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Defend Our Country Digest

Defend Our Country Digest — October 25, 2022

By October 25, 2022No Comments

Driving the Day: 

Must Read Stories

Tensions Mount In Arizona As Armed Vigilantes “Monitor” The Polls

  • NBC: Top Arizona Election Official Refers More Cases Of Potential Voter Intimidation To Law Enforcement: Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs has referred six reports of possible voter intimidation to law enforcement in the past week, as well as an allegation of harassment of an election worker, her office said Monday. The cases were referred to the state attorney general’s office and the U.S. Justice Department for further investigation. Early voting got underway Oct. 12 in the battleground state, where Hobbs is the Democratic nominee for governor. Hobbs said in a statement that her office had received “several complaints” and that voters should not feel threatened or intimidated when they try to exercise their right to vote. “Anyone attempting to interfere with that right should be reported,” she said.
  • CNN: Temporary Restraining Order Sought Against Group Linked To Voter Intimidation Allegations In Arizona:  An association for retirees and an organization for Latino voters are seeking a temporary restraining order against a group they allege is coordinating a campaign of voter intimidation in Arizona. The restraining order request was filed Monday evening with a federal court lawsuit alleging that the group Clean Elections USA and its founder, Melody Jennings, were running afoul of federal law with incidents near ballot drop box locations in Arizona. The lawsuit accuses the defendants of a “coordinated campaign of vigilante voter intimidation” in violation of the Voting Rights Act and federal civil rights law. Clean Elections USA did not respond to a CNN inquiry. A status conference has been scheduled for Tuesday at 10 a.m. in a federal courthouse in Phoenix.
  • CBS: Arizona Voters File Complaints Against Armed Vigilantes Patrolling Ballot Boxes: Multiple Arizona voters have filed formal complaints against armed vigilantes patrolling ballot drop boxes near Phoenix. And with just two weeks to go until the midterm elections, some candidates are even pushing theories of voter fraud in the state. Republican Kari Lake, who is running for governor, has been pushing threats of voter integrity throughout her campaign. Arizona’s Republican Secretary of State candidate Mark Finchem tweeted, “Watch all drop boxes. Period. Save the Republic.” Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, who is in charge of voter registration and counting early voting, said he’s witnessed “Threats, you name it. Threats to harass you online, but also threats to physicaly harm you.” Richer, a Republican, told CBS News he’s appalled by his own party’s election deniers. “It’s especially frustrating when people knowingly do it to satisfy a self desire for political office or gain,” he added.

How “Stop The Steal” Became “Watch The Polls”

  • Time: How ‘Stop the Steal’ Became ‘Watch the Polls’:  Poll watchers have long been a feature of American elections, allowed to observe and report back to their party or a local supervisor if they see something that appears amiss. But this year, watching the poll watchers is becoming a full-time job for local election officials. Ahead of the Nov. 8 midterms, tens of thousands of Americans have been recruited to serve in these roles by right-wing groups pushing false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. These newly minted poll watchers motivated by election conspiracies plan to show up en masse on Election Day to observe, record on their phones, and in general let both voters and election workers know that they’re being monitored. At best, this is likely to disrupt overburdened election offices. At worst, it could lead to further harassment of election workers and deepening distrust in the country’s democratic systems. “When you come in with a conspiratorial mindset, and not a lot of knowledge about how things work, it’s very easy to misconstrue what’s going on and to act in bad faith,” says Rick Hasen, an election-law expert at the University of California, Los Angeles.
  • Washington Post: Pro-Trump Republicans Court Election Volunteers To ‘Challenge Any Vote’: The Republican National Committee and its allies say they have staged thousands of training sessions around the country on how to monitor voting and lodge complaints about next month’s midterm elections. In Pennsylvania, party officials have boasted about swelling the ranks of poll watchers to six times the total from 2020. In Michigan, a right-wing group announced it had launched “Operation Overwatch” to hunt down election-related malfeasance, issuing a press release that repeated the warning “We are watching” 10 times. Supporters of former president Donald Trump who falsely claim the 2020 election was stolen have summoned a swarm of poll watchers and workers in battleground states to spot potential fraud this year. It is a call to action that could subject voting results around the country to an unprecedented level of suspicion and unfounded doubt. “We’re going to be there and enforce those rules, and we’ll challenge any vote, any ballot, and you’re going to have to live with it, OK?” one-time Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon said on a recent episode of his podcast. “We don’t care if you don’t like it. We don’t care if you’re going to run around and light your hair on fire. That’s the way this is going to roll.”

