A report by pro bono lawyers indicates that there may be that at least 50 Trump Electors who were chosen in contradiction to state law or the Constitution. This could be grounds for objections to be filed on January 6, 2017 (tomorrow!), when the electoral vote is certified.
Two types of potential violations are at play:
1) The Constitution requires that “no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector”. Consider that Pam Bondi, Attorney General of Florida, was an elector. That certainly sounds like she holds an Office of Trust or Profit. State constitutions and statues often also have laws against holding multiple offices, and Elector would seem to be an office.
2) Some states require that electors be from specific congressional districts as representatives of those districts, yet apparently some electors may not have been.
How perfect would it be to smack down Republicans with their own voter fraud meme? But, you know, for it to actually be real?
However, this group acknowledges that they are not election law experts. I cannot vouch for anything in the report either. Dammit, Kos, I’m a scientist, not a lawyer. But I don’t think it would at all be surprising for violations to creep into a system that has been treated as almost exclusively ceremonial for a very long time. And in any case, Congress has lawyers who are far better prepared—and far better paid—to handle this kind of question.
All that said, my perennial question to you, fellow Kossaks: Do you want this to happen? If law exists that would stop Trump from being automatically elected and to force Congress to go into a contingent election between Clinton, Powell, and Trump, would you take it? Then help make it happen by calling your members of Congress RIGHT NOW and letting them know that you support them here.
The objections noted here may be in addition to the potential objections due to the nature of the election that I wrote about previously, but this report alone could be on more solid legal footing if their findings hold up.
There is something seriously wrong with Trump. If we don’t take every avenue available to us, we will be complicit in what comes next. So let’s resist.