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patriottruth · 4 days ago

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This is an hourly reminder that on March 4th, 2024, the Supreme Court of the United States ordered donald j. trump to have 87 Democrats in both houses of Congress remove his insurrectionist disqualification from ever holding any federal office again. He failed to do so prior to November 5, 2024.

What that means is that between now and December 17th, 2024, donald j. trump has no choice but to go to Congress and have 70 Democrats in the House of Representatives and 17 Democrats in the Senate vote to remove his insurrectionist disqualification, as he was ordered to do by SCOTUS on March 4th, 2024, or he's not legally the President Elect and cannot be inaugurated, sworn in, or hold federal office again on January 20, 2025. The clock is ticking!

*** For those who are still saying this is misinformation due to donald trump's MAGA cult allies in the Senate preventing him from being convicted, the bipartisan Congressional J6 committee investigated donald j. trump for insurrection, found him guilty of insurrection, referred him for criminal prosecution for insurrection, and donald j. trump was indicted and is currently being prosecuted for insurrection by the Department of Justice (unless the case gets dropped). Section 3 of the 14th Amendment doesn't require a formal conviction, so the Congressional investigation, finding, and referral for criminal prosecution, and the federal indictment and prosecution for insurrection can easily be used to keep him from ever holding federal office again. ***

So I've seen some comments suggesting this is misinformation. It's not. Per the Supreme Court of the United States' own Berger Test to disqualify judges, the MAGA SCOTUS majority ruling pertaining to donald j. trump being permanently immune from federal enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment means nothing; because it lacks standing in precedent, law, constitutionality, and relevance.

The three dissenting justices clarify that the only matter that was actually legally settled and, therefore, legally enforceable, pertained to state actions, not federal law enforcement actions against a disqualified insurrectionist presidential or federal candidate, such as donald j. trump, committing the federal crime of being an insurrectionist attempting to hold office without having their insurrectionist disqualification removed via a two-thirds vote of both houses. And so it is legal fact that the Supreme Court did, in fact, order donald j. trump to have his insurrectionist disqualification removed by a two-thirds vote of both houses on March 4th, 2024; it's just that donald j. trump and his legal team were too illiterate and unintelligent to actually read what was legal and had standing (state enforcement against federal candidates), and what didn't (federal enforcement against federal candidates). And MAGA SCOTUS is now permanently legally barred from ever addressing any matter pertaining to federal enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment against donald j. trump, so they can't even try to interfere on his behalf again should Democrats in the House of Representatives and the Senate demand and force a vote on the matter of donald j. trump's disqualification for holding federal office.

Berger v. United States, 255 U.S. 22 (1921), is a United States Supreme Court decision overruling a trial court decision by U.S. District Court Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis against Rep. Victor L. Berger, a Congressman for Wisconsin's 5th district and the founder of the Social Democratic Party of America, and several other German-American defendants who were convicted of violating the Espionage Act by publicizing anti-interventionist views during World War I.

The case was argued on December 9, 1920, and decided on January 31, 1921, with an opinion by Justice Joseph McKenna and dissents by Justices William R. Day, James Clark McReynolds, and Mahlon Pitney. The Supreme Court held that Judge Landis was properly disqualified as trial judge based on an affidavit filed by the German defendants asserting that Judge Landis' public anti-German statements should disqualify him from presiding over the trial of the defendants.

The House of Representatives twice denied Berger his seat in the House due to his original conviction for espionage using Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution regarding denying office to those who supported "insurrection or rebellion". The Supreme Court overturned the verdict in 1921 in Berger v. U.S., and Berger won three successive terms in the House in the 1920s.

Per the United States Supreme Court's "Berger test" that states that to disqualify ANY judge in the United States of America: 1) a party files an affidavit claiming personal bias or prejudice demonstrating an "objectionable inclination or disposition of the judge" and 2) claim of bias is based on facts antedating the trial.

All 6 criminal MAGA insurrectionist and trump-loyalist U.S. Supreme Court Justices who've repeatedly and illegally ruled in donald j. trump's favor are as disqualified from issuing any rulings pertaining to donald j. trump (a German immigrant) as the United States Supreme Court ruled U.S. District Court Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis was when he attempted to deny Victor L. Berger (a German immigrant) from holding office for violating the Espionage Act and supporting or engaging in insurrection or rebellion against the United States of America.

The only misinformation that exists surrounding the Anderson vs. trump ruling is the belief that the MAGA SCOTUS ruling on federal enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment against donald j. trump settled the matter and handed him permanent immunity from prosecution should he ever commit the federal crime of attempting to hold federal office. In legal fact, MAGA SCOTUS' nonsensical ruling attempting to grant donald j. trump permanent immunity from prosecution for insurrection is grounds for immediate and permanent disbarment; as they're clearly attempting to legislate from the bench and prevent Congress from legislating in a way that's unfavorable to their presidential candidate.

This is the only pertinent and legally important part of the Anderson vs. trump ruling with regards to federal enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment against donald j. trump or any other insurrectionist committing the federal crime of attempting to hold office without first having their insurrectionist disqualification removed by a two-thirds vote of both houses:

Justice Sotomayor, Justice Kagan, and Justice Jackson Opinion on the Majority Ruling:

Yet the majority goes further. Even though “[a]ll nine Members of the Court” agree that this independent and sufficient ratioAnd MAGA SCOTUS is now permanently legally barred from ever addressing any matter pertaining to federal enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment against donald j. trump.nale resolves this case, five Justices go on. They decide novel constitutional questions to insulate this Court and petitioner from future controversy. Ante, at 13. Although only an individual State’s action is at issue here, the majority opines on which federal actors can enforce Section 3, and how they must do so. The majority announces that a disqualification for insurrection can occur only when Congress enacts a particular kind of legislation pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In doing so, the majority shuts the door on other potential means of federal enforcement. We cannot join an opinion that decides momentous and difficult issues unnecessarily, and we therefore concur only in the judgment.

Yet the Court continues on to resolve questions not before us. In a case involving no federal action whatsoever, the Court opines on how federal enforcement of Section 3 must proceed. Congress, the majority says, must enact legislation under Section 5 prescribing the procedures to “ ‘ “ascertain[ ] what particular individuals” ’ ” should be disqualified. Ante, at 5 (quoting Griffin’s Case, 11 F. Cas. 7, 26 (No. 5,815) (CC Va. 1869) (Chase, Circuit Justice)). These musings are as inadequately supported as they are gratuitous.

To start, nothing in Section 3’s text supports the majority’s view of how federal disqualification efforts must operate. Section 3 states simply that “[n]o person shall” hold certain positions and offices if they are oathbreaking insurrectionists. Amdt. 14. Nothing in that unequivocal bar suggests that implementing legislation enacted under Section 5 is “critical” (or, for that matter, what that word means in this context). Ante, at 5. In fact, the text cuts the opposite way. Section 3 provides that when an oathbreaking insurrectionist is disqualified, “Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.” It is hard to understand why the Constitution would require a congressional supermajority to remove a disqualification if a simple majority could nullify Section 3’s operation by repealing or declining to pass implementing legislation. Even petitioner’s lawyer acknowledged the “tension” in Section 3 that the majority’s view creates. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 31.

Similarly, nothing else in the rest of the Fourteenth Amendment supports the majority’s view. Section 5 gives Congress the “power to enforce [the Amendment] by appropriate legislation.” Remedial legislation of any kind, however, is not required. All the Reconstruction Amendments (including the due process and equal protection guarantees and prohibition of slavery) “are self-executing,” meaning that they do not depend on legislation. City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U.S. 507, 524 (1997); see Civil Rights Cases, 109 U.S. 3, 20 (1883). Similarly, other constitutional rules of disqualification, like the two-term limit on the Presidency, do not require implementing legislation. See, e.g., Art. II, §1, cl. 5 (Presidential Qualifications); Amdt. 22 (Presidential Term Limits). Nor does the majority suggest otherwise. It simply creates a special rule for the insurrection disability in Section 3.

