In the never ending quest to fluff Trump and soothe his ego over losing the state of Georgia in 2020 Republicans in their state legislature made fools of themselves. They didn’t exactly invent the problem they set out to fix but they created their state-centric version of “Voter Fraud” (by Democrats of course) and passed legislation. Then they fumbled the part about actually implementing it!
Yep, they fumbled the ball. More than once in fact. Currently they are doing a version of Carolina Quarterback Cam Newton with a Super Bowl on the line looking at his own fumble and freezing up – letting the ball get recovered by the other team. (FYI it didn’t go over well with teammates and fans and was the beginning of the end of his career) That’s the gist of this reporting from Alternet. The article describes Trumpty’s complaints about the 2020 election including his ridiculous claim he even won California (he lost by 20 points there) but that it was rigged. Most folks laughed off or at least ignored that kind of crazy talk. GOPers in GOP weren’t allowed that luxury.
As the article notes California is as blue a state as it gets. Georgia on the other hand had been reliably RED until 2020. Then Biden narrowly won, and they’ve got TWO Democratic Senators now. John Ossoff is in a tough fight to retain his seat this fall but while Georgia still leans Red it’s “swingy” enough he’s got a good chance of doing so. Add in that for all Trump’s (illegal) efforts to extort Georgia’s top officials to ‘find me enough votes’ they refused. Multiple recounts took place and all confirmed Biden’s win. Trump simply couldn’t let it go. So, with a state legislature strongly under GOP control and with Trump throwing a Toddler Tantrum they passed yet another (aimed at Democratic voters) voter suppression bill.
Alas, as I’ve pointed out they dropped the ball on providing the means (mostly money) to implement the changes. More than one deadline has passed for them to do so and they couldn’t seem to get their collective sh*t together. As things stand, the new machines and other measures supposed to be in place by this summer haven’t happened because the resources haven’t been allocated. This year’s legislative session has expired, so Gov. Kemp would have to call them back for a Special Session to take care of this. Kemp doesn’t seem in any hurry to do so. Tick Tock.
It’s really funny when you think about it. To recap, Trump lost Georgia in 2020. He’s whined about it ever since. As I’ve noted Georgia is still Red but not ruby Red – it’s moved towards being “swingy.” But Trump just can’t get over losing, or having candidates he endorse (did he REALLY think Herschel Walker could win a Senate seat?) lose. He just won’t STFU about it so GOPers in the state legislature made up some crap about election fraud and that by golly they were going to put an end to it and passed a law to do just that. Maybe they’ve all been wearing Trumpian too long neckties and tripped over them:
Two years ago, Georgia’s GOP legislators pretended it was true by passing a new law requiring a whole new way of casting and counting ballots, touting the new system as necessary to prevent the fraud that didn’t happen in 2020. They set a deadline of this summer to have the new system in place and running in time for the upcoming midterm elections.
Then, to prove just how serious they were about election integrity, they neglected to authorize the funds needed to buy the new machines and train elections staff on the new system that they had mandated. Here we are, less than three months from the deadline that they themselves wrote into state law, and not a damn thing has been done.
Did you notice in the first part of the blocked out section above they passed this crap TWO FREAKING YEARS ago? I sure did. However as Alternet reports it gets worse. They’ve had plenty of time to fix their little “oops” in not funding the initiative. Yet they haven’t done jack including in THIS year’s legislative session:
State legislators gathered in Atlanta in January for the latest session of the General Assembly. They were here in January, February, March and into April, knowing full well that the deadline was looming and could never be met. All they needed to do was pass a bill delaying the deadline that they themselves had set, while authorizing money to pay for that new equipment and training.
They did neither.
To review:
They invented an election-fraud problem that didn’t exist, then they claimed to have fixed the election fraud problem that didn’t exist, then they failed to fund their solution to the problem that didn’t exist, thus creating an actual major, real-life problem, and then they refused to fix that problem of their own making.
Given how many chances they’ve had to fix the problem of fixing their imaginary problem I don’t see this as a case of a circular firing squad so much as repeatedly hitting themselves in the head with a hammer. There’s another possibility. Maybe it was, from the beginning all for show. Just a way to keep Trump from ragging on them and calling attention to Georgia as the state can no longer be sure of winning statewide races. That’s a gamble however. If someone in Trump’s circle convinces him that’s the case he will make their lives hell and in the process set Ossoff (and other Democrats) for wins in November.
Gov. Kemp is the wild card at this point. I keep saying he’s been quietly setting himself up for a 2028 Presidential run and calling the legislature back for this would hurt him with Independents who’ve become disgusted with the GOP in general in numbers that worry Republicans within arm’s reach of reality. The article concludes talking about how the legislators are back home in their districts saying maybe Kemp will call a Special Session to ‘fix’ things before the July deadline. Or maybe not:
“Maybe not” means they’ll dump the problem they created onto the laps of state and federal judges. “Maybe not” means they’ll be able to whine later about the unfairness of whatever solution those judges impose. “Maybe not” means even more election chaos, and even more public doubt about the credibility of the electoral process. They have to know how irresponsible they would be to do that.
Or, as the last words of the linked article say “Maybe not.” It’s quite the clusterf**k and Georgia has become more influential than it was for so long. I’m going to keep an eye on this and so should you.
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kemp himself comnited election fraud on a large enough scale to get himself elected governor. while he was secretary of state he refused ti recuse himself from election mattersand went so far as to order a nassive, uneccessary, purge of the voter rolls costing stacy abrams the election. she’s been leading georgia democrats to victories ever since.
sorry…if i understand you correctly the new machines and processes HAVE to be up and running by november?
The way I understand it is if they don’t allocate the funds to buy all the machines (and the software) by July then they have no choice but to use what they’ve been using. Remember, a LOT of election workers down to the precinct level would have to be trained on the new equipment. AND it has to be tested once delivered to ensure it’s worth the time and money it would take to train the workers.
THAT assumes if they place an order in July they can buy all that. Remember, Georgia isn’t just a decent sized state geographically, it’s got a lot of people. It’s one thing to buy voting machines for sparsely populated states in the mountain west (or Alaska) that might not have even a million or so residents and quite another for a state like Georgia. GA would need a LOT of machines even with their usual practice (common in red states) of limiting precincts in Democratic areas. Unless a substantial down payment was made to a contractor who’s got a large enough batch of them sitting in a warehouse there might not even be time to get machines delivered AND certified (along with the software) before early voting begins.
So, it’s possible that even July would be too late. It would be funny as hell to have Kemp cave and call a special session in July and the legislature hurredly pass a funding bill only to not even have a contractor/manufacturer selected. Or even if at least that much has been done have them say ‘Sorry – but we don’t have time to manufacture an order of that size. Imagine the cluster-fuck of trying to use whatever can actually be delivered in some places but not others! I’m sure lawyers down in Georgia would love it but no one else.
The more I’ve thought about it the more I think this was GOP run govt. in Georgia (from the Gov. to the leaders in the legislature) “punting” – make a show of pleasing Trump. They know like everyone else he’s got no ability to process details. Sure, he’ll pitch a fit at some point but with so much going on despite his obsession over losing GA in 2020 he won’t have the time or energy to fixate on it and hurt them.
I believe you’re spot on: this was a bullshit op to keep Trump off their backs for a while. Let’s hope no one shows your article to him. Meanwhile, which machines were the GOP going to buy? Surely not Dominion nor Smartmatic? Do other machines exist and are they in use elsewhere? What an enormous waste of everyone’s time.