The Commentariat -- November 7, 2020

Late Morning Update:

JOE BIDEN IS PRESIDENT-ELECT

~~~ AND the U.S. will soon have it's first female Vice President, the first Vice President of color, the first Black woman, the first Indian-American woman.

Benjamin Swasey of NPR: "President-elect Joe Biden said in a statement that 'it's time for America to unite,' after he was declared the winner of the presidency by The Associated Press. Biden will address the nation Saturday at 8 p.m. ET and will be joined by the vice president-elect, Kamala Harris, and their spouses." ~~~

America, I’m honored that you have chosen me to lead our great country.

The work ahead of us will be hard, but I promise you this: I will be a President for all Americans — whether you voted for me or not.

I will keep the faith that you have placed in me. pic.twitter.com/moA9qhmjn8

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) November 7, 2020

Nevada. Camila Domonoske of NPR: "The Associated Press has called Nevada for President-elect Joe Biden, bringing his bringing his electoral vote total to 290."

Jonathan Martin & Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. was elected the 46th president of the United States on Saturday, promising to restore political normalcy and a spirit of national unity to confront raging health and economic crises, and making Donald J. Trump a one-term president after four years of tumult in the White House. Mr. Biden's victory amounted to a repudiation of Mr. Trump by millions of voters exhausted with his divisive conduct and chaotic administration, and was delivered by an unlikely alliance of women, people of color, old and young voters and a sliver of disaffected Republicans. Mr. Trump is the first incumbent to lose re-election in more than a quarter-century. The result also provided a history-making moment for Mr. Biden's running mate, Senator Kamala Harris of California, who will become the first woman to serve as vice president.... He offered a mainstream Democratic agenda, yet it was less his policy platform than his biography to which many voters gravitated. Seeking the nation's highest office a half-century after his first campaign, Mr. Biden -- a candidate in the late autumn of his career -- presented his life of setback and recovery to voters as a parable for a wounded country."

Jonathan Lemire & Zeke Miller of the AP: "Democrat Joe Biden defeated ... Donald Trump to become the 46th president of the United States on Saturday, positioning himself to lead a nation gripped by the historic pandemic and a confluence of economic and social turmoil."

** The Washington Post's live election updates Saturday are here: "The state of Biden's birth, where he was affectionately deemed an honorary third senator over his decades representing neighboring Delaware, is now projected to deliver him the presidency according to Edison Research. Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes will put Biden over the 270 votes needed even with a handful of other states still too close to call."

The Wall Street Journal & Fox "News" have also projected Biden to win Pennsylvania, putting him over 270 Electoral College votes.

CNN: "Joe Biden will become the 46th president of the United States, CNN projects, after a victory in the state where he was born put him over the 270 electoral votes needed to win. With Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes, Biden now has a total of 273 electoral votes." According to the NYT, CNN was first to call the race for Biden.

Pennsylvania. A small dump (about 2,800 ballots) from Philadelphia increases Biden's lead in the state to 30,908. Apparently on the basis of this small report, NBC News has called Pennsylvania for Biden.

Arizona. A Saturday morning ballot dump from Maricopa County has reduced Biden's lead to 20,573 votes. This is supposed to be Maricopa's last report of a significant number of ballots. Trump's lead does not seem to be enough for him to overtake Biden.

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "Twitter flagged all of President Trump's early-morning tweets on Saturday as disputed and potentially misleading after he made baseless claims about election irregularities. In a series of posts, Mr. Trump focused his ire on Pennsylvania...." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Shear doesn't reveal what-all Trump tweeted, so I checked. Here's a good one: "I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT!" Yeah, "potentially misleading."

Jim Rutenberg, et al., of the New York Times: "President Trump's bellicose pledge to fight the outcome of the election in the courts crashed on Friday into skeptical judges, daunting Electoral College math and a lack of evidence for his claims of fraud. On a day that began with vote tallies in Georgia and Pennsylvania tipping in Joseph R. Biden Jr.'s favor, Mr. Trump's campaign declared, 'This election is not over,' as the Republican National Committee announced it had activated 'legal challenge teams' in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and Pennsylvania. And the Trump forces named a new general to lead the effort, the hardened conservative political combatant David Bossie. But none of the dozen or so lawsuits they had brought in battleground states appeared to be gaining any traction in the courts. And in any case, none seemed likely to give Mr. Trump the edge he would need in vote counts in the states that will determine the outcome."

Jason Hanna, et al., of CNN: "Two armed Virginia men who were arrested Thursday outside the Philadelphia Convention Center were 'coming to deliver a truck full of fake ballots' to the city, CNN affiliate KYW reported, citing prosecutors." Mrs. McC: See, those armed men weren't dangerous shoot-'em-up cowboys as we assumed; they were just patriotic Americans delivering fake votes for Donald Trump.

