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Defend Our Country Digest

Defend Our Country Digest — September 8, 2022

By September 8, 2022No Comments

Driving the Day: 

Must Read Stories

Michigan GOP Leaders Are Encouraging Poll Workers To Break The Law At Training Sessions 

  • CNN: Michigan GOP Leaders Encourage Rule Breaking At Poll Worker Training Session: The evening before Michigan’s state primary, Wayne County GOP leaders held a Zoom training session for poll workers and partisan observers — warning them about “bad stuff happening” during the election and encouraging them to ignore local election rules barring cell phones and pens from polling places and vote-counting centers. “None of the constraints that they’re putting on this are legal,” former state senator Patrick Colbeck told trainees on the August 1 call. As far as cell phones, “I would say maybe just hide it or something, and maybe hide a small pad and a small pen or something like that because you need to take accurate notes,” Cheryl Costantino, the GOP county chairwoman and host of the call, told participants. Some participants raised concerns about being tossed out if they broke the rules. “That’s why you got to do it secretly,” Costantino replied. While volunteer partisan observers have always been trained by political parties and non-profit groups in Michigan, the Wayne County GOP had also invited poll workers — people hired and paid by the local clerk’s office. They are in charge of running the election, and their responsibilities can include checking voter IDs, counting ballots, and even securing voting equipment at the end of the day. Poll workers are required to engage in non-partisan training overseen by the local clerk and are only identified as Republicans for the purposes of making sure there is equal representation of both major parties working the election, according to the Michigan Bureau of Elections. During the Wayne County training call, obtained by CNN, the presumption that Democrats cheat — thus justifying Republican rule-breaking — permeated the discussion. It offers a snapshot of one of the ways Trump-backing, MAGA-minded conspiracy theorists are intervening in the election process across the country, sometimes encouraging poll workers or volunteer observers to violate election rules in hopes of finding evidence that Democrats might be doing the same.

“Election Integrity” Activists Flood Local Election Offices With High Volumes Of Onerous And Nonsensical Document Requests 

  • Votebeat: Election Activists Are Seeking The “Cast Vote Record” From 2020. Here’s What It Is And Why They Want It:  Elections departments across the country are getting tons of near-identical requests for an obscure document generated by ballot-counting machines, spurred by people who insist this record could help detect fraudulent voting patterns that show former President Donald Trump actually won the 2020 presidential election. It is the latest example of the endless, fruitless quest for a smoking gun that has so far yielded no proof of wrongdoing affecting the election results. But the document, called a “cast vote record,” can’t be used to detect these kinds of patterns, nor is it particularly useful to people who aren’t researchers or auditors, experts say. And the sheer number of requests is overwhelming elections offices as they prepare for this year’s general election. […] Whether the resulting records can be made public varies around the country, and the exact definition and appearance of what’s included in a cast vote record also varies, depending on the jurisdiction and the voting technology it uses. But requesters, spurred on by recent instructions from people known for promoting baseless theories about election fraud, are bombarding elections offices with cut-and-paste requests for them.  My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell, known for promoting baseless theories of election fraud, together with a man named Jeff O’Donnell, who uses the moniker “The Lone Raccoon” online, and another far-right internet personality named Lady Draza, are urging people to file the requests and  collect the records in a repository for eventual analysis. They also ask requesters to report back if officials deny their requests, to generate a list of potential lawsuits. 
  • KSDK: ‘They Don’t Make A Lot Of Sense’: Local Election Officials Flooded With Impossible Demands: With nine weeks to go before the 2022 midterms, local election officials across Illinois are fielding a new wave of baseless grievances and impossible demands from ‘election integrity’ activists who insist the 2020 presidential election was stolen. In recent weeks, a variety of form letters and emails, most of them including the same language, started arriving in county clerks’ inboxes. The letters often came as open records requests filed under the state’s Freedom of Information Act law, but they included incoherent demands or inaccurate lists of data the clerks don’t collect in their election counting processes. “I do not have the type of data that they’re asking for,” Madison County Clerk Debbie Ming-Mendoza told 5 On Your Side. “This is a no-brainer for me. If I don’t have it, I can’t give it.” Dan Tang, Madison County’s deputy clerk, showed our cameras how the vote tabulators work, and explained why the data the activists sought isn’t kept in the machines. He said the vote counters cannot connect to the internet, and only start tabulating the final vote count for each candidate once a marked ballot passes through the scanner. Each machine is zeroed out before the polls open, and each machine tabulates the final results after polls close. The vote-counting machine will not count a ballot that doesn’t correspond with a voter in that precinct, but the device doesn’t keep a written record of how each person voted. That evidence exists only on the paper ballot itself. “They create a FOIA that no one can comply with,” Tang said. “And since no one can comply with it, maybe that’s their ammo to say, ‘Look, there’s a problem here.’“

