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Defend Our Country Digest

Defend Our Country Digest — September 23, 2022

By September 23, 2022No Comments

Driving the Day: 

Must Read Stories

Secretary of State Campaigns For Control Of Key State Voting Apparatuses Intensify 

  • New York Times: Secretary of State Races Turn Rowdy During the Homestretch: In a normal election year, races for secretary of state are sleepy affairs, and their campaigns struggle for media coverage amid the hurly-burly of more prominent Senate, governor and House contests. This year, however, is anything but normal. Democrats are pouring millions of dollars into races for secretary of state, buoyed by the nature of their Republican opponents and the stakes for American democracy. According to an analysis by my colleague Alyce McFadden, Democrats in Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota and Nevada have outraised their Republican opponents as of the most recent campaign finance reports. And overall, Democratic-aligned groups working on secretary of state races in those four states have outspent Republicans by nearly $18 million in this election cycle, according to the ad analytics firm AdImpact, with more spending on the way. The role of a secretary of state varies, but in those four states, as well as Arizona and Pennsylvania (where the governor appoints the secretary), they play a critical role in overseeing the mechanics of elections.
  • Politico: Liberal Group Spends $2 Million To Boost Secretary Of State Races: A liberal group focused on secretary of state races is making its first major investments of the midterm election cycle, putting down seven-figure buys in a pair of states where the chief election officer is on the ballot in November. iVote, the organization behind the buys, is launching $2 million TV advertising campaigns in Minnesota and Michigan. Both states have incumbent Democratic secretaries of state: Steve Simon and Jocelyn Benson, respectively. POLITICO first reported on the plans for the new buy. The group had previously announced its intentions to spend $15 million on a paid media campaign this cycle — about twice as much as it spent during the 2018 cycle.

Trump Group To Spend Tens Of Millions Of Dollars To Boost Far Right Election Denying Candidates  

  • Politico: Trump To Unleash Millions In The Midterms In Possible Prelude To 2024: Donald Trump’s top lieutenants are launching a new super PAC that is expected to spend heavily to bolster his endorsed candidates in the midterm election — and, some people close to the former president say, could become a campaign apparatus if he runs in 2024. Sanctioned by the former president, the new group, dubbed MAGA, Inc., will become the primary vehicle for Trump’s operation to engage in political activity in 2022. The outfit is designed to funnel large sums into key races and could conceivably be used to boost Trump in the event he seeks the White House again. The organization provides the clearest indication yet of how Trump plans to engage during the final stretch of the midterm campaign and, those in the former president’s orbit say, offers a preview into what the structure of a 2024 campaign could look like. Republicans have been heavily outspent in races across the map, and party strategists have been anxious for Trump — by far the party’s biggest money magnet — to help financially.

Trump’s Legal Problems Continue To Mount 

  • Washington Post: Trump Faces Growing Legal Peril As He Seeks To Raise Profile Ahead Of 2024: The legal dangers facing former president Donald Trump rose this week, after the New York attorney general filed a fraud lawsuit that could effectively shutter the Trump Organization and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit allowed federal investigators to continue their probe into classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago. These and other setbacks for Trump come as at least a half-dozen additional legal efforts proceed against him and his allies — committing him to months of legal wrangling as he seeks to raise his political profile for a possible 2024 bid while also increasing the prospect of becoming the first former U.S. president to face indictment after leaving office. Federal prosecutors have subpoenaed dozens of his former advisers, and many others, as part of a sprawling investigation into efforts to obstruct the transfer of power after the 2020 election. Separately, a Georgia grand jury has been looking at allegations that he tried to obstruct that state’s electoral count by pressuring Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) to “find” enough votes to overturn the election.
  • New York Times: As Trump’s Legal Woes Mount, So Do Financial Pressures on Him: The New York attorney general’s fraud lawsuit that was filed on Wednesday against former President Donald J. Trump seeks to recover $250 million from his company and essentially run him out of business in the state. Next month, Mr. Trump’s company will go on trial in Manhattan on criminal tax charges in a separate case that could cost millions of dollars in penalties and legal fees. And on the horizon are civil suits from people seeking to hold the former president responsible for injuries and trauma inflicted during the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol by his supporters, a possible wave of litigation that some of his advisers fear could prove extremely costly to him. Together, the numerous investigations and lawsuits swirling around Mr. Trump are creating new and significant financial pressures on him. There is no evidence that he faces any immediate crisis. In an interview on Thursday, Eric Trump, his son, said the Trump Organization was in a strong position, noting that it had recently paid off some outstanding debts and seen a windfall from the sale of the Trump International Hotel in Washington. But when stacked up altogether, the potential costs that the former president faces show that his challenges extend beyond the courtroom and into the maintenance of his wealth even as he continues to signal that he plans another run for the White House.