The majority is left with next to no support for its requirement that a Section 3 disqualification can occur only pursuant to legislation enacted for that purpose. It cites Griffin’s Case, but that is a nonprecedential, lower court opinion by a single Justice in his capacity as a circuit judge. See ante, at 5 (quoting 11 F. Cas., at 26). Once again, even petitioner’s lawyer distanced himself from fully embracing this case as probative of Section 3’s meaning. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 35–36. The majority also cites Senator Trumbull’s statements that Section 3 “ ‘provide[d] no means for enforcing’ ” itself. Ante, at 5 (quoting Cong. Globe, 41st Cong., 1st Sess., 626 (1869)). The majority, however, neglects to mention the Senator’s view that “[i]t is the [F]ourteenth [A]mendment that prevents a person from holding office,” with the proposed legislation simply “affor[ding] a more efficient and speedy remedy” for effecting the disqualification. Cong. Globe, 41st Cong., 1st Sess., at 626–627.

Ultimately, under the guise of providing a more “complete explanation for the judgment,” ante, at 13, the majority resolves many unsettled questions about Section 3. It forecloses judicial enforcement of that provision, such as might occur when a party is prosecuted by an insurrectionist and raises a defense on that score. The majority further holds that any legislation to enforce this provision must prescribe certain procedures “ ‘tailor[ed]’ ” to Section 3, ante, at 10, ruling out enforcement under general federal statutes requiring the government to comply with the law. By resolving these and other questions, the majority attempts to insulate all alleged insurrectionists from future challenges to their holding federal office.

“What it does today, the Court should have left undone.” Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98, 158 (2000) (Breyer, J., dissenting). The Court today needed to resolve only a single question: whether an individual State may keep a Presidential candidate found to have engaged in insurrection off its ballot. The majority resolves much more than the case before us. Although federal enforcement of Section 3 is in no way at issue, the majority announces novel rules for how that enforcement must operate. It reaches out to decide Section 3 questions not before us, and to foreclose future efforts to disqualify a Presidential candidate under that provision. In a sensitive case crying out for judicial restraint, it abandons that course.

Section 3 serves an important, though rarely needed, role in our democracy. The American people have the power to vote for and elect candidates for national office, and that is a great and glorious thing. The men who drafted and ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, however, had witnessed an “insurrection [and] rebellion” to defend slavery. §3. They wanted to ensure that those who had participated in that insurrection, and in possible future insurrections, could not return to prominent roles. Today, the majority goes beyond the necessities of this case to limit how Section 3 can bar an oathbreaking insurrectionist from becoming President. Although we agree that Colorado cannot enforce Section 3, we protest the majority’s effort to use this case to define the limits of federal enforcement of that provision. Because we would decide only the issue before us, we concur only in the judgment.

What all of that means is that between now and December 17th, 2024, donald j. trump has no choice but to go to Congress and have 70 Democrats in the House of Representatives and 17 Democrats in the Senate vote to remove his insurrectionist disqualification, as he was ordered to do by SCOTUS on March 4th, 2024, or he's not legally the President Elect and cannot be inaugurated, sworn in, or hold federal office again on January 20, 2025. The clock is ticking!

Here's why this will work: donald trump's legal tactics are deny, attempt to wiggle out of it on technicalities, and delay, delay, delay. Well, from November 2023 to March 4, 2024, donald trump not only said that he was never an officer of the United States, but that he also never swore an oath to support the United States Constitution. And then he said that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment says nothing about running for office, only holding office, and since he's only running for office, nothing can keep him off the ballot. And that's where this has finally caught up to him.

SCOTUS illegally took the case to begin with. SCOTUS was required to kick the case back to Congress immediately to force a two-thirds of both houses vote to remove donald trump's insurrectionist disqualification. But they illegally denied Congress the ability to vote on it at the time, illegally legislated from the bench to keep donald trump on the ballot by illegally amending Section 3 of the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution, and dismissed the clear two-thirds vote requirement to replace it with "Congress must pass new legislation and amend Section 3 of the 14th Amendment in order to keep insurrectionists off of the ballot and out of office in the future. All six MAGA SCOTUS injustices can now be immediately and permanently disbarred from ever judging or practicing law anywhere in the United States now and in the future for that illegal legislating from the bench; because the U.S. Constitution clearly says that the Judiciary can never interfere with Congress legislating, or with the President enforcing the laws of the United States.

donald trump and his allies figured that was a win, that SCOTUS couldn't be challenged, that the Democrats could never get legislation passed to keep him off the ballot or from holding office again, and the matter was dropped. But that's where he was wrong; because Section 3 of the 14th Amendment still reads, and only legally reads, that the only way an insurrectionist can hold federal office again is by a two-thirds vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate; and that means that now that donald trump can't try and use the technicality of "I'm not even trying to hold office, I'm just running for office," and he's actively trying to hold office with no technicality wiggle room, donald trump's only path to the White House is to have 70 Democrats in the House of Representatives and 17 Democrats in the Senate vote to remove his insurrectionist disqualification by December 17th, 2017; and his favorite tactic of delay, delay, delay won't work because delaying means he can't be inaugurated, sworn in, and serve as the 47th President of the United States; and that means Kamala Harris would become 47th President of the United States by default.

If anyone is interested in fighting another trump presidency, contact every Democrat representative in the House of Representatives and the Senate and remind them that donald j. trump cannot be inaugurated, sworn in, and be the 47th President of the United States on January 20, 2025 unless 70 Democrats in the House of Representatives and 17 Democrats in the Senate vote to remove his insurrectionist disqualification before December 17, 2024. Many of them have online contact forms. You may have to enter an address near their local office in their district for the contact form to go through, but I know they're going to want to be reminded of this by as many people as possible in order to save humanity and American democracy from donald trump. Plus, Kamala Harris can be contacted via the White House Vice President contact form; and as a presidential candidate and the President of the Senate, she and President Biden can do a lot to enforce donald trump having to have his insurrectionist disqualification removed by a two-thirds vote of the House of Representatives and the Senate before December 17, 2024.

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charyou-tree · 3 months ago

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For anyone that wants to read it directly:

Some key points:

Jack Smith's team says that the superseding indictment was "presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case," which separately charged Trump with the same crimes.

Rather than go through the evidentiary hearing in DC, Jack Smith goes back to a grand jury and gets a superseding indictment based on what it believes satisfies the Supreme Court immunity decision. This resets the case, requires a new arraignment, and Court process.

The news is an entirely new grand jury decided to re-indict Trump on the same election subversion counts without seeing the evidence that the Supreme Court barred from consideration—i.e. the DOJ corruption stuff and any other conspiring with federal officials.

Jack Smith added "private" to all of the co-conspirators, to highlight their clearly non-official roles — and got rid of Jeffrey Clark, the DOJ guy who was willing to be acting AG and pursue Trump's fake election fraud claims if Trump let him.

Judge Tanya Chutkan remains the judge on the case

Trump is so fucked in the election interference case that even though the supreme court threw him a bone and ruled that "official acts" are subject to presidential immunity, a completely new case with all such "official acts" removed from evidence was so strong that a second, completely separate, grad jury felt there was a compelling case to indict him.

The wheels of justice turn slowly, but he's running out of options.

The only way Trump doesn't spend the rest of his natural life in prison is by winning the election and installing himself as dictator, and he knows this. If we defeat him and his fascist goons this November we shouldn't be hearing from them again.