~~~~~~~~~~

Presidential Election Results, Etc.

The New York Times' presidential election results page includes a crawl of pithy, informative comments from reporters.

Pennsylvania. AP: "Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito has ordered county elections officials in Pennsylvania to keep separate mail-in ballots that arrived after Election Day. The state's top elections official already had ordered those ballots be kept apart. The order came Friday night in response to a plea from the state Republican Party as Democrat Joe Biden inched ahead of ... Donald Trump in Pennsylvania in the presidential race. Alito, acting on his own, said he was motivated in part by the Republicans' assertion that they can't be sure elections officials are complying with guidance issued by Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar, a Democrat. The justice handles emergency appeals from Pennsylvania. He ordered a response from the state by Saturday afternoon and said he has referred the matter to the full court for further action."

Jonathan Lemire, et al., of the AP: "Democrat Joe Biden was on the cusp of winning the presidency on Friday as he opened up narrow leads over ... Donald Trump in the critical battlegrounds of Georgia and Pennsylvania. Those put Biden in a stronger position to capture the 270 Electoral College votes needed to take the White House. The winner will lead a country facing a historic set of challenges, including a surging pandemic and deep political polarization. The focus on Pennsylvania ... came as Americans entered a third full day after the election without knowing who will lead them for the next four years. The prolonged process added to the anxiety of a nation whose racial and cultural divides were inflamed during the heated campaign. Biden was at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, as the vote count continued and aides said he would address the nation in primetime. Trump remained in the White House residence as more results trickled in, expanding Biden's lead in must-win Pennsylvania." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Politico's live election updates Friday are here: "Georgia's [Republican] secretary of state said Friday morning that there will be a recount of the state's presidential votes, as Joe Biden took a narrow lead of a few hundredths of a percentage point over ... Donald Trump.... Donald Trump's reelection campaign insisted on Friday that the presidential election is 'not over,' working to stave off defeat with baseless claims of voter fraud even as Democratic nominee Joe Biden pulled ahead in two states that would hand him the White House.... A handful of Republicans are beginning to speak out about ... Donald Trump's baseless claims of fraud in the presidential election, with GOP Sens. Susan Collins and Pat Toomey the latest to bat away Trump's rhetoric as the presidency slips away from him.... [But] some top Republicans such as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy have raced to defend Trump, illustrating his tight grip on the party and suggesting a GOP-led intervention isn't coming anytime soon." (Also linked yesterday.)

From the New York Times' live updates Friday: "With Georgia's 16 electoral votes likely to be decided by a tiny margin, Democrats are urging voters there to fix absentee ballots that were rejected because of invalid or missing signatures before the deadline on Friday evening. Those who voted absentee -- a group that this year has been heavily Democratic -- can check online to see whether election officials have accepted or rejected their ballots.... The Postal Service found hundreds of ballots in Pennsylvania and North Carolina facilities on Thursday, according to data filed in federal court. Election rules in both states allow mail-in ballots received after Election Day to be counted." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Maggie Astor of the New York Times: "With many ballots still left to count in heavily Democratic cities, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was leading President Trump on Friday by more than 4.1 million votes. Amid all the anxiety over the counts in Pennsylvania and Georgia, and despite Americans' intense ideological divisions, there was no question that &-- for the fourth presidential election in a row, and the seventh of the past eight -- more people had chosen a Democrat than a Republican."

Joe Biden spoke at about 10:30 pm ET Friday: ~~~

Shane Goldmacher, et al., of the New York Times: "Joseph R. Biden Jr.'s advisers accelerated their transition planning on Friday as election results showed him with an advantage in battleground states that could hand him the presidency, with the first senior officials in a potential Biden White House possibly named as early as next week. In Wilmington and Washington, Mr. Biden's advisers and allies are ramping up their conversations about who might fill critical posts, both in the West Wing and across the agencies, guided heavily by Mr. Biden's plan to assemble what would be the most diverse cabinet in history.... The Biden camp has prepared for multiple scenarios in case Mr. Trump refused to concede and his administration would not participate in a transition. So far, officials in Mr. Trump's government have worked in good faith, according to Biden officials, who said they hoped and expected that cooperation to continue."