Voters In Georgia Prioritize Threats To Democracy As A Top Issue 

  • Atlanta Journal Constitution: AJC Poll: Voters Prioritize Threats To Democracy Among Top Issues: Georgia voters rank threats to democracy as the second-most-important issue in the country — above the economy, immigration and abortion — according to a poll by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Only the cost of living scored higher among Georgians’ priorities as they’re coping with inflation that has driven up prices of food, gas and many other necessities, the poll said. Though voters are worried about the state of American democracy, they’re increasingly convinced that this fall’s elections will be conducted fairly and accurately. About 67% of likely voters in the poll said they’re either very confident or somewhat confident in the upcoming election, an increase from 56% in January and 60% in April. The poll indicates that voters care about protecting elections following the contentious 2020 presidential race, when then-President Donald Trump falsely claimed that he was the real winner and alleged widespread fraud that was never found. Three vote counts, multiple investigations and court cases upheld Democrat Joe Biden’s 12,000-vote win in Georgia over Trump, a Republican.

In The States 

GEORGIA: Election Officials Swamped By Floods Of Voter Challenges From Election Deniers 

  • The 19th: With Midterms Looming, Georgia Officials Are Grappling With Challenges From Election Deniers:  One by one, the speakers approached the podium at the elections meeting to air their grievances. One person asked about alleged “phantom” voters who may be registered in Gwinnett County, their community just northwest of Atlanta. Another suggested officials count ballots by hand to avoid fraud. And yet another questioned whether the results of the 2020 election, the most secure in history, should have been certified in Georgia — and then cited the penalties for treason. “I highly recommend that each of you take your responsibility very seriously, because that time is quickly approaching,” that person said. The dozen or so speakers were gathered Wednesday night to watch local election officials discuss the fate of more than 37,000 voter registrations in the county after a group of election deniers challenged them last month. Similar challenges have arisen in counties across Georgia, as people who have embraced debunked conspiracy theories about the security of elections deluge officials with questions. They are eating up time and resources as election officials — a workforce predominately run by women — are finalizing the logistics for November’s midterms in a state that is in many ways the center of the country’s political universe.

FLORIDA: Ron DeSantis Overrides Will Of The People To Install Conservatives In Local Office 

  • Bolts: All the Governor’s Men: Allison Miller, a public defender seeking to become the next chief prosecutor of Pinellas and Pasco counties in central Florida, may face one of the strangest conundrums of any candidate for political office in the United States. She has said she would not prosecute people for seeking or providing abortions, in a state whose governor recently removed from office a sitting, democratically elected prosecutor—in Tampa, just across the bay from Pinellas County (St. Petersburg)—for saying the same thing. The repeal of Roe v. Wade in June vested enormous control over women’s reproductive decisions in local officials. There has been plenty of talk since about the resulting geographic injustices: people seeking now-illegal abortions in blue localities may at least be shielded from prosecution, the thinking goes, while their counterparts in redder areas may face criminal punishment for the same acts. But in August, after Hillsborough County (Tampa) State Attorney Andrew Warren signaled he would decline to pursue abortion cases should Florida’s 15-week ban go into effect, Republican Governor Ron DeSantis suspended and replaced him with a member of the conservative Federalist Society. (Warren has sued to get his job back; a judge has said the case should be decided at trial, but hasn’t set a date.)  The governor’s move, part of his broader push to undermine voting rights and override democratic results to install conservatives in local offices, summons an existential question for the shape of democracy in Florida. In the face of a governor willing to overturn an election to achieve his own ends, the familiar playbook of fighting for social change at the ballot box—organizing the grassroots, galvanizing young people and people of color, elevating candidates who will fight for reproductive justice—is under siege. The threat of further undemocratic moves by DeSantis now hangs over Miller’s race—and by extension, any election in the state. What does it even mean to run for office when the governor’s political whims could turn a win into a loss?

