[Discussion] Election 2020

Seems like the board is set. Let’s see how this goes.

Competence is just not something the Trump administration does.

Stele wrote:

Except Florida counts early. They can have totals on election night. And if Trump loses Florida he loses, period.

So maybe that stupid state can start to make up for 2000

I have zero faith in FL. Right now 538 has Trump with a 40% chance of winning the state. That's up from 35% a month ago and 29% the month before that.

And the closer the vote tallies are, the more likely that legal shenanigans followed by actions by Gov DeSantis and Florida's Republican-led legislature come into play. Even if they're not successful, it will essentially leave FL as uncalled in one direction or another for weeks.

The fact that mail in ballot security isn't handled at least as well as credit card security is another failure of our system. Send the ballot and the security code separately. Completed ballot envelope must have the code to be valid. Voter can check online if the ballot has been successfully received.
Signature use is so bad.

lunchbox12682 wrote:

The fact that mail in ballot security isn't handled at least as well as credit card security is another failure of our system. Send the ballot and the security code separately. Completed ballot envelope must have the code to be valid. Voter can check online if the ballot has been successfully received.
Signature use is so bad.

The bad security is a feature not a bug.

Another good one:
Ohio judge blows up GOP plan to allow only 1 ballot box in each county

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A directive that restricted Ohio counties to one ballot drop box in November was arbitrary and unreasonable, a county judge ruled Tuesday, delivering the Republican secretary of state in the presidential battleground another in a series of blows to his policies.

The office of Secretary of State Frank LaRose said he would soon appeal the decision by Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Richard Frye, assuming the judge follows through and invalidates the secretary’s drop-box order.
[...]
It is often the largely Democratic urban counties — such as Cuyahoga, home to Cleveland — that look to expand the number of drop boxes. Cuyahoga must serve more than 860,000 registered voters with only a single drop box under LaRose’s order.

thrawn82 wrote:
lunchbox12682 wrote:

The fact that mail in ballot security isn't handled at least as well as credit card security is another failure of our system. Send the ballot and the security code separately. Completed ballot envelope must have the code to be valid. Voter can check online if the ballot has been successfully received.
Signature use is so bad.

The bad security is a feature not a bug.

I know. I just like to pretend.

Trump Blames Biden, Who Isn’t President, For Not Instituting Mask Mandate

“Well, I do wear them when I have to and when I’m in hospitals and other locations,” Trump said. “But I will say this. They said at the Democrat convention they’re going to do a national mandate. They never did it, because they’ve checked out and they didn’t do it. And a good question is, you ask why Joe Biden ― they said we’re going to do a national mandate on masks.”
Biden addressed the claim just moments after it aired: To be clear: I am not currently president. But if you chip in now, we can change that in November

Such a dumb idea. Have they considered that cars have horns?

Washington (CNN)CNN will host the first political drive-in town hall of the 2020 presidential election Thursday night -- the latest adaptation to campaigning during the coronavirus pandemic.
Thirty-five cars will file into the parking lot, where a stage and monitors have been set up, and audience members and cars will be spaced out to comply with social distancing guidelines, according to Kate Lunger, the vice president of CNN's special events team.

Why do they feel the need for an audience? Pre-record the damn questions and play them during the debate. An audience at these things is, and always has been, a distraction.

FBI director Wray says Russia is actively interfering in 2020 election to 'denigrate' Biden

CNN wrote:

FBI Director Christopher Wray said Thursday that Russia has been "very active" in its efforts to influence US elections, with the primary goal being to "denigrate" Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Testifying before the House Homeland Security Committee, Wray told lawmakers that Russia is primarily interfering through "malign foreign influence in an effort to hurt Biden's campaign" -- echoing the intelligence community's public assessment on Moscow's meddling efforts issued last month.

Wray's comments come as President Donald Trump and several other top administration officials have recently attempted to play up the theory that China is meddling to get Biden elected, while downplaying well-founded reports that Russia is trying to help Trump win again, like it did in 2016.

Foreign election interference efforts differ from what was observed in 2016, when there was also an effort to target election infrastructure, Wray said. "We have not seen that second part yet this year or this cycle, but we certainly have seen very active, very active efforts by the Russians to influence our election in 2020," he added.

