Institutional Republicans seems to be perfectly fine with impeached two-time popular vote loser lame duck Donald Trump living in denial about the election, but the judges that have been spending the better part of the last two weeks listening to his increasingly harebrained challenges to the results have had enough. So have the states.
In the biggest blow to Trump yet, there are two developments out of Pennsylvania. First, there will be no recount for any race there, presidential included. Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar said "We are extremely grateful to all 67 counties who have been working overtime and putting in an extraordinary effort to count every vote, with so far more than 6.8 million votes having been counted." No candidate was defeated by one-half of one percent based on the unofficial results, the trigger for a recount. "The counties continue to adjudicate and count the approximately 100,000 provisional ballots issued to voters at the polls on Election Day, as well as the more than 28,000 military and overseas ballots that were cast in this election," Boockvar said. Trump lost in Pennsylvania.
A federal appeals court isn't going to help him, either. That's the second blow. A three-judge panel of the Third Circuit rejected a Republican appeal challenging Pennsylvania's ballot receipt deadline and to block all ballots received November 4-6 from being counted. The state Supreme Court allowed the deadline extension in light of the coronavirus crisis, meaning that ballots postmarked on or before Election Day arriving by the Friday after would be counted. The appeals judges, led by Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Brooks Smith, noted the "unprecedented challenges" facing the nation, particularly the "vast disruption" from the pandemic. Smith wrote the court sought to uphold "a proposition indisputable in our democratic process: that the lawfully cast vote of every citizen must count." Former U.S. Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal provides context in what he calls "a huge loss for Trump" and "a very big deal." He notes that Chief Judge Smith is a Reagan/Bush judge, and he was joined by "legendary conservative Reagan nominee" Judge Anthony Scirica.
Trump still sort of has a shot with the U.S. Supreme Court, which Republicans have asked to review the issue. That these two prominent judges slapped down the challenge so hard, and with Trump having lost beyond the margin for a recount, and there not being enough late-arriving ballots at issue—about 9,300—there is no chance that Trump can win the state on votes. It would be a massive stretch for five Supreme Court justices to erase a 60,000 vote majority for Biden and decide the state had to be handed to Trump. Even this Supreme Court. Four might do it, which is terrifying enough. But damn.
That's not all Trump lost Friday! The chief judge of Michigan’s Third Judicial Circuit rejected the campaign's attempt to stop certification in Wayne County. Chief Judge Timothy Kenny wrote "It would be an unprecedented exercise of judicial activism for this Court to stop the certification process of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers." The challenge came from Republican poll watchers who had a litany of complaints about the counting process and its supposed lack of transparency. Their attorney went so far as to complain to the court about the county's "so-called COVID regulations, whatever those are."
That didn't go over well. "No formal challenges were filed," Kenny noted. "However, sinister, fraudulent motives were ascribed to the process and the City of Detroit. Plaintiffs' interpretation of events is incorrect and not credible." He wrote "The Court cannot defy a legislatively crafted process, substitute its judgment for that of the Legislature, and appoint an independent auditor because of an unwieldy process. In addition to being an unwarranted intrusion on the authority of the Legislature, such an audit would require the rest of the County and State to wait on the results."
This. Is. Over. And at some point, some judge is going to lose her shit over yet another conspiracy-theory fueled nuisance lawsuit coming from Team Trump and start putting some lawyers in jail for contempt of the rule of law. I hope, anyway. In the meantime, I'm just going to enjoy the humiliation they're receiving in the real world.