RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/h-r-1-would-steamroll-the-constitution-11622737590?mod=opinion_lead_pos6

President Biden and his media partisans are stepping up the pressure campaign on Joe Manchin. The West Virginia senator is the only Democrat in the upper chamber who hasn’t signed on to H.R.1, styled the For the People Act, an unprecedented federal takeover of U.S. election laws that the House passed in March and that the Senate plans to consider this month. The bill’s supporters describe it as a vital safeguard of democracy, but it’s the opposite: If enacted it would destroy the Constitution’s careful balance of federal and state powers, taking common election safeguards along with it.

H.R.1 plainly exceeds Congress’s power to regulate presidential elections, as we argued in these pages in February. That’s only the start of its constitutional infirmities.

The primary asserted constitutional basis of H.R.1 is Article I’s Elections Clause, which authorizes state legislatures to establish the “times, places and manner” of congressional elections, while providing that “Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations.” In Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona (2013), the Supreme Court held that several state election-integrity measures were invalid because federal law pre-empted them.

Yet H.R.1’s sponsors fail to recognize that the Elections Clause limits Congress’s authority to time, place and manner. “Prescribing voting qualifications,” Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the court in 2013, “forms no part of the power to be conferred upon the national government by the Elections Clause.” Article I’s Qualifications Clause provides that “the electors”—that is, voters—“in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature.” Determining those qualifications is up to the states, except where the Constitution says otherwise—for instance in the 19th and 26th amendment, enfranchising women and 18-year-olds, respectively.

Speaking at Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day, Boobus Maximus warned that “Democracy itself is in peril here at home and around the world,” as Democrats move to establish one-party rule in the United States.

With the narrowest margin in the House in 100 years, and facing certain defeat in the 2022 election, Biden and his socialist party are moving rapidly to create a system where the semblance of democracy is maintained but Democrats are in power in perpetuity, through:

1. Packing the Supreme Court 

2. Blocking any effort at ballot integrity

3. DC and Puerto Rican Statehood – giving them a permanent majority in the Senate

4. Eliminating the Senate filibuster – and the need for the White House to negotiate anything

5. Abolishing the Electoral College – nationalizing presidential elections

6. Keeping the borders wide open – importing a new electorate.

These toxic “reforms” will make future elections a sham.

Like “The Perils of Pauline,” Democrats will have representative government tied to the railroad tracks, while Slow Joe drives the train over its prostrate body.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/06/01/the_us_is_a_voter_photo_id_outlier_theyre_the_rule_in_europe_and_elsewhere_778714.html

Democrats and much of the media are pushing to make permanent the extraordinary, pandemic-driven measures to relax voting rules during the 2020 elections – warning anew of racist voter “suppression” otherwise. Yet democracies in Europe and elsewhere tell a different story – of the benefits of stricter voter ID requirements after hard lessons learned. 

A database on voting rules worldwide compiled by the Crime Prevention Research Center, which I run, shows that election integrity measures are widely accepted globally, and have often been adopted by countries after they’ve experienced fraud under looser voting regimes.

Britain is Europe’s outlier in generally not requiring voter IDs, but Prime Minister Boris Johnson aims to change that. He went to the polls in May with wife-to-be Carrie Symonds.
AP Photo/Matt Dunham

Of 47 nations surveyed in Europe — a place where, on other matters, American progressives often look to with envy — all but one country requires a government-issued photo voter ID to vote. The exception is the U.K., and even there voter IDs are mandatory in Northern Ireland for all elections and in parts of England for local elections. Moreover, Boris Johnson’s government recently introduced legislation to have the rest of the country follow suit. 

Criticisms of the British leader’s voter ID push are similar to those heard in the U.S. The Scottish National Party claims his voter ID push targets “lower income, ethnic minority and younger people” who are less likely to vote for Johnson’s conservatives and therefore represents “Trump-like voter suppression.” 

Yet despite such pushback, Britain looks set to follow countries in Europe and elsewhere with stricter voting regimes, few of which temporarily relaxed any of their voting rules during the pandemic.

Seventy-four percent of European countries entirely ban absentee voting for citizens who reside domestically. Another 6% limit it to those hospitalized or in the military, and they require third-party verification and a photo voter ID. Another 15% require a photo ID for absentee voting.

Similarly, government-issued photo IDs are required to vote by 33 nations in the 37-member Organistion for Economic Co-operation and Development (which has considerable European overlap). Only the UK, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia currently do not require IDs.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-texas-voting-melodrama-11622495406?mod=opinion_lead_pos2

As the Texas legislative session drew near its end Sunday, lawmakers appeared set to pass a bill overhauling the state’s elections, until Democrats did one final maneuver: They snuck out of the building. “Members, take your key and leave the chamber discreetly,” a Democratic leader in the state House told his caucus in a 10:35 p.m. text message.