David Brennan of Newsweek: "... Joe Biden's campaign has said it does not matter whether ... Donald Trump concedes the election or not, as America waits for confirmation that Biden will be the nation's 46th president.... But the Trump campaign is resorting to conspiracy theories and litigation to try and stop Biden's victory. Sources inside the White House told CNN Thursday that the president has no intention of conceding to his Democratic rival. Asked for their response to developments, Biden's campaign released a brief and uncompromising statement. 'As we said on July 19th, the American people will decide this election. And the United States government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Vanessa Williams & Reis Thebault of the Washington Post: Stacey "Abrams, 46, who was the first Black woman to win a major-party gubernatorial nomination, was roundly applauded by Democratic political leaders and activists on social media and elsewhere Friday after Biden overtook Trump in ballots counted in Georgia. The state is continuing to tally overseas, provisional and military ballots and plans to conduct a recount. The accolades often mentioned the overall work of Black women, among the most engaged and active segments of the Democratic electorate -- both as voters and as activists like Abrams, who register voters, rally them to the polls and, more and more, run for office." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Every American should pause and thank Black Americans for all they have done to bend the arc of the moral university toward justice. If you're white & have a tendency to pat yourself on the back for "helping" less fortunate Black Americans, it's useful to remember that many Blacks have done more for you than you did for them.

Do as I Say, Not as I Do. Joe Biden should not wrongfully claim the office of the President. I could make that claim also. Legal proceedings are just now beginning! -- Donald Trump, in a tweet, Friday afternoon

Frankly, we did win this election. -- Donald Trump, Wednesday morning speech

I won Pennsylvania by a lot.... Likewise, in Georgia, I won by a lot.... In Michigan, we're way up in Michigan, won the state. In Wisconsin we did likewise, fantastically well.... In every case, they got whittled down.... they are finding ballots all of a sudden. -- Donald Trump, Thursday evening speech

Kevin Liptak & Kaitlan Collins of CNN: "Facing a disappearing pathway to victory..., Donald Trump offered little indication on Friday he was prepared to concede defeat, leading those around him to wonder who might be able to reckon with a leader who has given virtually no thought to leaving the White House.... Trump has not prepared a concession speech and in conversations with allies in recent days, he has said he has no intention of conceding the election, people familiar with the matter said. So far he has been bolstered in his stance by those closest to him, including his senior advisers and his adult sons, who have mounted an aggressive effort in the courts to challenge the results and have pressured other Republicans into defending him." Mrs. McC: Looks as if he still thinks Amy Covid Barrett & her new Supreme friends will bail him out, and who knows? Maybe they will. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times: "The president has had all this time to hatch a spidery plot to ruin democracy on the way out the door, and this is the best he can come up with?... It was the same old tired Trump routine we've watched for four years, right through the pandemic failure: Beat your chest and bleat that you're king of the world. Then do nothing except screw up.... As Trump howled at the moon, denizens of Trumpworld were looking over the horizon, plotting new jobs or book deals."

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Katie Robertson of the New York Times: "Last month The New York Post called President Trump 'an invincible hero, who not only survived every dirty trick the Democrats threw at him, but the Chinese virus as well.' Then it published front-page articles trying to link the contents of a laptop said to belong to Hunter Biden to his father, Joseph R. Biden Jr. On Thursday, in a sudden about-face, Rupert Murdoch's scrappy tabloid published two articles with a wildly different tone. One accused the president of making an 'unfounded claim that political foes were trying to steal the election.' The headline on the other described Donald Trump Jr. as the 'panic-stricken' author of a 'clueless tweet.'... The president appears to be going down -- and The Post is not about to go with him. With Mr. Trump headed toward a likely defeat, top editors at the tabloid told some staff members this week to be tougher in their coverage of him...."

"The People vs. Donald Trump." Roger Cohen of the New York Times: "... Trump's attempted coup against democracy, for it is no less than that, will be resisted.... To see that child-man charlatan in the White House spouting lies yet again, asserting without a trace of evidence that 'If you count the legal vote I easily win,' claiming that 'I won Pennsylvania by a lot,' and Michigan and Georgia, too, was to be reminded of the American nightmare of these past four years that the American people seem to have brought to an end...."

If Democrats were conspiring to steal the election, they would have stolen a couple of Senate seats, too. -- Joyce Vance, on MSNBC (slight paraphrase)

Richard Lopez of the Minnesota Reformer: "Minnesota GOP Chairperson Jennifer Carnahan told party activists on Thursday night that she would help amplify claims of ballot fraud made by ... Donald Trump and national Republican leaders, even though they are baseless assertions disputed by election officials of both parties. Carnahan said that earlier Thursday, Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel asked her and other GOP officials around the country to recruit elected Republicans to parrot the false claims of fraud. 'I'm going to be making calls tomorrow to all of our leaders asking them to help us be a voice,' Carnahan said during the call Thursday with local Minnesota GOP party officials and activists."