Biden Administration To Warn Of Multiple Threats To Nation’s Election Infrastructure

  • Politico: Biden Admin Set To Warn About Threats To Nation’s Election Infrastructure: Top Biden national security officials are tracking multiple threats to the nation’s election security infrastructure ahead of the midterms and are set to issue warnings, including in an internal intelligence bulletin this week, according to two people familiar with the matter. The bulletin will lay out details of cyber threats posed by China and Russia, as well as other non-state actors, and potential physical threats to election officials in jurisdictions across the country, the people said. The warnings come as the midterm elections near and amid increasing reports of intimidation at ballot drop boxes. The people requested anonymity to talk freely about sensitive national security and election matters.

Prosecutors Press Trump Aides To Testify In Mar A Lago Documents Case 

  • New York Times: Prosecutors Pressure Trump Aides to Testify in Documents Case:  Federal prosecutors investigating former President Donald J. Trump’s handling of national security documents he took with him from the White House have ratcheted up their pressure in recent weeks on key witnesses in the hopes of gaining their testimony, according to two people briefed on the matter. The effort by the Justice Department shows how the investigation is entering a new phase as prosecutors seek to push recalcitrant witnesses to cooperate with them. A key focus for prosecutors is Walt Nauta, a little-known figure who worked in the White House as a military valet and cook when Mr. Trump was president and later for him personally at Mar-a-Lago, the former president’s private club and residence in Florida. Prosecutors have indicated they are skeptical of an initial account Mr. Nauta gave investigators about moving documents stored at Mar-a-Lago and are using the specter of charges against him for misleading investigators to persuade him to sit again for questioning, according to two people briefed on the matter. At the same time, the prosecutors are trying to force a longtime aide and ally to Mr. Trump, Kash Patel, to answer questions before a grand jury about how the documents were taken to Mar-a-Lago and how Mr. Trump, his aides and his lawyers dealt with requests from the government to return them, according to a person briefed on the matter.

In The States 

COLORADO:  Election Denial Looms Large In Colorado Campaigns 

  • Axios: 2020 Election Denial Looms Large In Colorado’s 2022 Midterm: Election deniers will appear on the ballot in nearly every state this midterm — including at least five in Colorado who have rejected the 2020 election outcome or questioned the results. Why it matters: The depth of the skepticism about the voting system, even as evidence shows elections are largely secure, demonstrates the threat level to democracy and raises the stakes of the 2022 election. Zoom in: The issue is most evident in Colorado’s governor race, where Republican candidate Heidi Ganahl has questioned the 2020 election and picked Danny Moore, an election denier, as her lieutenant governor.

NEVADA: How Rural Nevada Became A “Big Lie” Battleground 

  • Nevada Independent: How Rural Nevada Became The Next Battleground For The ‘Big Lie’: Just six weeks after the 2020 election, a group of Nevada Republicans gathered outside the Legislative Building in Carson City to pledge the state’s six electoral votes to Donald Trump. Unlike other swing states, there was never much worry that Nevada — with a Democratic governor and Democratic majorities in the Legislature — would have its normal electoral count process hijacked by Republicans attempting to overturn the election. The state’s six electoral votes were cast for Joe Biden, who won the state by more than 33,000 votes. Since the conclusion of the 2020 election, though, a stream of Trump’s most fervent supporters and allies in Nevada have led calls to overturn the results of the election and spread unproven claims of widespread election fraud while casting doubt on the state’s election system. But with Democrats in control of the levers of power, Republican election activists, including secretary of state candidate Jim Marchant and unsuccessful gubernatorial candidate Joey Gilbert, turned to another path — rural county commissioners. In the wake of Trump’s loss, a handful of rural county commissioners, who wield power as policy-setters and executive officers in some of Nevada’s least-populated corners, brought forward “election integrity” measures and promulgated false claims about the 2020 election.

