The time to clarify the Electoral Count Act is now, not January of 2025. ed_kilgore writes
Will this vice president be able to play the limited role Pence ultimately filled in the January 6, 2021 proceedings? Photo: Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images The now-notorious Eastman Memo — the script Donald Trump gave to Mike Pence for overturning the election results on January 6, 2021 — was potentially more dangerous to our nation than the rioters he incited to storm the building.
Should Trump or his acolytes try to subvert the 2024 election, the last Democrat with any power to stop the steal—or at least try to—would be Harris. “She’s certainly going to have quite a job on her hands on January 6, 2025,” Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor and liberal constitutional scholar, told me. Nine months ago, Tribe and other Democrats praised Pence for interpreting his authority narrowly, but the next time around, they might ask Harris to wield the same gavel more forcefully.
“It’s critical to be clear that the Constitution does not vest the vice-president with any unilateral authority at all to reject electoral votes or to resolve disputes about competing slates of electors,” he said. “That theory was the basis of the Eastman memo, and it is absolutely incorrect — whether it’s Vice-President Pence, Vice-President Harris, or any other politician of any political party.
So if, hypothetically, a Republican-controlled Congress was tempted to supplant electors certified by the appropriate officials under a given state’s laws with some self-appointed alternative slate , Harris might be able to gavel such a move out of order. But as Seligman told me, the ECA does not give the veep “freewheeling authority to pick and choose how to count electoral votes, for good reasons or for bad reasons, and it would be dangerous if it did so.
Australia Latest News, Australia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Kamala Harris Sells Washington D.C. Condo For $1.85 MillionVice president Kamala Harris sold her Washington D.C. condo for $1.85 million earlier this week, according to a person familiar with the deal.
Read more »
'Keep registering every voter': Harris to address Voto Latino conferenceVP Harris delivers opening remarks at a Latino conference, urging Congress to act on voting rights bills, after Florida and Texas passed restrictive voting laws that Democrats say will suppress voter turnout.
Read more »
After Arizona audit, Oregon county clerks receive increase in recount requests, threatsOne county official said election workers fear having their pictures taken and becoming targets for violence.
Read more »
Nikki Haley, in a shift, says 2024 candidacy not dependent on whether Trump runsThe former U.N. ambassador changed her tune this week on a possible 2024 presidential bid, saying she will make a decision to run that is not dependent on whether the former president has decided to seek another term himself.
Read more »
Hollywood's shift to streaming is making some workers regret getting into the industry'People outside the industry say they would work on a set for free if given the opportunity, but this isn’t one day. This is day after day, hundreds of days, thousands of hours with these conditions and little pay,' one Hollywood worker says.
Read more »