Raffensperger Pressured by Graham
NY Magazine reports Lindsey Graham Pressured Georgia Secretary of State to Toss Legal Ballots
Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham and other Republicans have reportedly pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, to toss out legal ballots as part of their increasingly desperate efforts to contest Joe Biden’s victory over Donald Trump in the presidential election.
The president and his allies, including Doug Collins, the Georgia representative leading Trump’s challenge on the integrity of the results in the state, have publicly attacked Raffensperger over his handling of the election. Collins has accused Raffensperger of caving to Democrats, while Trump has called Georgia’s recount “a scam” which “means nothing.” In an interview with the Washington Post, Raffensperger said that he and his family have received death threats as a result of the rhetoric, and detailed the Trump team’s attempts to pressure him into supporting their claims of voter fraud. Those allegations include a bizarre and baseless conspiracy theory involving Dominion Voting Systems, the manufacturer of the voting machines Georgia uses, as well as the validity of mail-in absentee ballots. But Raffensperger made it clear to the Post that no credible evidence of widespread voter fraud has been uncovered, and he has defended the state’s handling of the election.
Graham Questions Raffensperger Per the Post
Graham questioned Raffensperger about the state’s signature-matching law and whether political bias could have prompted poll workers to accept ballots with nonmatching signatures, according to Raffensperger. Graham also asked whether Raffensperger had the power to toss all mail ballots in counties found to have higher rates of nonmatching signatures, Raffensperger said.
Raffensperger said he was stunned that Graham appeared to suggest that he find a way to toss legally cast ballots. Absent court intervention, Raffensperger doesn’t have the power to do what Graham suggested, as counties administer elections in Georgia.
“It sure looked like he was wanting to go down that road,” Raffensperger said.
Graham denied the charge calling the claim ridiculous.
Three Choices
- Graham intended to apply pressure
- He is a totally ignorant buffoon
- Both of the above
There are no other choices.
How can Graham possibly think it would be acceptable to discard all mail-in ballots in counties on the basis of any number of non-matching signatures?
Note that ballots with non-matching signatures were in fact discarded or cured.
What Graham asked was a preposterous fishing expedition. Was this really ignorance and nothing more?
Question of the Day
Three Choices
1. Graham intentionally applied pressure on the Sec of State to illegally disenfranchise voters
2. Graham is an ignorant buffoon
3. Both of the above— Mike “Mish” Shedlock (@MishGEA) November 17, 2020
Mish
I don’t care who took the bribes; what I care about is the list of businesses. I can only vote for three people in the entire Congress once every few years, but I can vote every day with my dollar.
link to fahadkhan.pk
Rudy’s day in court
What business does a senator from sc have to call an election official from ga for anyway.
Yes. Exactly.
The only reasons are
Neither of the above is appropriate at this time (directly after an election) for the relationship between “out of state US Senator” and “state official in charge of elections”.
Looks like Graham is asking for a quality check on the election. If there are too many defective ballots, one does have to question the validity of the process. That’s the way normal quality oversight works Mish.
Dishonest article title.
Just for giggles: what would you title/call it?
Graham needs Trump supporters for his 2024 presidential run. Something happen to graham after McCain died and Trump owned him. Cruz, Graham and others are vying for Trump voters in 2024.
I think Trump has dirt on him like being gay or god knows what
He is not ignorant. He knew what he has doing. He didn’t bank on the SoS having integrity.
Americans you talk of your country as the “only real democracy” and then you prove the inverse! It’s been two weeks, where every single challenge by the GOP to the election process has been, literally, laughed out of court!
Two whole weeks, clear evidence that it’s all over, and your President still talks as if he won the vote…As a Canadian I am increasingly worried to be next to you guys — I’m starting to think that building a wall between Canada and the US is an excellent idea, with luck we will get you guys to pay for it!
Only 20k supporters showed up to the million maga march. 20k out of an adult population of about 200M. You do the math and tell me if you think a single word the president says or does matters. They stopped giving him security briefings in early October.
As a Canadian, frozeninthenorth, do you sometimes feel that your country is “kind of like” having an apartment above a meth lab?
I wonder what hold Trump has on Graham–was he always such a “deep state” swamp-fighter?
Perhaps it was the machinations of Blavatnik and Wang/Dong that brought him under Trump’s thumb.
Agree. Part of me thinks Graham saw the redacted portions of the Senate Intelligence report on Trump and is doing all this to wrestle control back. The only way to do that is to use Trump supporters for 2024. He surely doesn’t want Don Jr being the face of the Republican party in 2024.
What the GOP party fails to understand is that they have alienated a large number of mainstream Republican supporters, like myself, by pandering to a demagogue. Someone needs to reshape the Republican Party for its own good.
The sooner this current administration is shown the door the better.