Tony Romm & Isaac Stanley-Becker of the Washington Post: "A Republican firm run by a top aide to President Trump's 2020 campaign appears to have helped send unmarked text messages on Thursday that urged supporters in Philadelphia to converge outside a building where local election officials were counting votes. 'ALERT: Radical Liberals & Dems are trying to steal this election from Trump!' began the short text, sent in the hours before former vice president Joe Biden took the lead in the state. 'We need YOU! Show your support at the corner of 12th St. & Arch St. in Philadelphia,' [which is next to the Pennsylvania Convention Center]. The messages were sent from phone numbers that had been leased by Opn Sesame, a company that offers texting services to Republican candidates and causes.... Opn Sesame is run by Gary Coby, the digital director for Trump's 2020 campaign, and it has worked for years on behalf of a number of key GOP clients, including the Republican National Committee.... The messages foreshadowed how Trump and his allies might use the vast troves of data they have collected over the previous four years to target sympathetic voters in a bid to disrupt a smooth transition of power." A Raw Story summary report is here. ~~~

~~~ Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Whaddaya bet at least one of these two guys got that message? ~~~

~~~ Tom Winter, et al., of NBC News: "Two armed men were arrested Thursday near the Philadelphia convention center where votes were being tallied, police said.... Philadelphia district attorney Larry Krasner identified the men on Friday night as Joshua Macias and Antonio Lamotta, both of Chesapeake, Va.... Krasner said there were some QAnon stickers on [their vehicle] and that a hat with a QAnon logo was visible inside the vehicle.... Social media profiles that match Lamotta's name and included pictures of the silver Hummer and stickers suggest he was a supporter of the QAnon conspiracy theory. On his Facebook page, which was removed by early Friday morning, Lamotta posted about QAnon 'as a positive military operation' and suggested a judgement day was fast-approaching. On Twitter, Lamotta posted signed drawings of cartoons that included anti-Semitic tropes and depicted Trump as a machine-gun carrying hero.... Social media profiles tied to Macias' name mentioned the 'Stop the Steal' campaign, a group which was banned from Facebook Thursday due to repeated calls for violence."