MARYLAND: Donald Trump To Host Fundraiser For January 6 Participant Gubernatorial Candidate Dan Cox 

  • Washington Post: Trump To Host Mar-A-Lago Fundraiser For Md. Governor Candidate Dan Cox: Former president Donald Trump is scheduled to host a fundraiser for Maryland GOP gubernatorial nominee Dan Cox next month, according to an invitation first published by the Hill. The $1,776-per-person event, confirmed by The Washington Post, will be held at Trump’s Mar-a-Largo estate in Florida, and it has the potential to give Cox’s campaign a much-needed financial boost. His Democratic opponent, Wes Moore, has outraised Cox 10 to 1. Cox had just $130,000 to spend as of late August, a sum that Republican operatives say is not enough to finance a statewide mail campaign. The fundraiser reinforcing his ties to Trump comes as Cox has tried to moderate his rhetoric, pivoting to a general election in which just 24 percent of registered voters are Republicans. Trump’s approval ratings in the deeply Democratic state stands at 32 percent, according to a Goucher College poll published this week. The same poll shows Moore with a 22-percentage-point lead over Cox, with 9 percent of voters undecided ahead of the Nov. 8 election.
  • Baltimore Banner: Will Dan Cox Accept The Election Results? His Answers Aren’t Clear: Dan Cox, the Republican nominee for governor of Maryland, has maintained that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald J. Trump as part of a conspiracy. He went to Pennsylvania in 2020 as part of “Lawyers for Trump” as the ex-president sought to secure victory in an election he actually lost. So when it comes to 2022, reporters have been asking Cox: Will he accept the outcome of the election, whether he wins or loses to Democratic candidate Wes Moore? Cox has not always clearly answered the questions, which are especially pertinent with new polling showing that Cox is significantly trailing Moore. 

What Experts Are Saying

Joyce Vance, former US attorney: “The 11th Circuit..treated Trump just like any other person..The court..has in the past included judges with a civil rights era-legacy of being willing to stand up for what was right, even when it was not easy. On Wednesday, the court honored that legacy.” Tweet | CAFE Audio 

Harry Litman, former US attorney: “Cannon reinstates her order with an amendment based on the 11th circuit reversal. DOJ indicated they could live with that before, but it’s far from ideal. They can still bring an appeal on the merits now that they have the most important part taken care of.” Tweet 

Norm Eisen, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution: “NEW: Judge Dearie has issued his first order, and it’s a doozy[.] It pushes the ball up the court fast & forces Trump to articulate the basis for his ridiculous claims for the return of each doc under Rule 41(g)[.] He’s gonna be hopping mad” Tweet 

Headlines

The MAGA Movement And The Ongoing Threat To Elections

New York Times: Jury Rules Against Project Veritas in Lawsuit

New York Times: ‘I’m Done Saying I’m Sorry,’ Alex Jones Tells Sandy Hook Families in Court

January 6 And The 2020 Election

Axios:Non-existent Jan. 6 report is hot with publishers

CNN: Federal judge denies Mike Lindell’s request to reclaim phone seized by FBI

New York Times: Nazi Sympathizer Is Sentenced to 4 Years Over Role in Jan. 6 Attack

Politico: McConnell seeks a Jan. 6 mop-up on his terms

Washington Post: Jan. 6 Twitter witness: Failure to curb Trump spurred ‘terrifying’ choice

Other Trump Investigations 

New York Times: Trump Claims He Declassified Documents. Why Don’t His Lawyers Say So in Court?

Washington Post: Dearie asks Trump lawyers whether they believe FBI lied about seized documents

In The States 

Deseret News: How tight is the Mike Lee-Evan McMullin race for Senate? New Utah poll has answers

Politico: House GOP cuts loose candidate who misled about military service