FOX calling Arizona for Biden very early.
I happened to be watching FOX when it happened.
Brit Hume and the gang were celebrating like Trump had won the election and all of a sudden they had to brake away for an important announcement and that announcement was “FOX is calling Arizona for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris”.
It then switched back to Brit Hume who said “now that changes everything”.
It has been while documented how upset Trump was over FOX doing that, no other station had called Arizona or any other “swing” state by then. Trump was getting ready to go on TV and declare victory and claim they were try to steal the election and vote counting needed to be stopped.
But after FOX called Arizona for Biden, again before any other network had called Arizona or any swing state for any candidate, it took all the air out of Trump’s lies and calls of action.
It is well known that networks, especially after 2000, take longer than needed to call states. That is they almost always know before the polls close in even most “swing” or close states who is going to win from the exit polls and early returns in key precincts.
My question is, did FOX do what it did because they are good citizens and wanted to stop their viewers from doing illegal anti-democratic heinous acts, did they do it to get control over their on air team to keep them from making fools of themselves as those who knew what was happening knew Trump was going to lose?
But I believe that FOX calling Arizona when it did prevented in 2020 exactly what drriddle is predicting in 2024.
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I think your list may be a little out of date. The state of Virginia allows preprocessing of ballots prior to Election Day, and even mandates from 7 days before the election on.
And it seems that many other states do as well: “Forty-three states and the Virgin Islands permit election officials to begin processing absentee/mail ballots prior to the election.”
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To wit: JD Vance’s statement in regard to the fabrication about Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, that if he had to lie and make up stories to get the press to cover an issue (from his own viewpoint, I presume), he would do it.