Josh Rogin of the Washington Post: "Late Friday afternoon, the White House fired Bonnie Glick the Senate-confirmed deputy administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, without any justification offered, making her the first senior Trump political appointee to be purged following the election. The move further cripples the $31 billion agency in the middle of a global pandemic and potentially during a presidential transition as well. The departure of Glick is the first in what is widely expected to be a broader purge of officials whom President Trump feels to have been insufficiently loyal.... She was fired Friday because the White House would rather have its political allies in control of the agency than an establishment Republican with actual expertise and experience." ~~~

~~~ Wait, Wait. There's More. Ayesha Rascoe & Michele Kelemen of NPR: "The Trump administration abruptly dumped the leaders of three agencies that oversee the nuclear weapons stockpile, electricity and natural gas regulation, and overseas aid during the past two days.... The sudden departures included: Lisa Gordon-Hagerty, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, the first woman to oversee the agency in charge of the nuclear stockpile. She was required to resign on Friday. Bonnie Glick, deputy administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development.... Neil Chatterjee, chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and a former aide to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell."

Benjamin Weiser, et al., of the New York Times: "Stephen K. Bannon, the former adviser to President Trump who is known for his right-wing extremism, suggested on Thursday that the F.B.I. director and Dr. Anthony S. Fauci should be beheaded, and Twitter responded by banning one of his accounts. On Friday, a prominent lawyer who was defending Mr. Bannon against fraud charges in federal court in Manhattan abruptly moved to drop him as a client, one person familiar with the matter said. 'Mr. Bannon is in the process of retaining new counsel,' the lawyer, William A. Burck, said in a brief letter to the court, giving no explanation.... Since August, Mr. Bannon has been fighting the criminal charges lodged against him by federal prosecutors in Manhattan, the case in which Mr. Burck has been his lawyer." A Law & Crime story is here.

The Trumpidemic, Ctd.

The Washington Post's live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here: "The United States reported more than 128,000 new coronavirus cases Friday as the number of fatalities nationwide exceeded 1,000 for the fourth consecutive day. The seven-day average of new cases was nearly 100,000, almost 20,000 higher than on this day last week."

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here: "The United States recorded at least 121,000 new infections on Thursday, a day after hitting 100,000 for the first time since the pandemic began, and for many Americans, fatalism was the order of the day." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Shocking News. Mario Parker, et al., of Bloomberg, via the Seattle Times: "... Donald Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has told associates he has coronavirus, according to people familiar with the matter, adding to the outbreaks connected to the White House. It wasn't immediately clear when Meadows learned that he had contracted the virus or whether he had developed symptoms of Covid-19.... He informed a close circle of advisers after Tuesday's election, one of the people said.... A Trump campaign aide, Nick Trainer, is also infected, according to two people familiar with the matter. He and campaign spokespeople declined to comment. Meadows has remained involved in Trump's post-election effort to challenge votes in several states where he trails former Vice President Joe Biden, according to one person familiar with the matter." Mrs. McC: How could this have happened?? ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Here's the New York Times story: "And four other White House officials tested positive for the virus, a person familiar with the diagnoses told The New York Times.... One White House official, who asked for anonymity because the official was not allowed to speak publicly about internal discussions, said people were told to keep quiet about the various cases."

     ~~~ Thanks to PD Pepe for the link.

The Commentariat -- November 6, 2020

Afternoon Update:

CNN is reporting on-air that Joe Biden will give an address "in prime-time" Friday night.

Jonathan Lemire, et al., of the AP: "Democrat Joe Biden was on the cusp of winning the presidency on Friday as he opened up narrow leads over ... Donald Trump in the critical battlegrounds of Georgia and Pennsylvania. Those put Biden in a stronger position to capture the 270 Electoral College votes needed to take the White House. The winner will lead a country facing a historic set of challenges, including a surging pandemic and deep political polarization. The focus on Pennsylvania ... came as Americans entered a third full day after the election without knowing who will lead them for the next four years. The prolonged process added to the anxiety of a nation whose racial and cultural divides were inflamed during the heated campaign. Biden was at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, as the vote count continued and aides said he would address the nation in primetime. Trump remained in the White House residence as more results trickled in, expanding Biden's lead in must-win Pennsylvania."

Politico's live election updates are here: "Georgia's [Republican] secretary of state said Friday morning that there will be a recount of the state's presidential votes, as Joe Biden took a narrow lead of a few hundredths of a percentage point over ... Donald Trump.... Donald Trump's reelection campaign insisted on Friday that the presidential election is 'not over,' working to stave off defeat with baseless claims of voter fraud even as Democratic nominee Joe Biden pulled ahead in two states that would hand him the White House.... A handful of Republicans are beginning to speak out about ... Donald Trump's baseless claims of fraud in the presidential election, with GOP Sens. Susan Collins and Pat Toomey the latest to bat away Trump's rhetoric as the presidency slips away from him.... [But] some top Republicans such as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy have raced to defend Trump, illustrating his tight grip on the party and suggesting a GOP-led intervention isn't coming anytime soon."

From the New York Times' live updates Friday: "With Georgia's 16 electoral votes likely to be decided by a tiny margin, Democrats are urging voters there to fix absentee ballots that were rejected because of invalid or missing signatures before the deadline on Friday evening. Those who voted absentee -- a group that this year has been heavily Democratic -- can check online to see whether election officials have accepted or rejected their ballots.... The Postal Service found hundreds of ballots in Pennsylvania and North Carolina facilities on Thursday, according to data filed in federal court. Election rules in both states allow mail-in ballots received after Election Day to be counted."

Kevin Liptak & Kaitlan Collins of CNN: "Facing a disappearing pathway to victory..., Donald Trump offered little indication on Friday he was prepared to concede defeat, leading those around him to wonder who might be able to reckon with a leader who has given virtually no thought to leaving the White House.... Trump has not prepared a concession speech and in conversations with allies in recent days, he has said he has no intention of conceding the election, people familiar with the matter said. So far he has been bolstered in his stance by those closest to him, including his senior advisers and his adult sons, who have mounted an aggressive effort in the courts to challenge the results and have pressured other Republicans into defending him." Mrs. McC: Looks as if he still thinks Amy Covid Barrett & her new Supreme friends will bail him out, and who knows? Maybe they will.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here: "The United States recorded at least 121,000 new infections on Thursday, a day after hitting 100,000 for the first time since the pandemic began, and for many Americans, fatalism was the order of the day."

     ~~~ Thanks to PD Pepe for the link.

~~~~~~~~~~

Presidential Vote Count, Etc.

The New York Times' live election updates Friday are here. (Revised): "Joseph R. Biden Jr. stood on the cusp of the presidency on Friday, seizing a lead over President Trump in both Pennsylvania and Georgia and drawing ever closer to securing the 270 electoral votes needed to lay claim to the White House. Mr. Biden, who has 253 electoral votes, pulled ahead of Mr. Trump in Pennsylvania by about 5,600 votes on Friday morning. If his lead holds -- and it is expected to -- the state's 20 electoral votes would vault him past the threshold to win the election. Mr. Biden had already begun to project the image of a man preparing to assume the mantle of office, meeting on Thursday with his economic and health advisers to be briefed on the coronavirus pandemic.... Mr. Biden's appeal to let the process play out contrasted with that of Mr. Trump, who took the lectern in the White House briefing room to falsely claim that the election was riddled with fraud, as part of an elaborate coast-to-coast conspiracy by Democrats, the news media and Silicon Valley to deny him a second term."