#election interference #fascism #trump #voting #jack smith #supreme court

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wilwheaton · 4 months ago

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The violent attack on Congress on 6 January 2021, and all the ancillary attempts to steal the 2020 election, were a coup attempt led from the executive branch of the federal government with support from Republicans in the legislative branch. 1 July 2024 – this Thursday – was a more successful coup attempt orchestrated by six judges of the judicial branch. “With fear for our democracy, I dissent,” wrote Justice Sonia Sotomayor in an opinion joined by justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan, after the US supreme court’s conservative majority ruled that Donald Trump holds “absolute immunity” for “official acts” done while president. Part of what’s shocking about the state of the union right now is that an entire party and the US supreme court’s conservative majority have abandoned almost everything – the truth, the rule of law, their own legitimacy, their place in history and the fate of the nation – to serve one man. They could not have picked a more outrageous man to throw their weight and reputations behind – a psychotic clown who’s also an indicted felon found liable in civil court for sexual assault, barred from doing business in New York, a stealer of state secrets, a would-be thief of an election and the instigator of a violent attack on the legislative branch of government and the constitutionally mandated transition of power after an election. A grifter who in 2016 won a minority victory in a corrupted election – his conviction earlier this year was on charges for one small part of that corruption. A man who has gloated about seizing dictatorial powers and never letting go and a worshiper of tyrants denounced by dozens of his former cabinet members and senior staffers. January 6 was an attack on the constitution and so was 1 July. That no one is above the law has been a pillar of this nation and a cherished value since the 18th century; to knock it down in the 21st destabilizes structures and values that have stood these two centuries and more. A president with total immunity poses obvious threats to the rule of law, the balance of powers and democracy itself, and if that president is the vindictive criminal on the Republican ticket the dangers are immediate and obvious.

The US supreme court just completed Trump’s January 6 coup attempt

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reality-detective · 4 months ago

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The Dems/MSM are framing this whole thing incorrectly.

The Supreme Court did not “grant” Trump immunity.

Presidents have always had immunity, the Supreme Court just had to overrule the corrupt Biden regime’s unprecedented lawfare against a political opponent.

The Dems/MSM are making it seem like the Supreme Court just made this up out of nowhere, when in reality, it was the Biden regime who crossed the line and have been violating the law, by weaponizing the DOJ for political means and election interference. The Supreme Court merely did their jobs, and put the Biden regime in check.

The Dems never cared about the “rule of law”. They are just throwing a fit, because their Gestapo-like election interference operation has been shut down. Their entire campaign strategy revolved around Trump being behind bars, and now it’s blowing up in their faces. 🤔

#pay attention #educate yourselves #educate yourself #knowledge is power #reeducate yourself #reeducate yourselves #think about it #think for yourselves #think for yourself #do your homework #do your own research #do some research #ask yourself questions #question everything #rule of law #law and order #constitutional law #government corruption

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simply-ivanka · 5 days ago

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Democrats, Blame Yourselves

Voters on Tuesday repudiated the results of progressive policies.

By The Editorial Board Wall Street Journal

If Democrats want some sage counsel on how to recover from their electoral drubbing on Tuesday, we suggest they recall that classic relationship breakup line from Seinfeld’s George Costanza: “It’s not you; it’s me.”

The temptation after a defeat this humiliating is to hunt for scapegoats—fading Joe Biden, untutored Kamala Harris, Russian disinformation, benighted and racist voters. They’d be wiser to look in the mirror.

The defeat was less a resounding endorsement of Mr. Trump than a repudiation of progressive governance. America rejected the consequences of left-wing policies. Democrats lost ground from 2020 across many demographic groups, according to the exit polls. Even women moved percentage points closer to Mr. Trump. How could Democrats possibly lose like this to a man they think is Hitler? Allow us to offer a list for liberal reflection:

• The failure of Bidenomics. Democrats once understood that private business drives growth and higher incomes. Sometime in the 21st century, they came to believe that government spending creates wealth—via the “Keynesian multiplier” and other nostrums.

Thus they passed, on a party-line vote, a $1.9 trillion pandemic-relief bill that wasn’t really needed, fueling the highest inflation in decades. This robbed millions of workers of real wage gains, which haunted Democrats on Tuesday as two-thirds of voters said they were unhappy with the state of the economy.

• Cultural imperialism. Democrats took their 2020 victory as an invitation to turn identity politics into woke policy. They stood with transgender activists instead of parents who don’t want boys to play girls sports or elementary teachers to pass out pronoun pins. Republicans hammered Democrats with ads that attacked Democratic votes against tying federal funds to transgender school policies.

Democrats also began using the term “Latinx,” which sounds to many Spanish-speakers like illiterate cultural imperialism from elites. Could that and other woke policies have played a role in Mr. Trump winning 46% of the Hispanic vote and 55% of Latino men, according to the exit polls?

• Regulatory coercion. In pursuit of their climate obsessions, Democrats pushed coercive mandates, including an EPA rule effectively saying that by 2032 only 30% of new car sales can be gas-powered models. The EV mandate caused layoffs among auto workers in Michigan that Mr. Trump attacked in TV ads and on the stump.

• Lawfare. Democrats used Mr. Trump’s divisiveness to escalate against him at every turn. After calling him a Russian stooge and impeaching him twice, Mr. Biden labeled him a “fascist” and Democrats tried to bar him from the ballot.

They criminally indicted Mr. Trump—four times—and targeted his family business with a civil suit. They convicted him in New York, under an elected Democratic prosecutor who stretched the law to turn misdemeanors into felonies, in a case that wouldn’t have been brought against another businessman.

The strategy turned Mr. Trump into a martyr to GOP voters and cemented his support in the Republican primaries.

• Breaking democratic norms. Democrats decided to use taxes from plumbers and welders to forgive college loans for lawyers and grad students in grievance studies. When the Supreme Court struck Mr. Biden’s effort down as an abuse of power, he tried again and taunted the Court to stop him.

Democrats tried to override the Senate filibuster to seize control of the nation’s voting laws and impose practices such as ballot harvesting, as Mr. Biden raged that his opponents were creating “Jim Crow 2.0.”

They tried to override the filibuster to pass a national abortion law that would go beyond Roe v. Wade. They promised to override the filibuster in 2025 to bulldoze the High Court. They ran Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema out of the party for disagreeing.

All of this and other progressive preoccupations caused Democrats to lose sight of the larger public interest. They came to believe, backed by the mainstream press, that voters would tolerate it all because Mr. Trump was simply unacceptable.

This opened the door for Mr. Trump to remind voters that they were better off under his policies four years earlier. Mr. Trump won more than 72 million ballots. He improved his standing with minority voters. He gained votes even in Democratic states.

Voters were telling Democrats on Tuesday that the party has wandered into ideological fever swamps where most Americans don’t want to go. Winning those voters again will require more than firing back up the anti-Trump “resistance.”

#trump #trump 2024 #president trump #ivanka #repost #america first #americans first #america #democrats #donald trump

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asidian · 7 days ago

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Go Vote

I don't often talk politics on this blog, but I'm going to for a minute.

This is, bar none, the most important election of our lifetimes.

Our options are between a career prosecutor and a career criminal. A person who held rapists accountable and a rapist. An intelligent, articulate woman in the prime of health and an elderly man whose mental facilities barely allow him to string together a coherent sentence. A person who has a genuine plan to make life better for millions of Americans and a grifter who is only in it to line his own pockets. A racist who espouses Hitler's talking points and a competent, experienced woman who will work for all Americans.

Whoever the next president is will likely get to decide two Supreme Court justices. This will determine the fate of the court for a literal generation.

The rights of trans people are on the line. The rights of anyone with a uterus to have a say in what happens to their own body is on the line. My right to remain married to my wife is on the line.

Palestinians are begging people to vote for Harris because Trump's policies will be so much worse for them.

I understand that some people are inclined to vote third party. This is not the election to do that. In 2016, people thought there was a big enough lead for Clinton to enable them to abstain from voting or to vote third party in protest. That's how we got Trump in the first place. Those extra votes would have made all the difference.

Much as we may wish our system was more open, much as we may wish we had more options, now is the worst possible time to advocate for that.

We have exactly two choices today. One of them is going to make life measurably worse for millions of people. One of them may not be perfect but will try her best and may make inroads toward a better life for countless Americans.

Please get out there and vote blue all down your ballot. For President, and Congress, and every single local position.

We need to slap the Republicans on their proverbial knuckles so hard that their free-press-revoking, fascist, rights-stealing heads spin. So hard they realize that our country will not stand aside and let them take it where they want to take it.