AP And PBS Explore How Michael Flynn Went From Being A Top Government Official To A Christian Nationalist Conspiracy Theorist 

  • Associated Press: Michael Flynn: From Government Insider To Holy Warrior: The retired lieutenant general, former national security adviser, onetime anti-terrorism fighter, is now focused on his next task: building a movement centered on Christian nationalist ideas, where Christianity is at the center of American life and institutions. Flynn brought his fight — a struggle he calls both spiritual and political — last month to a church in Batavia, New York, where thousands of people paid anywhere from a few dollars to up to $500 to hear and absorb his message that the United States is facing an existential threat, and that to save the nation, his supporters must act. Flynn, 63, has used public appearances to energize voters, along with political endorsements to build alliances and a network of nonprofit groups — one of which has projected spending $50 million — to advance the movement, an investigation by The Associated Press and the PBS series “Frontline” has found. He has drawn together election deniers, mask and vaccine opponents, insurrectionists, Proud Boys, and elected officials and leaders in state and local Republican parties. Along the way, the AP and “Frontline” documented, Flynn and his companies have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars for his efforts.

In The States 

COLORADO: How Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters Tried To “Stop The Steal” And Ended Up Under Indictment And Why It Increases The Chances Of Attacks In Future Elections 

  • New Yorker: The Election Official Who Tried to Prove “Stop the Steal”:  On March 8th, a few weeks after [Mesa County Clerk Tina] Peters announced her candidacy for Colorado secretary of state, the grand jury indicted her and Knisley for a mix of felonies and misdemeanors, including identity theft, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, and attempts to influence public officials. In the world of election deniers, it was a badge of honor. The next day, Bannon told his audience, “Tina Peters is now a national crusade.” Mike Flynn, Trump’s former national-security adviser, endorsed her candidacy. So far, the investigation into Peters has cost Mesa County more than a million dollars, a figure that does not include costs incurred by the district attorney’s office, local law enforcement, and the offices of Colorado’s attorney general and secretary of state. […] Some experts argue that what happened in Mesa County has increased the chances of an attack on similarly configured systems in future elections. According to J. Alex Halderman, a computer scientist at the University of Michigan who has studied Dominion systems extensively, the released files could “tell the Stop the Steal people and everyone else how to build an attack and how to write malicious code.” Two months after the Mesa County breach, the election clerk in Elbert County, Colorado, who admitted being assisted by at least one of Lindell’s associates, also made copies of the county’s election software and shared it with “unauthorized people,” according to a lawsuit filed by Griswold to get those copies back. In arguing the case, the secretary of state’s counsel pointed out that, if the files were not returned, they could be used to hack future elections. Earlier this year, the judge ruled in Griswold’s favor. (Griswold told the Post that she remains confident Colorado voting machines are secure.) There have also been breaches in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Ohio. Department of Homeland Security officials have warned of increasing intimidation and threats to election officials ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections.

GEORGIA: Georgia’s Largest County Can’t Find An Elections Chief

  • Washington Post: Georgia’s Biggest County Can’t Find A Top Elections Official: It is in many ways an ideal job for a public servant with a passion for democracy — the chance to facilitate voting in Georgia’s most populous county, the electoral center of one of the most important political battlegrounds in the nation. Yet for 10 months, local leaders have been unable to hire a permanent director to run the Department of Registration and Elections in Fulton County, home to Atlanta. The previous director resigned in November and left the position in April, after pressure from local lawmakers and the turmoil of the 2020 election, when county staff endured death threats, baseless conspiracy theories, high-stakes audits and harassment from former president Donald Trump and his allies. Now, with Georgia in another highly charged campaign season and poised to play a pivotal role in the next presidential election, many here think the toxic swirl of state politics, national scrutiny, ongoing harassment and long-standing logistical issues has turned off potentially strong candidates and cast a shadow over the office itself.

PENNSYLVANIA:  A QAnon-Supporting Election Denier Could Be Doug Mastriano’s Pick for Secretary Of State 

  • Vice: A QAnon-Touting Election Denier Could Soon Run This Swing State’s Elections: In June 2020, stuck at home with her kids and growing increasingly infuriated by the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, Toni Shuppe binge-watched a QAnon conspiracy theory video series that changed her life—and altered the trajectory of her state’s politics. “I knew there was more going on with this whole COVID crap than what we were being told, but I couldn’t figure out what it was, and in some weird way, the rabbit holes helped make sense of the craziness, ”she wrote in an April substack post recounting the moment. “I started sharing my newfound information with my family and friends who were willing to listen. Some of them woke up with me.” Shuppe became a pro-Trump activist and embraced his false claims that the election had been stolen after he lost. In February 2021, Shuppe co-founded Audit the Vote PA to pressure lawmakers to audit Pennsylvania’s 2020 election. The group’s petition got 100,000 signatures in less than four months, transforming her into a fast-rising star of the hard right that soon landed on Trump’s radar—and perhaps most fatefully, introduced her to Pennsylvania state Sen. Doug Mastriano, who was just making a MAGA name for himself with his own fight to overturn the 2020 election. Now, Mastriano is the GOP’s nominee for governor, and there’s been widespread chatter—and some concrete signs—that he might appoint Shuppe to run the state’s election system if he wins this November.