The Washington Post's live election updates Friday are here. They are free to non-subscribers: "Dismay mounted Friday among America's allies as Trump stepped up his unsubstantiated attacks on the vote count and continued to falsely claim victory in the U.S. presidential election. Officials and newspapers around the world lamented the polarization and dysfunction in the world's oldest democracy as Biden's path to the White House widened."

Pennysylvania. Steve Kornacki of MSNBC reports at 8:55 am ET that Joe Biden has taken the lead in Pennsylvania, by 5,587 votes. That's all, folks. Update: Here is a Hill report.

Georgia. According to the New York Times' count, Joe Biden just (@7:30 am ET) passed Trump (by about 1,100 votes). If Biden's lead holds, Trump cannot get to 270 Electoral votes. The ballot dump that put Biden over the top may have come from Clayton County, which John Lewis -- one of the greatest heroes in the battle for voting rights -- represented for so many years. ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Greg Bluestein of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "It was Clayton, the south metro county that's also the bluest bastion in the state, that provided the decisive votes. The county long represented in Congress by U.S. Rep. John Lewis, the late civil rights icon who was one of the most vocal critics of Trump.... Biden's erasure of Trump's once-formidable lead in Georgia doesn't guarantee him the state's 16 electoral votes. With the contest so close, no national outlet will likely project a winner in Georgia until more of the absentee, provisional and other votes are tallied. And Trump could reclaim the lead. But top Democrats exuded confidence about their slim lead in Georgia, particularly with a trove of absentee ballots in left-leaning Gwinnett County set to be added to the tally on Friday."

Arizona. A 9 pm ET dump of about 60,000 Maricopa County, Arizona, votes favored Trump, who got 59% of those votes. If the votes continue with these percentages, Trump would overtake Biden.

Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: If all of the undeclared states hold as expected (and they may not), the final Electoral College tally will be Biden 306, Trump 232. That is exactly the number by which Trump prevailed in 2016, in what he called the greatest landslide victory in history.

The Washington Post's live updates Thursday, which are free to non-subscribers, are here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.): "Speaking publicly for the first time since Election Night, Trump repeated his baseless claims of voter fraud and vowed 'a lot of litigation' to challenge the vote counting process during a White House news conference where he didn't take any questions. Trump rattled off a long list of false claims and baseless allegations about the election and the vote counting process. Without evidence, he attacked the integrity of mail-in ballots, claimed media and tech companies had engaged in 'interference,' and accused local election officials of corruption. He attacked public polls that showed Biden ahead as suppression efforts. He also mischaracterized processes related to the tabulation of ballots, falsely suggesting that Republican observers were not present in some vote counting centers. ~~~

~~~ "The president also lamented that he had been ahead in key battleground states on election night, but had lost significant ground since, suggesting wrongly that this was due to something nefarious. Biden began to overtake Trump once mail-in ballots were counted. 'We were winning in all the key locations by a lot, actually, and then our numbers started miraculously getting whittled away in secret,' Trump said. 'And we're still ahead by a lot, but not as many because they're finding ballots. All of a sudden we have some mail in ballots. It's amazing how those mail in ballots are so one sided, too,' Trump added. The president spent the last several months sowing doubt in mail ballots and encouraging his voters to wait to cast ballots until Election Day. Trump also incorrectly stated that the 'election apparatus in Georgia is run by Democrats' and that 'officials overseeing the counting in Pennsylvania and other states are all part of a corrupt Democrat machine.'" ~~~

~~~ AND not a word about Covid-19.

~~~ Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: "President Trump's statement in the White House briefing room on Thursday evening was a litany of falsehoods and grievance, with some baseless conspiracy theories thrown in for good measure. Here's a quick roundup of Trump's off-base claims." ~~~

~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Well into a presidency defined by disinformation and falsehoods, President Trump managed something remarkable on Thursday evening. Speaking to reporters in the White House briefing room, he offered the most thoroughly dishonest comments of his tenure.... Trump has for months telegraphed [his] backup plan in the event of a loss in the presidential contest.... With polling showing him trailing, everyone expected Trump to claim victory and to try to stop votes from being counted, which is what happened.... Trump's allies go along with all of this because it preserves their power. Trump's base goes along with it because they believe him." ~~~