I am begging all of my US followers of voting age:

Please go vote.

#us politics #election 2024

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mariacallous · 29 days ago

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Eleven abortion referendums will be in front of voters in 10 states this Election Day — the largest number of pro-choice amendments the country has ever seen during a single election cycle.

From red states like Missouri and South Dakota to blue states like New York, the abortion rights ballot measures could have a monumental impact on access throughout the country. Over 20 states have enacted abortion bans since the Supreme Court repealed federal abortion protections in 2022. Citizen-led initiatives, like most of this year’s abortion rights measures, have become the response to many of the near-total abortion bans passed by Republican-controlled state legislatures.

“This is a public health crisis that we have right now,” said Chris Melody Fields Figueredo, executive director at the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, who has worked with campaigns in all 10 states where an abortion rights amendment is in play. “The citizens, in the absence of their local elected officials, are addressing it. They’re taking power into their own hands.”

In 2022, there were six ballot measures addressing abortion, which at the time was the most in a single year. Voters protected abortion care in every state it was on the ballot during that election cycle, including in deeply Republican states like Kentucky. Ohio, a state with a long and extreme anti-abortion history, also voted to codify abortion rights into its state constitution just last year.

This year’s ballot measures range in their approaches to and levels of abortion protections. Nebraska will have two competing abortion measures, one to restrict access and one to expand. Maryland, New York and Colorado are all seeking to codify abortion protections throughout pregnancy — exceptions to the rest of the measures, which would primarily enshrine access until viability or around 24 weeks. Colorado’s Amendment 79 would also allow the use of public funds for abortion care. Missouri’s Amendment 3 would restore abortion access until viability and protect women from being prosecuted for pregnancy outcomes like miscarriage and stillbirth — a particularly progressive measure in a notoriously anti-abortion state.

If passed, most amendments would generally go into effect shortly after Election Day or at the start of 2025. Measures in Montana and South Dakota would tentatively go into effect in July 2025, while Nevada’s may not until 2026. There will be litigation in any state that passes a pro-choice measure; this is likely the time when states will bring legal challenges against successful ballot initiatives and fight to keep other abortion regulations like waiting periods and other long-standing targeted restrictions on abortion providers.

The historic number of abortion rights measures is emblematic of just how politically prominent abortion care has become. And despite conservatives who claim to want to “leave abortion to the states” since Roe fell, many did everything in their power to stop voters from weighing in on abortion rights measures.

“This is not just a reproductive freedom issue, it’s also a democracy issue,” Fields Figueredo said. “It’s about who has power and who has the determination to control what happens to their body.”

Arizona

Arizona’s Proposition 139 seeks to enshrine access to abortion up until fetal viability, or around 24 weeks, into the state constitution. If passed, the state of Arizona will not be able to limit access to abortion before viability unless the government “has a compelling reason and does so in the least restrictive way possible,” according to the measure. Under the amendment, also known as the Right to Abortion Initiative, abortions would be allowed after fetal viability only when the health or life of the pregnant person is at risk. The measure also bars future laws from punishing anyone who assists someone getting an abortion.

The state currently has a 15-week abortion ban in effect with no exceptions for rape or incest. Earlier this year, the Arizona state Supreme Court greenlit a near-total abortion ban that the Republican-controlled legislature voted to repeal.

The measure needs a simple majority to pass.

Colorado

Colorado’s pro-choice amendment would create a constitutional right to abortion care throughout pregnancy and mandate that Medicaid and private insurance companies cover abortion care. Amendment 79, also known as the Right to Abortion and Health Insurance Coverage Initiative, would repeal a 1984 addition in the Colorado constitution which barred the use of public funds for abortion care.

The measure is distinct for two reasons. Nearly every other state where abortion is on the ballot is trying to enshrine access until fetal viability, not throughout pregnancy. Additionally, requiring that abortion care be a covered service under all health insurance plans is a step pro-choice groups have been pushing for for decades.

The state does not currently restrict abortion at any point in pregnancy, making it a refuge for those who need abortion care later in pregnancy. The measure needs at least 55% of the vote to pass.

Florida

Amendment 4 would restore abortion access until viability by adding language to the Florida constitution that states “no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” The ballot measure, also titled Amendment to Limit Government Interference with Abortion, does not change the state’s current law that requires parental consent for a minor to obtain an abortion.

Since the Supreme Court repealed Roe v. Wade in 2022, the state passed a 15-week abortion ban with no exceptions for rape or incest and then a six-week ban with exceptions for rape or incest. Under the leadership of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), Florida has become one of the most extreme anti-abortion states in the country. If voters restore abortion access until viability, it would reestablish Florida as a critical safe haven in the Southeast, where most states have near-total abortion bans.

Florida has a supermajority requirement for citizen-led ballot initiatives, meaning the amendment needs to get at least 60% of the vote to pass.

Maryland

Maryland’s Question 1 guarantees the right to reproductive freedom, defined in the measure as “the ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue, or end one’s own pregnancy.” The amendment specifies that the government cannot “directly or indirectly, deny, burden, or abridge the right unless justified by a compelling State interest achieved by the least restrictive means.”

The Right to Reproductive Freedom Amendment would codify Maryland’s current law, which allows access to abortion care at any point in pregnancy and has made the state a safe haven for abortion access. It’s an exception to most other pro-choice measures on the ballot this year because it enshrines abortion access throughout pregnancy without limits. Colorado and New York are the only two other states where pro-choice groups are hoping to codify abortion access throughout pregnancy.

The amendment would pass with a simple majority.

Missouri

Amendment 3 would codify the right to reproductive freedom, including abortion access until fetal viability, into the Missouri constitution. The measure would protect the right to make decisions about other reproductive health issues including birth control, prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, miscarriage care and “respectful birthing conditions.” The Right to Reproductive Freedom initiative states plainly that, if passed, Missourians cannot be prosecuted for their pregnancy outcomes including miscarriage, stillbirth and abortion.

The initiative is extremely progressive for a deep-red state that has such a long anti-abortion history. The state only had three abortion clinics in 2017, and the last clinic closed shortly after Roe fell. Missouri currently has a near-total abortion ban with an exception to save the life of a pregnant person.

If the amendment passes, it would be a huge win for reproductive rights groups, and Missouri could become one of the few Midwest states with abortion access. But the state would still have a lot of work to do since many of the prior abortion regulations, such as Missouri’s 72-hour waiting period and ban on telemedicine, would need to be challenged in court.

The measure needs a simple majority to pass.

Montana

Montana’s Right to Abortion Initiative would enshrine the “right to make and carry out decisions about one’s own pregnancy, including the right to abortion” until fetal viability. The government could regulate abortion after viability except in cases where abortion care is needed to protect the life or health of the pregnant person. The measure also protects Montanans from being prosecuted for “actual, potential, perceived or alleged pregnancy outcomes,” as well as protecting anyone who helps someone seeking abortion care.

The amendment would codify the state’s current abortion law, which restricts abortion care after 24 weeks. Montana voters need a simple majority to pass the amendment.

Nebraska

Nebraska will have two ballot measures addressing abortion, one in favor of abortion rights and one against. It’s the first time competing abortion measures will be on a state ballot since the Supreme Court repealed Roe.

The pro-choice amendment, also known as the Right to Abortion Initiative, would enshrine abortion access until fetal viability into the state constitution. The measure opposed to abortion rights seeks to codify the state’s current 12-week abortion ban, or a ban on abortion after the first trimester. The anti-choice initiative does have exceptions for rape, incest and in cases of a medical emergency.

Both amendments need a simple majority to pass.

Nevada

Nevada’s Question 6 would enshrine the right to abortion access until viability and when necessary to protect the health or life of the pregnant person throughout pregnancy. The amendment states that the right to abortion until viability “shall not be denied, burdened, or infringed upon unless justified by a compelling state interest that is achieved by the least restrictive means.”

The measure, which needs a simple majority to pass, would enshrine Nevada’s current abortion law into the state constitution.