Except he simply asked a question. It’s leading to insinuate he was applying pressure to get ballots thrown out. And even assuming he was trying to get votes thrown out, what was he using to apply pressure? Can Graham have him fired or have his salary cut?
I think Mish is reading too much into this.
Well, getting your whacko followers to threaten his family, for starters…
Ruining any thoughts the guy had of running for another office? GOP has once again exposed themselves to be the party fraud. Gambinos have nothing on them.
So now you are a Graham whisperer? Do you know what that bigot is thinking?
No.
Asking the question IS applying pressure. That you can’t see that just means you are not using your brain.
One of the gay hookers that Graham patronizes must have given him something that has affected his brain.
Option 4: GA SOS misinterpreted Graham.
No misinterprettion. Graham is going to use the organized crime defense. He didn’t out right say get rid of legally cast votes. this is not how real life works. and if that really were a deense we’d never have had a successful prosection of an organized crime figure
No misinterpretation. A politician should not even be talking to an election official about how to count the votes. The election official follows the law, if someone doesn’t feel that the election official is following the law, go to the courts for relief and provide EVIDENCE, not hearsay.
Marco Rubio’s in
How does Rubio walk with such a rubbery spine?
As a lifelong Republican until recently, I am not surprised to once again be reminded the Republicans act in the manner they accuse the other tribe of acting like.
I am probably going to register as a Democrat after having been a Republican for 40 years. I just don’t want to be associated with the current crop. It’s embarrassing.
it s merely a democratic right to double check the voting cesspool innit ? Why would Dems oppose, if everything is kosher indeed it would definitely give an extra moral boost to Biden’s victory, at the same time silencing the Trump Troops for once and for all !
Except that the doublecheck he called for is now being derided by Trump BECAUSE it’s showing everything to be above board..
“Making sure” is democratic, smart and supported by all. But once it IS sure… that’s the result.
phil from flanders–no one is opposing the recount of such a close vote–it’s the “wink, wink” suggestion that some votes need to be tossed out, without evidence, that is the issue.
I think the key to your desperate longing for another Trump term comes from you living in the country where a statue of taking a piss is the most revered cultural icon.
You are a fckn acultural NONENTITY if you can t distinguish culture from folklore ! Of course I do understand that you must be envious of a very prosperous region with a impressive cultural heritage, a great economy, social safety net and accessible state of the art medical care AMERICANS CAN ONLY DREAM OF !! Btw, before you come up again with belgian corona deaths for the umpteenth time, let me inform you that our numbers are high because unlike other countries we also count people who already had a serious condition before they caught corona and would ve died in the short term anyway . Kind regards from Phil FF…..I do like my new name, sounds good. Thanks !
Taking the piss is a Commonwealth pejorative term meaning to take liberties at the expense of others, or to be joking, or to be otherwise unreasonable.
Btw we belgians are not really interested in Manneke Pis …..STUPID tourists are, many Americans among them !
Taking the piss, as I understand it, is usually done in a good-natured way. The closest American term I’m aware of, which I haven’t heard used in a very long time, is “ribbing” somebody. It’s a cousin of “teasing” but generally done in fun, and intended to be taken that way.
A couple times when visiting Australia, some locals took the piss out of me, and it was clearly all in fun, and done as a form of welcome and friendship. The UK may be known for that, but Australians have taken this to its most evolved and elegant form.
Drop bears, anybody?
Ahahaha…Phil from Flanders, I’ve spent time in Brussels. I always thought that the big to-do about a tiny statue behind a waffle stand was a tremedously diminishing thing to emphasize, but it’s a wondeful country. And I am sorry about all of the excess people NOT dying from covid (ahem).
I stayed down the street from the Inbev CEO ‘s house and took the trolley into the city to do exploration of the tremendous cultural importance that the merchantilists of the area developed.
Good food, good chocolate, enjoyed the old cities like Bruges and Ypres–looks like a good life when the sun is shining.
So sad, though, that many Europeans still admires tyrants and demagogues. You would have thought that the last millena should have taught them a lesson.
I suspect Graham wanted to tell Trump he tried and failed to stay in his good grace. He seems to have miscalculated on the willingness of the Georgia Secretary of State to go public.
Pretty scary stuff. If there was any dirt to be gotten on Raffensperger I have little doubt Republicans would have attempt blackmail to change the results of the election in Georgia
Lindsay can’t claim ignorance on this one. Not only is he a Senator but he’s a lawyer. I suspect this get picked up by the A.G. of the new Biden administration and that his conduct gets referred to the bar association.
These goons will never. Graham Is the scum of the swamp.
Why is New York magazine credible, who reads it anyways, but officials stating that GOP observers are limited to one representative for every ten tables? Any reasonable person would wonder why the imitation, how could anyone observe 10 different counts…