What Experts Are Saying

Just Security and Protect Democracy: Citizens Guide to January 6th and Ongoing Threats to Democracy: “In June 2021, the House of Representatives created the January 6 Select Committee to investigate the events surrounding the attack on the Capitol including their causes. This Guide presents an overview of the Select Committee’s findings to date, revealed to the public in a series of hearings that allege President Trump and his associates engaged in a seven-part conspiracy to hold onto power. This Guide covers the numerous threats to American democracy that have emerged, responsive reforms under consideration by policymakers, and how Americans can learn more about these events and possible paths forward toward a more resilient democracy in the future.” Overview | PDF 

Harry Litman, former US attorney: “The Cannon order is not only grievously flawed, it threatens inordinate delay and potential scuttling of the entire criminal investigation.” LA Times Column: The special master order for Trump’s Mar-a-Lago documents is perverse and potentially disastrous

Bipartisan Conference of Chief Justices, a group representing the top judges in all 50 states, in amicus brief re: Moore v. Harper: “The Elections Clause does not derogate from state courts’ authority to decide what state election law is, including whether it comports with state and U.S. Constitutions.” Copy of Amicus Brief | Reuters: Top state court judges defend their election oversight at U.S. Supreme Court 

Kristin Kobes Du Mez, a professor of history at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who studies the evangelical movement: “Flynn’s rhetoric — us versus them, good versus evil, the idea that God is on ‘our’ side — has been a staple among conservative Christians for decades, and is mainstream in conservative evangelicalism, Du Mez said. The thinking, she said, can fuel violence. ‘They’re out to get us. Therefore, we need to strike first. And the threat is always dire,’ Du Mez says the thinking goes. ‘And if the threat is dire, then the ends justify the means.’ ‘These values are not unconnected from the violence that we saw on Jan. 6,’ she added.” Associated Press 

Barbara McQuade, professor of law at the University of Michigan and a former US attorney: “In Michigan, you can feel extremism creeping into civic life. Michigan is far from the only state in the grip of politicians who peddle disinformation and demonize their opponents. But it may also be the one best positioned to beat back the threat of political violence.” NYT Op-Ed: How One State Resisted Political Extremism — Against All Odds

Headlines

The MAGA Movement And The Ongoing Threat To Elections

New York Times: In Voter Fraud, Penalties Often Depend on Who’s Voting

NPR: Two-thirds of independents say they don’t want Trump to run for president

Time: ‘Never Trump’ Groups Hope to Boost Democrats in the Midterms. But Can They Sway Their Fellow Republicans?

January 6 And The 2020 Election

NBC: Judge denies Stewart Rhodes’ request to delay Oath Keepers trial on Jan. 6 charges

New York Times: A Long-Shot Push to Bar Trump in 2024 as an ‘Insurrectionist’

New York Times: F.B.I. Sought Interview With Trump Aide

Washington Post: House urges judge to uphold Jan. 6 subpoena to top Trump aide Meadows

Washington Post: Navy reservist already charged in Jan. 6 riot indicted in Va.

Other Trump Investigations 

CNN: Why finding a special master for the Trump Mar-a-Lago documents won’t be simple

New York Times: Trump Pushed Officials to Prosecute His Critics, Ex-U.S. Attorney Says

New York Times: Justice Dept. Faces Tough Calls in Weighing Response to Trump Ruling

Rolling Stone: Trump Told White House Team He Needed to Protect ‘Russiagate’ Documents

Washington Post (Analysis): On judging Trump, Americans are moving from ‘unethical’ to ‘illegal’

Political Violence

Las Vegas Review Journal: Police arrest county official in reporter’s stabbing death

Washington Post: When a man with a pistol shows up outside a congresswoman’s house

In The States 

Associated Press: Wisconsin judge sides with GOP in absentee ballot fight

Bolts: Vermont Secretary of State Candidate Looks for Ways to Expand Ballot Access, but First She Faces an Election Denier

The Hill: Massachusetts GOP governor won’t endorse Trump-backed nominee to replace him

HuffPost: ‘Don’t Vote’: A Look At Blake Masters’ Emails To His Vegan Co-op At Stanford University

Kansas City Star: ‘We’ve got to find somebody’: JoCo sheriff appears to lack probable cause in election inquiry