New York

Proposal 1 would amend New York’s Equal Rights Amendment to include protections for “pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy” which would codify abortion protections throughout pregnancy. While it does not explicitly state abortion protections, including protections for pregnancy outcomes and reproductive decisions in the state constitution would safeguard abortion access in the state.

The state’s Equal Rights Amendment currently criminalizes the denial of rights to people based on “race, color, creed or religion.” Proposal 1 would add ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression, as well as reproductive health outcomes.

The initiative is noteworthy because, if passed, it will be the first equal rights amendment to include protections for pregnant people and pregnancy outcomes. Abortion is currently legal in New York until viability. Expanding the equal rights amendment to include pregnant people would codify the current law.

South Dakota

South Dakota’s Amendment G breaks down abortion protections by trimesters, similar to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. The initiative would codify abortion protections until 13 weeks or through the first trimester, and then allow the government to regulate abortion in the second trimester “only in ways that are reasonably related to the physical health of the pregnant woman.” In the third trimester, the state could regulate or ban abortions except in instances when the health or life of the pregnant person is at risk.

If the measure passes it would be a huge win for abortion rights groups because the state currently has a near-total abortion ban with no exceptions other than to save the life of a pregnant person. Pro-choice groups would still have a long way to go in restoring abortion access in the state, however. Even before Roe fell, South Dakota only had one abortion clinic left and zero in-state providers, and some regulations — like the state’s 72-hour waiting period before being able to access care — would likely need to be challenged in court.

The initiative needs a simple majority to pass.

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reasonsforhope · 1 year ago

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I keep seeing news about charges and what-not being piled onto Trump, and all I can keep saying to myself is "but is he going to experience one (1) single consequence of this?" So... is there any iota of a hope that something could come of this circus that will make the slightest ding in his capacity to run in 2024?

So, the answer to this is a bit complicated - partly because there are a lot of factors and a long time scale, and partly because it depends on how you define "consequences"

If you mean "any serious consequences at all," good news, that has already happened!

If you need to catch up on the whole "cases against Trump" situation, read this: The Cases Against Trump: A Guide. Via The Atlantic, November 1, 2023

1. The New York Fraud Case

A judge has ordered that the Trump Organization must be dissolved in a ruling that is being widely described as a "corporate death penalty." This is an incredibly rare ruling, and a huge deal.

The details will take a while to hash out - currently, Trump's kids are in the middle of testifying in a trial for this fraud case, but it's not to determine whether he's guilty - only the extent of the damages and the outline of how the org will be dissolved. It's extraordinarily unlikely Trump will be able to get out of this one. And high up on the list of things he's probably going to lose? Trump Tower itself.

Now, admittedly, this actually isn't because of, you know, the whole attempted coup thing. It's because the Trump Organization's finances were built on decades of absolutely massive fraud - including the very wealth that Trump lied about in order to explain why people should vote for him.

Oh, and let's not forget that in this case, Donald Trump spent weeks absolutely shit talking the judge to try to "poison the jury pool" (make sure that people on the jury would go in with a negative opinion of the judge already). ONLY TO FIND OUT THAT THERE IS NO JURY IN THIS CASE because his attorneys forgot to request one, so the sole arbiter of his fate is the judge he just spent weeks absolutely slandering in an attempt to win over the jury! And all else aside, judges very infamously do not like being insulted

Oh yeah, and the prosecutors are seeking a permanent ban on Trump doing business in the state of New York

Fraud trial explainer (New York Times, no paywall) Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x

2. 14th Amendment Lawsuit

Okay so I did all the other sections first, then came back and wrote this one. It's shorter because of that, and because this issue is a lot newer and doesn't have nearly as much legal stuff or investigations going on yet.

What's happening here is that several states have people who are filing petitions and lawsuits to try to get Trump taken off the ballot for the 2024 election, under the 14th Amendment, which was passed in the aftermath of the Civil War and bars anyone who has committed insurrection from holding office.

So far (as of the first week of November, there are cases to kick Trump off the ballot in about 20 states. Oral arguments have started in Colorado and Minnesota.

Basically, my take on the short version is that this could happen, but we'll have to wait at least a few more months to see how likely it is.

However, even if it does go through, Trump would only be kicked off the ballot on a state by state basis. So, if Colorado kicks him off the ballot, he'll still be on the ballot in the other 49 states, and the process would have to be repeated in each one. Still, even if it was just one state, that could be a big deal, voting-wise - and if he gets kicked off the ballot in more than a couple states, he might not end up being the Republican nominee anymore, given the size of that disadvantage.

Correction, 6 min after posting: It's expected that if Trump DOES get kicked off the ballot in any state, the Supreme Court will hear the case and weigh in. The decision would be binding for all states. Supreme Court probably unlikely to ban Trump from the ballot since they cheated their way into a conservative supermajority and 3 of them are Trump appointees

Explainer: Trial to kick Trump off the ballot in Colorado Explainer: Strengths and weaknesses of cases to kick Trump off the ballot Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x

3. The Classified Documents Case

So, the fraud case above is actually a civil case (that is, not a criminal case). The classified documents case, however, is a criminal case, and it's arguably the one most likely to lead to legal and political consequences for Trump, in large part because everything's very clear cut.

Like, Trump has literally admitted he retained classified documents on purpose - which is super against the law! Trump is just arguing a variety of nonexistent technicalities for why that law doesn't apply to him. But he did it! We know he did! We have photos of classified documents stored in the Mar-a-Lago bathroom! We have testimony from the employees he ordered to secretly move the boxes before the FBI probe. We have records proving he asked Mar-a-Lago's IT guy about erasing the surveillance footage of the move! We even have proof that a) he stole nuclear secrets, and b) a recording of him waving around the "plans of attack," bragging about them to other people!

All super damning.

(Post continues below, at length; sources at the end of each section.)

And another thing that's extremely key: Trump is charged in this case with violating the Espionage Act. And the Espionage Act explicitly does not give a single fuck about why you retained documents, or whether there's any proof you intended to show anyone. Any and all hoarding of national defense documents is illegal under the Espionage Act - EVEN if they're not classified, which is great since "I declassified them with my brain" (not how it works) is Trump's main defense here.

So, this case is basically the surest criminal conviction - and the most likely to have electoral consequences. Partly because Republicans, as few issues as they care about, generally are security hawks - "Trump stole nuclear secrets and showed them to people" is giving Repubs pause in a way that the insurrection just isn't, probably esp in the military and ex-military demographic.

Trump could also serve jail time if convicted in this case (which again he probably will be).

However, violating the Espionage Act doesn't ban you from running for or holding public office, which imho seems like a pretty major oversight.

Classified documents case explainer Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x

4. The Insurrection

So, this is where things get really complicated, because the case is complicated and so many things about it are so unprecedented.

There are two different cases here: a criminal case in the state of Georgia and a federal criminal case (that's the one run by Special Counsel Jack Smith, who is also running the classified documents case).