~~~ Anne Gearan of the Washington Post: "Trailing Democratic nominee Joe Biden in the unresolved presidential contest, Trump is pulling out a playbook perfected by Russian President Vladimir Putin and other authoritarians. It relies on sowing doubt about the institutions of law and government, spreading misinformation or outright lies that serve a leader's political ends, and relying on a cadre of loyal supporters to believe what they are told, Putin scholars said. Trump's attempts to brand legal election practices as fraud and to use the courts -- one pillar in the nation's democratic architecture -- to intervene in the counting of votes -- another pillar -- are the latest examples of what has long been his malleable view of the democratic system." ~~~

~~~ Annals of Journalism, Ctd. Michael Grynbaum & Tiffany Hsu of the New York Times: "The three big broadcast networks -- ABC, CBS and NBC -- cut away from President Trump's news conference at the White House on Thursday as the president lobbed false claims about the integrity of the election. Mr. Trump timed his appearance to air during the networks' evening newscasts, which draw the biggest collective audience in TV news. But the anchors broke in after a few minutes to correct some of his falsehoods." ~~~

~~~ Kim Lyons of the Verge: "Cable networks, broadcast networks and Twitter cut short their broadcasts of ... Donald Trump's speech from the White House briefing room Thursday; some outlets fact-checked the president's unproven statements rather than carry them live.... MSNBC, ABC, CBS, CNBC, and NBC cut away from his speech." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: What's equally amazing about this clip is that you can see Trump is reading -- in his child-like way -- from a script. He planned to tell these bald-faced lies & somebody wrote them down for him to say.

~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: So far, the only verified voter fraud has been perpetrated by the Trump campaign: ~~~

~~~ ** Mary Spicuzza & Bruce Vielmetti of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: "... Donald Trump's campaign in Wisconsin has desperately sought volunteers to call Pennsylvanians and urge them to mail in absentee ballots by Friday -- even as the president himself rails against late votes and the ongoing vote count. Only votes cast by Nov. 3 are legal according to Pennsylvania and federal election laws. Trump himself has described any effort to vote after Tuesday as clear election fraud.... The Trump campaign is trying to take advantage of an effort by Pennsylvania to count all absentee votes mailed by Nov. 3 even if received up to three days later.... An email obtained by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel sent at 5:19 p.m. Thursday by Kenosha for Trump ... reads: 'Trump Victory urgently needs volunteers to make phone calls to Pennsylvania Trump supporters to return their absentee ballots. These phone calls will help President Trump win the election!'... A pair of field directors listed in the email..., Riley Pella and Joshua Williams, are paid staffers for the Republican Party of Wisconsin.... Dozens of Republican staffers in Wisconsin were involved in the operation to recruit volunteers to contact Trump supporters in Pennsylvania, according to one person familiar with the effort." ~~~

~~~ CBS Philadelphia: "Two heavily armed men found outside the Pennsylvania Convention Center were taken into police custody late Thursday night. This comes as votes are currently being counted inside of the center. Philadelphia police say they were notified of a threat of an attack around 10 p.m. Thursday. According to police, the threat involved a group of individuals from out of state, driving in a silver Hummer ... with Virginia tags.... Authorities say they found multiple guns inside of the vehicle."

President-elect Joe Biden made a brief statement late Thursday afternoon:

      ~~~ Biden began his remarks by announcing that he & Sen. Harris had just attended a Covid-19 briefing.

Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "The Secret Service is sending reinforcements to Wilmington, Del., starting Friday to help protect former vice president Joe Biden as his campaign prepares for the possibility he may soon claim victory in his bid for the White House, according to two people familiar with the plans. The Secret Service summoned a squad of agents to add to the protective bubble around Biden after his campaign told the agency that the Democratic nominee would continue utilizing a Wilmington convention center at least another day and could make a major speech as early as Friday, according to the people.... The additional security for Biden that is expected to begin Friday doesn't give him a full protective detail that accompanies a president-elect, but it moves closer in that direction."

Until Thusday evening, Trump was in his hideyhole & had not been seen since his early-morning crazy-rant Wednesday. Occasionally he limbered up his Twitter thumbs & emits plaints like "STOP THE COUNT!" & "STOP THE FRAUD!" Very presidential.

Nancy Cook of Politico: "... Donald Trump has struggled to convince the country he already won the election. So he's just going to do the next best thing: Act like he's starting his second term early. Trump and his aides have settled on a plan for him to take full advantage of his existing perch at the White House to look as presidential as possible, according to three people briefed on the strategy ... even if, during the final months of his campaign, Trump repeatedly failed to lay out any agenda for another four years.... He may fire a few Cabinet members and top aides, including FBI Director Christopher Wray and Defense Secretary Mark Esper. He could sign a slew of base-pleasing executive orders. He might even resume his travel schedule. Meanwhile, Trump's team is planning to mount even more legal challenges and cast evidence-deficient aspersions on the integrity of ballots." Mrs. McC: So Trump's idea of "looking presidential" is firing top aides, signing executive orders that President Biden will likely reverse & traveling around the country on our dime. Pathetic.