The extraordinary move deprived the House of a quorum, killing the bill for now, at the cost of undermining the legislative process. But what do you expect after months of Democratic alarms about “voter suppression”? President Biden on Saturday called the Texas plan “un-American” and “part of an assault on democracy.” At least this time he didn’t say it’s worse than Jim Crow, which was the political bomb he lobbed at Georgia’s bill.

The reality is more prosaic. To start with the controversial, the 67-page bill would roll back Covid-19 innovations like Harris County’s drive-through voting and 24-hour voting. Those options were used disproportionately last year by black and Hispanic residents. But when did emergency procedures amid a 100-year pandemic suddenly become the new baseline? It’s hardly crazy to think polling-place shenanigans might be more likely at 3 a.m.

The bill says that on the last Sunday of early voting, polling places may not open until 1 p.m. This is a political mistake, at minimum, in that it’s being spun as an attack on black churches that have a “souls to the polls” tradition. One lawmaker supporting the bill argued: “Those election workers want to go to church, too.” But some people take care of their religious obligations on Saturdays, and in any event Texas repealed most of its blue laws in 1985. Lawmakers would be wise to drop this provision.

Under the bill, Texas would still offer some two weeks of early voting. Mr. Biden’s beloved Delaware won’t have any early voting until 2022, when it will get 10 days. The Texas bill would also raise minimum hours. In the final week, counties with 100,000 people must currently open their “main” polling place 12 hours on weekdays and five hours on Sunday. That population threshold would drop to 30,000, and six hours would be mandated on Sunday.

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/05/27/media-repeats-wuhan-lab-fiasco-with-its-election-fraud-coverage/

Remember how, until just this week, anyone who suggested that COVID-19 originated in a Chinese lab was called a Trump-style conspiracy nut? Well, the mainstream media is treating election fraud the exact same way.

Soon after Sen. Tim Cotton said that COVID-19 might have originated in a Wuhan lab, the media pounced.  The Washington Post accused Sen. Tim Cotton of repeating an already “debunked” coronavirus “conspiracy theory.”  Anyone who brought it up got similar treatment.

USA Today called the lab theory a “myth.” The New York Times called it a “fringe theory.” Others called it “baseless.” Fact-checking site Politico said the claim that COVID originated in a lab “is inaccurate and ridiculous. We rate it Pants on Fire!”

Just two months ago, ABC News ran a story headlined: “Sorry, conspiracy theorists. Study concludes COVID-19 ‘is not a laboratory construct’”.

And just days ago, Forbes ran a story declaring that “Science Clearly Shows That COVID-19 Wasn’t Leaked From A Wuhan Lab.”

But now reporters are all furiously backpedaling as the idea that the virus originated in a lab has suddenly gained credibility in the wake of new revelations. Politico even retracted its bogus “fact check.”

Leftist reporter Matthew Yglesias took the time to trace how the media came to decide in lockstep that any claim of a lab leak was a lie, and concluded that the press coverage over the past year was “a huge f—up.”

This revelation of media malpractice, by the way, comes shortly after the press got caught peddling a bogus story that Russia was paying bounties to Taliban who killed U.S. soldiers, and widespread reporting that Capitol Building “rioters” killed Officer Brian Sicknick during the melee.

Yet even as the press grudgingly admits that it horribly mishandled the Wuhan lab leak story and in the process needlessly besmirched those who brought it up,  these same outlets are playing the same game with the election fraud story.

As with the lab leak theory, we have been told repeatedly that there is no evidence to back it up. We’re told that court cases alleging election fraud were dismissed. We’re told, as with the Wuhan lab story, that the experts all agree that there’s no truth to election fraud claims. And we’re told that anyone who suggests fraud took place in the November 2020 elections is a Trump-loving conspiracy nut.

https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-georgia-judge-approves-audit-of-145000-absentee-ballots-in-fulton-county?itm_s

A judge in Georgia unsealed roughly 145,000 absentee ballots from the November election for review in a Friday ruling.

The ballots must remain with Fulton County election officials throughout the audit, and the results of the review cannot impact the outcome of the November election, Henry County Superior Court Judge Brian Amero said. The plaintiffs in the case accepted the terms, saying that the review is still needed after controversial behavior by Fulton County election officials last year, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“Friday’s decision came in a lawsuit filed by nine plaintiffs, including Garland Favorito, a Fulton county resident and self-styled election watchdog,” the Journal-Constitution reported. “It’s one of more than 30 Georgia lawsuits stemming from the November presidential election and the January runoff for U.S. Senate. Some of the lawsuits are still winding their way through the courts.”