I definitely can't summarize all of this huge situation here, but here's some key points re: whether there will be legal consequences:

I actually have a pretty high level of trust in Jack Smith, in large part due to his record: he's serving as special prosecutor while on sabbatical from his normal job of prosecuting war crimes at the Hague. And he's specifically been prosecuting war crimes from the wars and genocides in former Yugoslavia in the 80s and 90s. That specifically gives me a lot of confidence because - as someone whose family is from the region - I think it's a really strong demonstration of his abilities. It means he has a lot of experience prosecuting high-level government and army officials, in a complicated, multi-year, multi-war conflict, where there were way more sides and factions than we have, along with way less documentary evidence (bc 90s), and a lot of history of political corruption and coverups. I find that really reassuring, especially the "experience prosecuting high-level government and army officials" thing in a situation with, shall we say, extremely contested and variable national leadership, during the course of multiple civil wars

"Schwendiman compared it to prosecuting Kosovo’s equivalent of Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton. “If you indict these people, you’re saying, ‘The founding fathers of Kosovo have committed atrocities, and I’m ready to prove it, in an independent court, with independent judges and rules that apply to everyone.’” And that was Kosovo's founding president. So yeah, I think Jack Smith can handle Trump. Source

Okay now to the points you might have actually heard of lol

The Georgia case is a state level case, which means that no matter what, Trump can't pardon himself in that case

The Georgia case is also charging Trump under the RICO act - aka the rackeeting act, usually used to prosecute organized crime. And convictions under the Georgia RICO Act come with MANDATORY jail time

I think the evidence here is pretty compelling, see: the congressional Jan 6 hearings

There is a pretty high chance that, in a massively unusual step, filming will be allowed inside the trial/hearings. This is HUGE, especially because Trump supporters would actually be watching it too (unlike, generally, the congressional hearings), and that evidence all laid out looks really goddamn bad

Also, if yesterday's fraud trial testimony is any indication, Trump is likely to end up yelling and screaming at the judge, etc. in the trial, which is going to look wildly unprofessional

The federal trial will be taking place in Washington DC, where it should be very doable to get a jury that isn't stuffed with Trump cronies (unlike, say, if the case was brought in Florida)

Trump has attempted witness tampering on a lot of occasions, and tried to poison the jury pool, and he got caught so now he's under a gag order that restricts what he can say re: both of those.

Important note: Jack Smith has brought the narrower of two possible cases against Trump. He's filed against Trump with several conspiracy charges, including "conspiracy against rights," which was historically created to prosecute the KKK for racial terrorism

However, Jack Smith did not actually charge Trump with inciting an insurrection. There are a lot of possible reasons for this, but it mostly boils down to the fact that "inciting an insurrection" is significantly less objectively provable, in this case, esp since "insurrection" isn't actually defined in the relevant law

So, Jack Smith has traded a broader case (the one including insurrection charges) for a case that is much simpler and quicker to argue, and that he's sure he can prove

Jack Smith absolutely knows that he has an effective deadline of November 2024 (aka the next election, because a Republican president would shut down the investigation immediately), and he's planning accordingly

Look. Federal prosecutors - and the prosecutors in Georgia and the other NY case, for bribery of porn star Stormy Daniels - would not be bringing these charges if they did not feel sure they would win. Democracy aside, if any of them lose their cases? That is almost guaranteed to end their careers. So they have a very vested self-interest in only taking on what they are absolutely sure they can prove

The judge in the federal Jan 6 trial is the judge who has given the harshest sentences against any of the Jan 6 rioters, and she is the only judge to have sentenced rioters to more time than the prosecutors asked for

Jan 6 charges against Trump, explainer Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x

A Very Hot Take: It might not be a bad thing that Trump is still allowed to run

So, this is my personal take on the situation - I acknowledge that it's a very hot take on the Left, and that I might well be wrong about this. I might be totally misreading the field here. But I genuinely do think that Trump being the Republican candidate for president could be a good thing, and in fact I'll genuinely worry significantly more if Trump isn't the Republican nominee for president.

The why all basically comes down to this: I think Trump will be easier to defeat in the 2024 general election.

Again, look, I may totally be misreading this, and that would be really bad, but here are my thoughts:

Trump is super popular with the far right base - but that same strength makes him a huge liability in the general election. You CAN'T WIN a presidential election without the support of independents and moderates (including "moderates"). This is a really common problem for Republican candidates, actually: the more they move to the right to win the core Republican base, the more they risk hurting their chances in the general election

Independents and moderate Republicans - again, who Trump needs to win with to get the presidency - are significantly more likely to care about, you know, all the stealing classified documents and committing treason things

I can't think of anything that will guarantee people on the left get their asses to the polls better than "Vote or Trump is president again." A lot of the time, with someone who hasn't been president before, voters can lie to themselves and go "Oh it won't be that bad once he's in office," esp among moderates. But now we have proof that isn't the case!

Look, I don't know if Trump is getting dementia or what, but his faculties really do appear to be declining. They'll likely be significantly worse in another year - his speeches are already way worse than there were in 2016. He just can't track what he's saying well enough anymore. This makes it harder for him to make his case to the electorate

He's also the only actual Repub candidate that's about the same age as Biden - which will do a lot to stop the Right from using Biden's age as an effective weapon to get a Repub in office

Honestly, my biggest worry is that DeSantis will be the Republican nominee. I am way more scared of Biden vs. DeSantis than Biden vs. Trump.

Reasons I would absolutely rather Biden face Trump than DeSantis include: DeSantis is way younger and he has way less baggage. Because he hasn't been president yet, voters can do that self-delusion thing that he won't be that bad - that he'll be better than Trump - and that unlike Trump's, his plans will work. People on the left and in the center often don't know who he is yet, and there's not such a huge current of electoral energy to get them to the polls. And most of all - unlike Trump, DeSantis is actually smart. And as part of that, he is capable of a deep and absolutely premeditated cruelty that Trump just doesn't have the attention span or the patience for. Biggest example: actually literally kidnapping undocumented immigrants and sending them to Martha's Vineyard, and all the awfulness that went along with that, including the part where he started a goddamned trend.

Nikki Haley I'm less worried about because her core support base - conservatives - is also the country's core support base for misogyny. I hate to be glad about misogyny, but it genuinely would make it harder for her to turn out ultraconservative votes, especially evangelicals.

Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x

So, yeah, all told I don't actually have "Trump still gets to run for president" super high on the list of things I'm worried/mad about.

Also worth saying that we don't want just being indicted (aka charged with a crime) to disqualify people from running for office, because then all Republicans (or anyone) would have to do to disqualify an opposing candidate is find literally any excuse to charge them with something

But back to your original question! I genuinely DO think he'll face legal consequences, and I genuinely DO think he'll probably face jail time. Which obviously I am rooting for very hard

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robertreich · 1 year ago

Video

youtube

Does the Constitution Ban Trump from Running Again?

Donald Trump should not be allowed on the ballot.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment prohibits anyone who has held public office and taken an oath to protect the Constitution from holding office again if they “have engaged in insurrection” against the United States.

This key provision was enacted after the Civil War to prevent those who rose up against our democracy from ever being allowed to hold office again.

This applies to Donald Trump. He cannot again be entrusted with public office. He led an insurrection!

He refused to concede the results of the 2020 election, claiming it was stolen, even when many in his inner circle, including his own attorney general, told him it was not.

Trump then pushed state officials to change vote counts, hatched a plot to name fake electors, tried to pressure his vice president into refusing to certify the Electoral College votes, had his allies seek access to voting-machine data, and summoned his supporters to attack the capitol on January 6th to disrupt the formal recognition of the presidential election results.

And then he waited HOURS, reportedly watching the violence on TV, before telling his supporters to go home — despite pleas from his staff, Republican lawmakers, and even Fox News.

If this isn’t the behavior of an insurrectionist, I don’t know what is.

Can there be any doubt that Trump will again try to do whatever it takes to regain power, even if it’s illegal and unconstitutional?

If anything, given all the MAGA election deniers in Congress and in the states, Trump is less constrained than he was in 2020. And more power hungry.

Trump could face criminal charges for inciting an insurrection, but that’s not necessary to bar him from the ballot.

Secretaries of State and other chief election officers across the country have the power to determine whether candidates meet the qualifications for office. They have a constitutional duty to keep Trump off the ballot — based on the clear text of the U.S. Constitution.

Some might argue that voters should be able to decide whether candidates are fit for office, even if they’re dangerous. But the Constitution sets the bar for what disqualifies someone from being president. Candidates must be at least 35 years old and a natural-born U.S. citizen. And they must also not have engaged in insurrection after they previously took an oath of office to defend the Constitution.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment has already been used to disqualify an insurrectionist from continuing to hold public office in New Mexico, with the state’s Supreme Court upholding the ruling.

This is not about partisanship. If a Democrat attempts to overthrow the government, they should not be allowed on ballots either.

Election officials must keep Donald Trump off the ballot in 2024.

Democracy cannot survive if insurrectionists hold power in our government.