What Experts Are Saying

Joyce Vance, former US attorney, re: Clarence Thomas temporarily halting order that Sen. Lindsey Graham testify in Fulton County investigation: “This is only an administrative stay, which means Graham doesn’t have to testify while SCOTUS examines his request. Fulton County DA’s response is due Thursday. It would be shocking if Thomas ruled in Graham’s favor w/out referring this to the full court, given his wife’s activity” Tweet

Steve Vladeck, Charles Alan Wright Chair in Federal Courts at the University of Texas School of Law: “To be clear, Justice Thomas issued an “administrative stay,” which blocks the Eleventh Circuit ruling only temporarily while the full Court decides whether to block it pending appeal. Such a ruling is *not* predictive of how the full Court (or even Thomas) will vote on the stay…Indeed, there are lots of recent examples of the Circuit Justice issuing such a temporary ruling and then the full Court *declining* to make it permanent…One good recent example is the Yeshiva case. Justice Sotomayor drew a lot of headlines for temporarily blocking the lower court’s order pending full Court review, then was part of the 5-4 majority that ultimately refused to block it pending appeal…The application automatically goes to him [Thomas] in his capacity as Circuit Justice for the Eleventh Circuit, and there’s no mechanism for a non-recusal transfer.” Twitter Thread 

John Cohen, former Department of Homeland Security counterterrorism chief: “‘We are now hearing reports of people surrounding ballot drop boxes, some even wearing tactical gear, and questioning people,’ said John Cohen, the former counterterrorism chief at DHS. ‘Are the police prepared for that? They need to be. All of this is being driven by the false narrative that the 2020 election was stolen.’” Politico 

Jason Stanley, Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale University: “If any one of the GOP candidates for governor in Arizona, Michigan, and Pennsylvania wins they will refuse to certify a win by a Democratic candidate. Dems can’t really win a federal election without at least 2 of these states. The GOP candidate in AZ leads; the one is MI is tied[.] This is the end of American democracy. You wouldn’t know it from our feckless media.”  Tweet | Tweet 

Alan Rozenshtein, associate professor at the University of Minnesota Law School: “New paper! @jedshug  and I argue in a forthcoming @ConstComm essay that the First Amendment would not bar a prosecution of Donald Trump for inciting the January 6 mob. Comments welcome! Unlike others (including Judge Mehta in Thompson v. Trump), we don’t base this conclusion solely on the content of the speech, which we believe is ambiguous and thus plausibly protected under Brandenburg. Rather, we focus on Trump’s *overt acts*. E.g., his order to remove the magnetometers keeping the armed crowd away from the rally stage, and his  attempts to lead the mob at the Capitol. These overt acts provide a principled basis for prosecuting Trump without weakening 1A protections for political speech.” Twitter Thread | January 6, Ambiguously Inciting Speech, and the Overt-Acts Solution

Headlines

The MAGA Movement And The Ongoing Threat To Elections

Bloomberg: Trump Lawyer Habba Takes Senior Role on MAGA Political Group

Boston Globe: Elections weren’t in a healthy state pre-2020. Now, we’re pushing them to the brink.

Buzzfeed: “It’s Important That We Do Our Part To Make Sure Democracy Can Function”: As Threats Against Them Increase, Poll Workers Told Us Why They Have Decided To Work The Elections This Year

Daily Beast: QAnon Is Backing These Sec. of State Candidates in 2024 Master Plan

FiveThirtyEight: Most Candidates Who Think 2020 Was Rigged Was Are Probably Going To Win In November

Washington Post: 2 conservatives accused in hoax robocall scheme plead guilty

Washington Post: The effort to break America’s elections

January 6 And The 2020 Election

Associated Press: Jan. 6 trial delayed after Oath Keepers’ leader gets COVID

Insider: Trump raged against ’60 Minutes’ after it featured Dominion’s CEO calmly dismissing his election-fraud theories

Newsweek: Ted Cruz Hid in Supply Closet During Jan. 6, New Book Reveals

Politico: Court clears way for Jan. 6 probe to get Ward’s phone records

Politico: Son of Confederate flag-wielding rioter sentenced to 24 months for Jan. 6 breach

Washington Post: Supreme Court puts temporary hold on Graham grand jury election testimony

Washington Post (Analysis): Cruz called Trump’s fraud claims ‘reckless.’ Now he promises evidence.

In The States 

HuffPost: Armed Individuals In Tactical Gear Are Showing Up At Arizona Ballot Boxes

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: In 2018 governor’s race, Milwaukee absentee ballots took center stage. That could happen again in November.