A columnist for the Seattle Times has an excellent piece of advice for the Republican party: “If local Republicans knew what was good for them, they would now move to drop Donald Trump from Washington’s fall ballot.” He then goes on to explain that “If Republicans don’t do it, somebody else probably will.” That’s because there’s a law on the books from 1865 “that anyone convicted of “infamous crimes” could be blocked from holding elected office. That was modified in 1959, and then again more recently, to the scheme we have today.” I’d say 34 criminal counts involving falsification of business records to hide a hush money payment to a porn star qualifies as an infamous crime, wouldn’t you?
Any registered voter can “challenge the right of a candidate to appear on the general election ballot” for any of five causes, state law says. One of those causes is flashing in bold neon lights today: “Because the person whose right is being contested was, previous to the election, convicted of a felony by a court of competent jurisdiction, the conviction not having been reversed nor the person’s civil rights restored after the conviction.”
How about 34 felonies?
“I have clients lined up who are going to be all over pursuing a ballot challenge in this case,” says David Vogel, a Seattle attorney and former deputy prosecutor for King County who was briefly involved in an earlier ballot challenge against Trump before the presidential primary.
I asked the Secretary of State’s Office if there was some reason this provision allowing ballot challenges against convicted felons might not apply in this case. For example, is it only for state and local candidates, not federal?
They answered: “Whether that provision applies would be a question for courts to decide.”
States do have latitude to control the ballot. Candidates for president are excluded from Washington’s ballot all the time, though typically it happens to minor-party candidates who didn’t follow filing deadlines or didn’t meet the requirements to hold the office.
Ohio has been debating whether to bar President Joe Biden from its ballot over a filing deadline issue, so it’s clear states can do such a thing.
Washington law says a voter can file a challenge once candidates are certified to appear on the fall ballot, which for presidential races typically occurs after the parties’ national nominating conventions in late summer. That voter challenge goes to “any justice of the supreme court, judge of the court of appeals, or judge of the superior court in the proper county,” who, according to state statute, can potentially strip a candidate’s name from ballots prior to the election if they have a felony conviction.
And I love the way he wraps up this piece.
Hoo boy. Republicans: You sure you want to go down this road?
It seems possible that under Washington state law, there would be no name listed on ballots as a Republican candidate for president in November. If so, it will be because the party’s chosen candidate was too much of a disgrace to even meet the minimum state standards.
“Too much of a disgrace to even meet the minimum state standards” — that’s to just get on the ballot, let alone to fill the office of president. Wow. It’s only June 1. The hammer dropped on May 30. You well know the kneejerk reaction, the immediate fundraising call that Team Trump issued, the cries of “rigged” and “witch hunt” “conflicted judge” all of that blather. But here’s the bottom line: there may be other states that have something like this on the books and for the exact same reasons, the Civil War.
Plus, I don’t know if right-wing media can really pull off the coup they’re trying, that this is all a political hit job. I mean, have you seen the worried expression on Sean Hannity’s face lately? It’s beginning to sink in with normal minded people everywhere that the Party Of Law and Order, not to mention Family Values is running an adjudicated rapist and a convicted felon on the top of their ticket. No bueno.
And Mitch McConnell’s half baked, “the charges should have never been brought,” is very weak tea. It’s a rhetorical statement of regret, not a defense or a solution. The Republicans have no defense. They only have lies. Their entire platform this election year is: “I’m a political prisoner.” Woe is you, Donald, woe is you.
And not for the first, nor the last time, I will point out to you that there is still a window of opportunity for the GOP to get off the Trumptanic and into the lifeboats. Let him go down with the ship. He sunk it. To follow him down to Davy Jones’ locker is sheer madness. Yet I don’t know if the entire Republican party has any survival instinct, nor a set of balls collectively, in order to break free from Trump and go a different direction. We’re going to find out that very thing.
I’d say 34 criminal counts involving falsification of business records to hide a hush money payment to a porn star qualifies as an infamous crime, wouldn’t you?
No.
I would say 34 counts…to affect ELECTION INTERFERENCE in 2016.
Please stop with the “hush money” malarkey, it is NOT the story.
Well, you can say “to affect election interference” but NONE of the charges included that phrase.
The charges were brought for “falsifying business records” with the “intent to conceal or commit ANOTHER crime” (which included election laws but not exclusively) but ultimately the charges brought against Trump were listed as “Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree, a class E felony, 34 counts.”
There’s no “malarkey” in this case. Trump was found guilty of paying hush money and falsifying business records to do so. Why he did it is only incidental. The defense tried to pass it off as “to avoid embarrassing his wife” but, regardless of the whys, it was still a felony to falsify those business records.
if you paid attention. Trump did that crime to prevent it coming out before the election. that is election interference. one crime to cover up another.
I love this!!!! Especially if other states have an old law on the books. Shoot if Arizona can go back to 1800’s & SCOTUS can go back to 1700’s/1800’s, why not Washington State & others?
Your “… I’d say 34 criminal counts involving falsification of business records to hide a hush money payment to a porn star qualifies as an infamous crime, wouldn’t you?…” Yep! And if it does happen, it’s plausible that this’ll be a fanning of the reptilian responses, enough to blow his repurposed bleached merkin flies of his head:
CO already tried to do this and the s.c. shot the attempt out of the water. More to the point–this would piss off red states which would encourage them to do the exact same thing to President Biden. We’d have inconsistent ballots across the country. Unless many states, maybe a majority of states, tried to do this it’d be very foolish. And I’m pretty sure deep red states are already looking at their options for keeping President Biden off of their g.e. ballots so giving them any ammunition at all would not be very smart.
I disagreed with the s.c. decision over CO’s attempt to keep Von Shitzi off their ballot but now I’m starting to see a bigger picture emerge and it is complete and utter chaos were this allowed in any state. We’d no longer have workable elections and that plays into con xtian hands perfectly. F*cking up the system is exactly what they are trying to do and this does that. I doubt that is what the s.c. was trying to guard against but sometimes things work in ways we don’t expect.