#youtube #video #videos #Donald Trump #politics #election

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palmtreepalmtree · 8 months ago

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This is honestly still so shocking to me. As a California lawyer, I feel like it's difficult to understate the impact of John Eastman's fall.

Before Trump, John Eastman was a fixture of the California legal community. He was the Dean of Chapman University's law school for years. He was regularly interviewed in local media to get the conservative legal viewpoint, and even though I almost always disagreed with his positions, his reasoning was usually cogent and thoughtful. He clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas for fuck's sake (this is not a thing that stupid, sloppy, or thoughtless people can achieve or do--you can have bad and seriously wrong opinions, sure, but you can't be thoughtless).

I swear though, it sometimes feels like the entire conservative base has been captured by some kind of mania. He continues to insist that his prosecution is politically motivated. Even as his own witnesses collapsed on the lies he continues to peddle:

Testifying in Eastman’s defense was Michael Gableman, a former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who has stated the election was stolen. But at the trial, Gableman admitted that his own 14-month inquiry into the election failed to prove that fraud cost Trump the election.

Another Eastman witness, John Yoo, a longtime friend and a Berkeley Law professor, testified that Joe Biden had won the White House “fair and square” and that Pence had “unassailable grounds” in refusing to reject electoral votes.

I mean, I guess at this point he just has to go all in on the lie. He allegedly says that his legal fees are going to cost him between $3 to $3.5 million and he's raised something like $500k for his legal defense.

But this doesn't sound like someone who is lying. It sounds like someone in a fucking cult:

[Eastman] said the bar trial was “extraordinary and unprecedented” but gave him a chance to present wider evidence of election fraud than had been previously aired. “It was eye-opening for a lot of people about the amount of illegality that we exposed during that trial,” Eastman said.

My dude, the Judge issued a 128 page ruling that found you guilty of 10 out of 11 counts of misconduct. Exactly what did you expose except your own ass?

Eastman portrays himself as a battling patriot who has been subjected to “false narratives and calumnies.” He said he is the victim of “lawfare,” an attempt to silence unpopular views with legal machinery.

“We are in a rather significant fight, and for whatever reason, I am the lead point of the spear in that fight, and I am taking it on, as I think my duty as a citizen requires,” he said. “We’ll do what it takes.”

My god, someone needs to fucking deprogram this guy.

Anyhow, this continues to be insane to me.

#i used to think the truth was somewhere in the middle #but the right has gone so far off the deep end #i don't even know where the middle is #can i even see the middle #just gonna stay over here on the left

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allthebrazilianpolitics · 1 year ago

Text

BREAKING: Brazil court votes to bar Bolsonaro from running for office

Brazil’s top elections court voted Friday to bar Jair Bolsonaro from running for office for eight years — a period that covers the next presidential election — for making what members of the panel said were claims he knew to be false about the integrity of the country’s voting systems.

As president, the “Trump of the Tropics” repeatedly asserted without evidence that the voting systems in Latin America’s largest country were vulnerable to fraud. With the vote of Judge Cármen Lúcia Friday afternoon, the seven-member Superior Electoral Court reached a majority to convict the right-wing populist of abuse of power for undermining faith in the country’s young democracy.

The ruling, if it survives a planned Supreme Court appeal, means Bolsonaro, 68, won’t be able to run for president until the 2030 election, when he’ll be 75. It’s the first time in the court’s 90-year history that it has applied the ban to a former president.

Bolsonaro, aides and allies anticipated the result.

#brazil #politics #brazilian politics #brazilian elections #superior electoral court #mod nise da silveira #image description in alt

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patriottruth · 3 days ago

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This is a reminder that on March 4th, 2024, the Supreme Court of the United States ordered donald j. trump to have 87 Democrats in both houses of Congress remove his insurrectionist disqualification from ever holding any federal office again. He failed to do so prior to November 5, 2024.

Here's a compilation of evidence I'm being asked for that I pulled together from Wikipedia:

On March 4, 2024, the Supreme Court in Trump v. Anderson reversed the Colorado Supreme Court decision, holding that Congress determines eligibility under Section 3 for federal officeholders and states may only bar candidates from state office.

While all nine justices agreed that the Fourteenth Amendment grants this power to the federal government, and not to the individual states, two separate opinions were issued. Justice Amy Coney Barrett concurred in the Court's decision that states cannot enforce Section 3 against federal officials, but wrote that the court should not have addressed "the complicated question whether federal legislation is the exclusive vehicle through which Section 3 can be enforced." Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, in an opinion co-signed by all three Justices, concurred in the judgment, but said that the court went beyond what was needed for the case and should not have declared that Congress has the exclusive power to decide Section 3 eligibility questions, stating that the Court's opinion had decided "novel constitutional questions to insulate this court and petitioner [Trump] from future controversy."

On July 1, 2024, the Supreme Court ruled in a 6–3 decision, that failed and deposed insurrectionist 2020 election loser and former president donald j. trump had absolute immunity for acts he committed as president within his core constitutional purview, at least presumptive immunity for official acts within the outer perimeter of his official responsibility, and no immunity for unofficial acts.

Again, as the text of the Fourteenth Amendment clearly reads, and ONLY reads:

Section 3 clearly and ONLY gives Congress the power to remove a disability of an insurrectionist to "be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State".

Section 3 clearly DOESN'T give Congress the power to impose or enforce a disability of an insurrectionist to "be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State". That's what Impeachment is for, and donald j. trump was impeached for insurrection and referred to the Department of Justice by a Congressional committee for prosecution for his and his supporters acts of insurrection against the United States of America on January 6, 2021.

Section 3 clearly DOESN'T give the United States Supreme Court the authority to illegally and criminally engage in insurrection against the United States of America by MODIFYING the U.S. Constitution AND LEGISLATING from the bench to relieve their own political party and the former insurrectionist U.S. President who appointed them from needing a two-thirds vote of each House to remove the disability of an insurrectionist to run for President of the United States and hold the office of the President of the United States should they be legally elected in a free and fair election. The insurrectionist MAGA cult that's taken over the former Republican Party of the United States knows that there was no way they were getting a two-thirds vote in both Houses of Congress to put impeached insurrectionist and convicted felon donald j. trump on the ballot, and so they had their six legally disqualified U.S. Supreme Court criminal MAGA insurrectionist injustices legislate from the bench AND ILLEGALLY and CRIMINALLY modify the U.S. Constitution to put Espionage Act traitor, convicted felon, and impeached insurrectionist donald j. trump on the 2024 U.S. presidential election ballot.

There are two steps in the amendment process of modifying the U.S. Constitution. Proposals to amend the Constitution must be properly adopted and ratified before they change the Constitution. First, there are two procedures for adopting the language of a proposed amendment, either by (a) Congress, by two-thirds majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, or (b) national convention (which shall take place whenever two-thirds of the state legislatures collectively call for one). Second, there are two procedures for ratifying the proposed amendment, which requires three-fourths of the states' (presently 38 of 50) approval: (a) consent of the state legislatures, or (b) consent of state ratifying conventions. The ratification method is chosen by Congress for each amendment. (Wikipedia)

The necessary CONTEXT for the LEGAL UNMODIFIED ORIGINAL text of Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution is this: At the time of the drafting of the United States Constitution, the Americans known as "We The People" were fighting and dying to liberate themselves out from under a tyrannical king! Obviously, a President or Vice President who'd engage in insurrection against the United States of America DURING OR IMMEDIATELY AFTER the creation of the United States Constitution would be executed for TREASON; and because it'd be impossible for "a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any officeholder, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State" to BE IN A POSISTION TO IMMEDIATELY PROCLAIM THEMSELVES THE NEW TYRANNICAL DIVINE KING FOR LIFE OVER THE UNITED STATES AMERICA; and because all traitors were being actively and immediately executed for TREASON, it'd have been impossible for an insurrectionist traitor President or Vice President to run for any office again - because they'd be dead; therefore, it was unnecessary to include an executed treasonous President and/or Vice President in Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. With full knowledge and understanding of these facts, the criminal insurrectionist MAGA extremist U.S. Supreme Court injustices ILLEGALLY and CRIMINALLY legislated from the bench to modify Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution so that, as far as the 6 MAGA extremist U.S. Supreme Court injustices are concerned, it now reads as such WITHOUT having been LEGALLY amended by a both two-thirds vote of both houses of the U.S. Congress AND the approval of 38 of 50 U.S. states:

Section 3 No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. As of March 4, 2024, six partisan Justices on the United States Supreme Court bypassed the legal and proper constitutional amendment process, legislated from the bench, and added the following illegal and unenforceable legislation to Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution without Congressional or States approval and ratification: "Only Congress determines eligibility of insurrectionist candidates under Section 3 for federal officeholders and states may only bar insurrectionist candidates from state office. Federal legislation is the exclusive vehicle through which Section 3 can be enforced upon insurrectionist candidates for federal office."