According to Wray, Russia is using social media, proxies, state media and online journals to sow "divisiveness and discord" and "primarily to denigrate Vice President Biden and what the Russians see as kind of an anti-Russian establishment."

Intelligence officials have said they have uncovered evidence that Russia is currently interfering in the election to hurt Biden's campaign. Separately, some evidence has already emerged about Moscow's efforts, including Facebook's announcement earlier this month that a troll group that was part of Russia's attempt to interfere in the 2016 election is trying to target Americans again.

Former Pence aide says she will vote for Biden because of Trump’s ‘flat-out disregard for human life’ during pandemic

WaPo wrote:

President Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic showed a “flat-out disregard for human life” because his “main concern was the economy and his reelection,” according to a senior adviser on the White House coronavirus task force who left the White House in August.

Olivia Troye, who worked as homeland security, counterterrorism and coronavirus adviser to Vice President Pence for two years, said that the administration’s response cost lives and that she will vote for Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden this fall because of her experience in the Trump White House.

“The president’s rhetoric and his own attacks against people in his administration trying to do the work, as well as the promulgation of false narratives and incorrect information of the virus have made this ongoing response a failure,” she said in an interview.

Troye is the first Trump administration official who worked extensively on the coronavirus response to forcefully speak out against Trump and his handling of the pandemic.

...

The White House dismissed Troye as a disgruntled former employee, minimized her role on the task force and disputed her characterization that the pandemic response has not gone well.

...

Though Troye played a behind-the-scenes role during her time in the White House, she was a major participant in the task force’s work, attending and helping to organize “every single meeting” it held from February until July, she said. She worked closely with Pence on the administration’s response, including establishing an agenda for each meeting, preparing the vice president and arranging briefings for him, writing and editing his comments, and dealing with the vice president’s political aides.

She was often pictured sitting against the back wall of the Situation Room near Pence in photos posted to social media. Her assistant would send the seating chart to officials across the administration, who in turn would consult with her about the workings of the group and Pence.

...

Asked about Troye’s comments later in the day, Pence said he was very proud of the administration’s performance.

“I haven’t read her comments in any detail. But it reads to me like one more disgruntled employee that has decided to play politics during election year,” Pence said.

Trump dismissed her charges Thursday evening. “I have no idea who she is,” he told reporters. “I never met her, to the best of my knowledge. Maybe she was in a room. I have no idea who she is. She doesn’t know me.”

I'm trying to remember if there was ever a recent member of a sitting administration who came out and publicly said they were voting for the opposition and am coming up blank.

Also, Trump probably doesn't know who Troye is because he rarely attended the coronavirus task force meetings.

OG_slinger wrote:

“I haven’t read her comments in any detail. But it reads to me like one more disgruntled employee that has decided to play politics during election year,” Pence said.

But I thought you only hired the best

*mild shock.gif*

Boy, it's sure a good thing he has such an easy time finding great people, since he fires so many.

So Biden's townhall vs Trump's. Yikes, I mean we all knew Biden would wipe the floor with the Cheeto but I don't even know how to describe how unfair this will be. Seriously thinking that Trump will cancel, probably only agree to a debate if the moderators are Rogen, Hannity or the My Pillow guy.

Encouraged to see the photo of the long line voters on the first day of early voting in VA. A blue state, but still.

Also, completely anecdotal, but so far in the mailer totals here in WNC; they seem way down from past elections (maybe everything has gone digital) but in what we have received, the most have been from the Lincoln Project and one or two pro-Trump ads, but none from the Trump campaign themselves.

On the senate side, there have actually been more mailers for the Democrat, Cunningham than there have for Tillis.

We have had maybe 3 or 4 robocalls from Tillis.

Most interestingly, I'm actually starting to see Biden bumper stickers in the wild out here in our exurb/rural county. I never saw a Hillary sticker last cycle.

Badferret wrote:

Encouraged to see the photo of the long line voters on the first day of early voting in VA. A blue state, but still.

