Kamala Harris: MIA as U.S. burns (NYTimes)
Despite reports that the Kamala Harris campaign team is preparing a financial fund to pay for a hand recount of the 2024 presidential race, voting-integrity expert Stephen Spoonamore says he has received no word, or seen no sign, that Harris intends to join his effort to determine if the election was hacked to benefit Donald Trump and gift-wrap the presidency for a man (unfit for the position in a mountain of ways) who likely did not earn it. If that happens, we all can look forward to tossing aside our democracy and instituting an authoritarian form of government, with Trump as dictator, which likely will feature gross unlawfulness, the trampling of our Constitution and the rule of law, and the kind of chaotic "rule" and incompetence that led to 2.2 million American deaths from the COVID pandemic -- deaths that could have been prevented if Trump had leveled with the public, instead of calling the threat a "hoax" and bothered to read the playbook that had been prepared for just such a crisis because public-health experts knew a deadly virus was likely to develop in China and could spread around the globe without U.S. leadership.
("Hey, Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!)
So, Kamala Harris is comfortable leaving the United States in the hands of a man who shows signs of both mental and physical illness -- and lies so often, and abuses others to such an extent, that one must wonder if he has any integrity at all. If Harris decides to stay in her cocoon, it likely will mean the end of our country as we know it -- and probably the end of any hope for world stability. Should Harris make that choice, I will not be able to understand how she could live with herself. Her legacy, and that of the Democratic Party, will be in shambles -- going down as utter failures at a time when our nation was most vulnerable. (This isn't much comfort, but the Republican Party will look even worse, for allowing Trump to run roughshod over a party that once stood for something and could actually govern.)
The problem, Spoonamore says, is two-fold: (1) A full-scale election contest generally requires the candidate who suffered damage to be directly involved, because under the law, she is the only one who would have standing to appear in court; (2) Election contests have narrow windows of time when action must be taken. If those time requirements aren't met, the contest is doomed. Spoonamore writes at his Substack page under the headline "PA Citizen Instructions for Hand-Recount Challenges Still. A Hammer" :
PA Citizen Instructions for Hand-Recount Challenges
Still. A Hammer.Stephen Spoonamore
Nov 27, 2024In my Duty to Warn letter, I outlined the impossibility of the results coming out, matching human voting. There were many indications a machine was outputting the results. My first-pass calculations were not perfect, but now with time, it turns out they were pretty F-ing close in the swings. Below is a complete spreadsheet of drop-offs in PA by county. Multiple additional states will be coming out shortly. If you voted in a PA County with a drop-off ratio of more than 2%. please, if you can, fill out the form below to demand a hand recount. A recount requires three voters from the same precinct to make the request. Call your neighbors. Get three of you. Do it. My friend Lulu Friestad is making a TiKToK with the steps outlined as I type this. I will add it as soon as she posts.
Sadly, it appears Harris will be doing nothing. Only she can make it happen at scale. But any PA precinct with three voters can get a hand recount. We can see the ballots, and answer what exactly is making these numbers so . . . ahistorical.
PA VOTER RECOUNT REQUESTS
These are the county canvas final dates. Voters have five days after final county numbers to have three voters file a recount request in their election precinct. That means many of the challenge windows will close THIS WEEKEND. Others early next week. (It occurs to me that Harris might have a larger window to act than do voters. The rules also could vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, again [possibly] giving Harris more time to act. It's possible that one, or both of these -- or some other factor -- will allow a larger window for Harris to act. But I think all of that is iffy.)
Spoonamore writes:
Cross reference to this spreadsheet to see drop-off by county. Please post this Google form today to have people sign up in PA to make the recount request.
https://forms.gle/aZhTAtHYEkafAe4n7
Once you have three voters, the TikTok will have a link to a 24/7 online notary. You will then have to hand-deliver the challenge to your local BOE.
You can save some democracy while you prep your turkey.