How many elected Republicans, Democrats, and Independents in the House of Representatives and the Senate provided the necessary two-thirds vote to amend the U.S. Constitution in this manner? What are the names of all of these so-called elected officials and where are the official voting records? What dates did these voting sessions occur?

Which of the 38 U.S. states ratified this Congressional two-thirds-vote-approved constitutional amendment so that the Espionage Act traitor, convicted felon, and insurrectionist donald j. trump could appear on the 2024 U.S. presidential ballot? This is where the presidential Take Care Clause is automatically activated and the U.S. president enforces the laws of the United States and upholds, protects, and defends the U.S. Constitution, and perpetuates American democracy.

This is where all six MAGA criminal insurrectionist SCOTUS injustices face both immediate and permanent disbarment from ever practicing law anywhere in the United States of America AND Congressional Impeachment and removal from the Supreme Court of the United States of America for giving aid, comfort, and support to criminal defendant donald j. trump's felonies involving moral turpitude, forgery, fraud, a history of dishonesty, consistent lack of attention to the American people, the United States, his oath of office, and the U.S. Constitution, drug abuse, thefts of taxpayer and U.S. government monies, thefts of at least 13,000 classified documents and other U.S. government property, and a pattern of violations of all professional codes of ethics.

Article Two of the United States Constitution establishes the executive branch of the federal government, which carries out and enforces federal laws. Article Two vests the power of the executive branch in the office of the president of the United States, lays out the procedures for electing and removing the president, and establishes the president's powers and responsibilities.

Clause 5: Caring for the faithful execution of the law The president must "take care that the laws be faithfully executed." This clause in the Constitution imposes a duty on the president to enforce the laws of the United States and is called the Take Care Clause, also known as the Faithful Execution Clause or Faithfully Executed Clause. This clause is meant to ensure that a law is faithfully executed by the president even if he disagrees with the purpose of that law. The Take Care Clause demands that the president obey the law, the Supreme Court said in Humphrey's Executor v. United States, and repudiates any notion that he may dispense with the law's execution. In Printz v. United States, the Supreme Court explained how the president executes the law: "The Constitution does not leave to speculation who is to administer the laws enacted by Congress; the president, it says, "shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed," Art. II, §3, personally and through officers whom he appoints (save for such inferior officers as Congress may authorize to be appointed by the "Courts of Law" or by "the Heads of Departments" with other presidential appointees), Art. II, §2." In Mississippi v. Johnson, 71 U.S. 475 (1867), the Supreme Court ruled that the judiciary may not restrain the president in the execution of the laws. In that case the Supreme Court refused to entertain a request for an injunction preventing President Andrew Johnson from executing the Reconstruction Acts, which were claimed to be unconstitutional. The Court found that "[t]he Congress is the legislative department of the government; the president is the executive department. Neither can be restrained in its action by the judicial department; though the acts of both, when performed, are, in proper cases, subject to its cognizance." Thus, the courts cannot bar the passage of a law by Congress, though it may later strike down such a law as unconstitutional. A similar construction applies to the executive branch. (Wikipedia)

The Take Care Clause is the constitutional checks and balances guardrail to counter judicial activism, legislating from the bench, and a rogue U.S. Supreme Court that's supporting and actively engaging in insurrection against the United States of America and We The People of the United States with the purpose of overthrowing the U.S. government, installing a dictator/King for life, ending American democracy, and engaging in tyranny against We The People of the United States of America. Due to the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on presidential immunity, President Joe Biden can simply overrule MAGA SCOTUS, remove donald j. trump from the 2024 U.S. presidential ballot, and issue an Executive Order barring all six of the criminal insurrectionist MAGA extremist SCOTUS injustices from taking or ruling on any 2024 U.S. presidential election matters and/or any matters pertaining to donald j. trump, per the Berger Test that legally disqualifies them from doing so. President Biden can then simply issue an Executive Order proclaiming that no sworn election official or law enforcement official anywhere in the U.S. or its territories can attempt to cause even one vote for the Espionage Act traitor, convicted felon, and insurrectionist donald j. trump to be counted for the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

This is why donald j. trump has no path to the White House without having 70 Democrats in the House of Representatives and 17 Democrats in the Senate vote to remove his insurrectionist disqualification; and why all 6 MAGA Insurrectionist SCOTUS injustices will be immediately and permanently disbarred for legislating from the bench, denying Congress the opportunity to legislate as the U.S. Constitution requires, and illegally and criminally amending Section 3 of the 14th Amendment so that elected Democrats in the House of Representatives and Senate would be denied the opportunity to represent their constituents via the required two-thirds vote to remove donald j. trump's insurrectionist disqualification from ever holding federal office again.

MAGA SCOTUS' Illegal and Criminal Actions in the Anderson vs. trump Case. From www.supremecourt.gov:

The text of Section 3 reinforces these conclusions. Its final sentence empowers Congress to “remove” any Section 3 “disability” by a two-thirds vote of each house. The text imposes no limits on that power, and Congress may exercise it any time, as the respondents concede. In fact, historically, Congress sometimes exercised this amnesty power postelection to ensure that some of the people’s chosen candidates could take office.

…it is Congress that has long given effect to Section 3 with respect to would-be or existing federal officeholders. Shortly after ratification of the Amendment, Congress enacted the Enforcement Act of 1870. That Act authorized federal district attorneys to bring civil actions in federal court to remove anyone holding nonlegislative office—federal or state—in violation of Section 3, and made holding or attempting to hold office in violation of Section 3 a federal crime.

Section 5 limits congressional legislation enforcing Section 3, because Section 5 is strictly “remedial.” To comply with that limitation, Congress “must tailor its legislative scheme to remedying or preventing” the specific conduct the relevant provision prohibits. Section 3, unlike other provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment, proscribes conduct of individuals. It bars persons from holding office after taking a qualifying oath and then engaging in insurrection or rebellion—nothing more.

Any congressional legislation enforcing Section 3 must, like the Enforcement Act of 1870 and §2383, reflect “congruence and proportionality” between preventing or remedying that conduct “and the means adopted to that end.” Neither we nor the respondents are aware of any other legislation by Congress to enforce Section 3.

The disruption would be all the more acute—and could nullify the votes of millions and change the election result—if Section 3 enforcement were attempted after the Nation has voted. Nothing in the Constitution requires that we endure such chaos—arriving at any time or different times, up to and perhaps beyond the Inauguration.

Justice Sotomayor, Justice Kagan, and Justice Jackson Opinion on the Majority Ruling:

Yet the majority goes further. Even though “[a]ll nine Members of the Court” agree that this independent and sufficient rationale resolves this case, five Justices go on. They decide novel constitutional questions to insulate this Court and petitioner from future controversy. Ante, at 13. Although only an individual State’s action is at issue here, the majority opines on which federal actors can enforce Section 3, and how they must do so. The majority announces that a disqualification for insurrection can occur only when Congress enacts a particular kind of legislation pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In doing so, the majority shuts the door on other potential means of federal enforcement. We cannot join an opinion that decides momentous and difficult issues unnecessarily, and we therefore concur only in the judgment.

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