Also, completely anecdotal, but so far in the mailer totals here in WNC; they seem way down from past elections (maybe everything has gone digital) but in what we have received, the most have been from the Lincoln Project and one or two pro-Trump ads, but none from the Trump campaign themselves.

On the senate side, there have actually been more mailers for the Democrat, Cunningham than there have for Tillis.

We have had maybe 3 or 4 robocalls from Tillis.

Most interestingly, I'm actually starting to see Biden bumper stickers in the wild out here in our exurb/rural county. I never saw a Hillary sticker last cycle.

That jives with this article from WP today: Virginia’s era as a swing state appears to be over

Weird, I don't see my VA ballot in my mail yet.

Small side question if I may: wondering if any Goodjers in North Carolina ( in the Durham area) mind if I talk with them about the area?

My family and I are looking at moving at some point soon (I want to get out of the deep red south). Just wanted to talk to someone in the area. Please DM if you don’t mind talking so I don’t intrude on this thread more than I have. Thanks all. Sorry for interruption.

Trump’s Ohio suburb slide signals peril in industrial north

AP wrote:

Peggy Lehner, a Republican state senator in Ohio, doesn’t sugarcoat what she has seen happen to support for President Donald Trump in her suburban Dayton district.

“It hasn’t ebbed. It’s crashed,” said Lehner, who is not seeking reelection in the district of working-class and white-collar communities the president won comfortably four years ago. “He is really doing poorly among independents.”

Trump’s chances for a second term rest heavily on being able to maintain the margins he won by in 2016, particularly in suburban areas. He plans to campaign outside Toledo on Monday, as liberal Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death stokes questions of whether the sudden court vacancy would energize more suburban voters who support abortion rights or social conservatives in small-town and rural areas who oppose them.

Republican lawmakers and strategists in Ohio say they are seeing research that shows a near-uniform drop in support from his 2016 totals across every suburban region of the state.

They say that Trump, who won Ohio by 8 percentage points in 2016, maintains a yawning advantage in more rural areas and small towns. Still, Republicans are concerned that if he is losing badly in suburban areas in Ohio, it is a signal that Trump’s hold on other states in the industrial heartland that delivered him the presidency may be in peril.

“The million-dollar question becomes, how does that translate in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania?” said Corry Bliss, a Republican strategist who managed Ohio Sen. Rob Portman’s 2016 reelection campaign. “It translates into probably not a very good night.”

Ohio has long been a bellwether. No Republican has won the White House without carrying the state since the advent of the modern two-party system, and no Democrat has since 1960.

Trump is faring worse than four years ago in communities in essentially all suburban areas around Ohio, from its major cities to its several mid-size metro areas, more than a half-dozen Republican operatives tracking races across Ohio say.

Trump has slipped in suburbs to the east and west of Cleveland, where he narrowly edged Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in 2016, they say. In the blue-collar suburbs of Youngstown, where Trump won by double digits, the same appears to be true.

In affluent suburbs, such as Dublin northwest of Columbus, 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney won by almost 20 percentage points. Four years later, Trump narrowly lost to Clinton. Less than two months before the 2020 election, Republicans were concerned about signs the trend in Dublin has continued, according to several GOP operatives following legislative and congressional races.

There is debate among state Republican strategists about how many new voters there are left to lift Trump in rural and small town Ohio.

Former Ohio Republican Party Chairman Kevin DeWine, a second-cousin to Gov. Mike DeWine, said, “I just don’t see him getting more votes.”

But veteran Ohio GOP strategist Doug Preisse countered, saying, “I perceive a commensurate intensification in the support for Trump in small towns.”

There is less debate in other states. Pennsylvania Republicans say across the longtime GOP stronghold of Chester County west of Philadelphia, for instance, Trump has slipped as far as he has in Ohio’s suburbs, though in more populous towns and in a state he carried by fewer than 45,000 votes.

Former Pennsylvania Rep. Ryan Costello, a Republican, said that the suburban electorate is rapidly diversifying in ways that hurt Trump, especially among young families and among those concerned about the coronavirus.

“I think Trump has proved to be the accelerant,” said Costello.