Former Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who now leads the voter registration group Greater Georgia Action after losing a runoff election in January, cheered the judge’s ruling in a statement:

Voter confidence in our election system is the bedrock of our republic. Unfortunately, inconsistencies in Fulton County’s November 2020 absentee ballots cast serious doubt on voters’ faith in our elections. An independent investigation even characterized Fulton County’s absentee ballot handling as ‘generally bad management.’ While there is a dire need to investigate a number of other well-documented issues, we must also inspect Fulton County’s absentee ballots to reassure Georgians that their voices are heard and their votes are counted. The integrity of future elections is critical, and Judge Amero’s decision is a helpful step in restoring transparency, accountability, and voter confidence. We look forward to the findings and their role in promoting transparency and rebuilding faith in our elections.

https://amgreatness.com/2021/05/22/why-are-democrats-so-afraid-of-election-audits/

Democrats are positively terrified of election audits that aren’t completely controlled by the political establishment. If there’s a chance an audit might reveal meaningful information, you can bet Democrats (and certain weak Republicans) will stridently oppose it. The only audits Democrats and their allies support are the ones designed to rubber-stamp previous conclusions.

The increasingly desperate attacks on the ongoing audit in Maricopa County, Arizona—particularly those intended to undermine the credibility of the auditors—show just how much the Democratic Party establishment fears the whole process. Their entire argument is based on sarcasm, scorn, and scare quotes.

The auditors are inspecting the paper that ballots were printed on? They must believe in a far-fetched conspiracy theory!

The auditors are checking to make sure the ballots don’t have watermarks that are not supposed to be there? They must be members of fringe online message boards!

The audit is being funded primarily by private donations? It must be an elaborate “grift” rather than a serious fact-finding effort (not to mention they need the funds to fend off the litany of lawsuits they’re facing).

By smearing the auditors as corrupt and/or inept, and the audit itself as a partisan stunt, leftists are hoping they can discredit the process and convince Americans to stop asking pesky questions about whether any laws were broken or procedural loopholes exploited during the 2020 elections. That’s the way people respond to questions when they don’t want anyone to know the answers.

It’s not just the Arizona audit, either. Democrats and their media allies are already fully engaged in a crusade to preemptively impugn the legitimacy of any audits that might be conducted in other states, describing conservative support for audits in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere as “a bid to bolster former President Donald Trump’s lies about widespread fraud in the 2020 election.”

If they really believe the 2020 elections were “the most secure in American history,” then they should welcome audits as a way of substantiating that claim. Indeed, they should even be celebrating audits run by Republicans, since their conclusions will carry so much more weight with GOP voters. That said, the Arizona auditors have practically been begging Democrats to participate, but the Democrats have only been interested in attacking the process from afar.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/05/breaking-maricopa-countys-attorney-office-writes-senate-leader-karen-fann-requests-documents-regarding

It appears the Maricopa County Attorney will weaponize her office and use it for a possible investigation of cyber forensics of America’s Audit cyber team.

Maricopa County officials have fought tooth-and-nail to prevent the Arizona Senate Audit from taking place.  They have stalled the process at every turn.

On Friday they threatened the audit team with legal action.
What are they so scared of?

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/an_election_audit_in_new_hampshire_may_be_the_pebble_that_diverts_the_stream.html

I’ve shied away from reporting on events in Maricopa because it would require more hours than I have in a day to track intelligently the back-and-forth in that recount. My touchstone there is the fact that the Democrats’ and NeverTrumpers’ ferocious efforts to stop the count strike me as the actions of people with something to hide. Otherwise, they’d be there helping to prove that they’re right. Events in a small town in New Hampshire, though, are more interesting because a low-key audit may reveal serious election anomalies harming Republicans.

Windham, New Hampshire, a town of 14,853 people, has long been a stalwart Republican stronghold in an otherwise Democrat state. As was the case throughout New Hampshire, it relied on AccuVote machines to collect and tally its 2020 votes.

When the election in Windham ended, Kristi St. Laurent, the Democrat candidate, had lost by only 24 votes. With that close a margin, she naturally demanded a hand recount.

The hand recount revealed something very peculiar: St. Laurent hadn’t lost by 24 votes; she’d lost by 420 votes. In a small election, that meant that her margin of defeat wasn’t 0.005% but was, instead, 9.6%, which is a significant loss.