Hillary Clinton carried Chester County by almost 10 percentage points, the first Democrat to win there since Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Chester is also steadily growing, with a population of about 525,000, the fourth largest in the state.

“I think that there is a higher likelihood at this moment in time that Trump performs worse in the suburbs,” Costello said. “It’s his tone. It’s the chaos. Perhaps a combination. But certainly the pandemic, the mismanagement of the pandemic.”

This is why McConnell and the Senate Republicans are frantically pushing through judicial nominations: they're literally scraping the bottom of the rural barrel trying to get more white people to vote for them because their policies and rhetoric turned off voter in the cities and the suburbs. They know the end is nigh for the current iteration of the GOP.

"If I lose to him, I don't know what I'm going to do,” Trump said Saturday night. “I will never speak to you again. You'll never see me again."

To anyone on the fence about voting for Biden: This is the best reason yet.

farley3k wrote:

Trump Threatens To Issue Executive Order Preventing Biden From Being Elected President

He is loopy but so many of his cult are too!

Confirmation our president is on drugs:

The drugged one wrote:

Trump also expanded on his unproven claim that Biden is on drugs, stating, "they gave him a big fat shot in the ass… and for two hours, he is better than ever before. Problem is, what happens after that?"

JLS wrote:
farley3k wrote:

Trump Threatens To Issue Executive Order Preventing Biden From Being Elected President

He is loopy but so many of his cult are too!

Confirmation our president is on drugs:

The drugged one wrote:

Trump also expanded on his unproven claim that Biden is on drugs, stating, "they gave him a big fat shot in the ass… and for two hours, he is better than ever before. Problem is, what happens after that?"

Confirmation the president gets his uppers injected in his buttocks. I wonder if it's ephedra, or actual speed, or maybe just liquified calf liver like the author of his favorite book.

Shadout wrote:
"If I lose to him, I don't know what I'm going to do,” Trump said Saturday night. “I will never speak to you again. You'll never see me again."

To anyone on the fence about voting for Biden: This is the best reason yet.

Trump's a narcissist who's figured out that grifting rubes and hicks can be a highly profitable business. It's a virtual certainty that he'll resurrect Trump TV or partner with OANN if he loses so he can stay in the limelight longer. And he'll also very likely create a non-profit so he can continue raising money from his deplorables and not have to report how he uses the cash.

JLS wrote:
farley3k wrote:

Trump Threatens To Issue Executive Order Preventing Biden From Being Elected President

He is loopy but so many of his cult are too!

Confirmation our president is on drugs:

The drugged one wrote:

Trump also expanded on his unproven claim that Biden is on drugs, stating, "they gave him a big fat shot in the ass… and for two hours, he is better than ever before. Problem is, what happens after that?"

Yeah. He's always accusing other people of the thing he's doing, so this means he's definitely on amphetamines.

I had a thought, Bloomberg is contributing funds in FL. Why doesn’t he go in and pay off all the court debts of the felons? Then they can vote and it would be a huge poke in the eye the eye to Republicans.

JC wrote:

I had a thought, Bloomberg is contributing funds in FL. Why doesn’t he go in and pay off all the court debts of the felons? Then they can vote and it would be a huge Pokémon the eye to Republicans.

Bloomberg pays fines for 32,000 felons in Florida so they can vote

JC wrote:

I had a thought, Bloomberg is contributing funds in FL. Why doesn’t he go in and pay off all the court debts of the felons? Then they can vote and it would be a huge poke in the eye the eye to Republicans.

Just gonna leave this right here:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...

Yes but this is fundraising, not his cash. I’m suggesting he just does it himself and be done with it. He won’t miss the cash.

There's approximately 775,000 felons in Florida who owe court-related debts that are keeping them from being able to vote. The average amount owed is $1,500. (Rather than fund its courts with tax dollars, Florida has increasingly relied on "legal financial obligations"--basically fees it charges people who've been convicted.)

Bloomberg would have to cough up about $1.2 billion of his $55 billion so people could have the opportunity to vote.

Unfortunately, Florida didn't exactly set up a centralized clearinghouse that makes it easy for former inmates to know exactly how much they owe and that communicates the debt repayment to the Sec State for voting purposes.