The New York Times' live election updates Thursday are here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.): "As results trickled in from the remaining undecided states Mr. Biden increased his lead in Nevada by about 4,000 votes and was eroding Mr. Trump's leads in Georgia and Pennsylvania, while holding on to his modest lead in Arizona.... Mr. Trump issued a written statement on Thursday afternoon through his campaign in which he made baseless claims that there could be fraud in the late votes and then repeated many of them at his news conference. The statement, which was written in all capital letters, resembled one of his tweets -- but by issuing it through the campaign, the president avoided getting a warning label from Twitter, which has flagged many of his recent tweets as potentially misleading."

Amy Gardner, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump and his allies pressed their claims Thursday that election officials have allowed ballot fraud to infect the counting process in the battleground states poised to decide the presidency, but they offered no evidence of irregularities and met with two immediate defeats in court. In Georgia, a local judge in Chatham County, home of Savannah, denied the Trump campaign's effort to disqualify about 50 ballots that a Republican poll watcher claimed may have arrived after the 7 p.m. deadline on Election Day. In court, the poll watcher offered no evidence that the ballots had arrived late, and county election officials testified that they had arrived on time. And in Michigan, a Court of Claims judge said she would deny the campaign's request for an emergency halt to the counting of votes in the state. She noted that the request made little sense, given that the counting has essentially been finished in the state, with former vice president Joe Biden ahead by about 150,000 votes. He has been declared the winner of the state by national news organizations. Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel's office described Trump's request as an 'attempt to unring a bell.'" The article is free to non-subscribers.

Ashley Parker & Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "Huddled with family members and advisers [Tuesday night] -- including Kellyanne Conway, campaign adviser Corey Lewandowski, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and former White House press secretary Sarah Sanders, among others -- first in the White House residence and then in the Map Room, Trump became increasingly agitated as the evening wore on.... Trump began complaining about voter fraud and the election being stolen, and by the time he appeared in the East Wing around 2 a.m. Wednesday to make remarks, he was determined to declare victory, even though his prepared notes did not say that.... By Wednesday evening, however, Trump had begun telling allies he believed he could lose -- but only because the election was being 'stolen from him,' a campaign official said. And when he woke up Thursday, he was angry again and eager to take a more defiant tone, advisers said.... The president was eager to speak publicly Thursday about the election -- arguing that his rightful victory was being stolen, and that states were conspiring against him.... On Thursday evening, the president appeared in front of reporters at the White House around 6:45, seeming subdued and deflated, and made unproven claims about voter fraud and vowing to continue the fight through legal channels." ~~~

      ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Funny, we are reading any stories headlined, "Biden Goes Bonkers."

** Jacob Bogate & Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: "More than 150,000 ballots were caught in U.S. Postal Service processing facilities and not delivered by Election Day, agency data shows, including more than 12,000 in five of the states that have yet to be called for either President Trump or Democratic challenger, Joe Biden. Despite assurances from Postal Service leaders that agency officials were conducting daily sweeps for misplaced ballots, the mail service acknowledged in a court filing Thursday that thousands of ballots had not been processed in time, and that more ballots were processed Wednesday than on Election Day. The number of mailed ballots the Postal Service did not deliver by Election Day is expected to grow as more data is released in the coming days.... Under Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a major Trump financier who took over the agency in June, first-class mail delivery rates have steadily declined, especially in urban areas that are bastions of Democratic voters."

Simon Romero, et al., of the New York Times: "In a year defined by protests ... the presidential election brought even more demonstrators to the streets across America this week as days passed without a clear winner.... Protests broke out in hotly contested areas including Detroit, Philadelphia, Atlanta and Phoenix, where demonstrators said they were convinced the election was being stolen -- a baseless claim that has circulated fiercely on social media, including on the Twitter feed of President Trump. Protests also took place in areas where the results were settled, like New York, Portland, Washington and Miami, where the organizers -- Latino Republican groups --offered a warning on a Facebook page called Stop the Steal: 'They're trying to steal this election from the President Donald J. Trump and we're not going to let it happen.'... [The page] mushroomed to more than 360,000 members within hours, before it was shut down by Facebook." And so forth.

Carly Johnson, et al., of the AP: "An Associated Press analysis reveals that in 376 counties with the highest number of new [Covid-19] cases per capita, the overwhelming majority -- 93% of those counties -- went for Trump, a rate above other less severely hit areas. Most were rural counties in Montana, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa and Wisconsin -- the kinds of areas that often have lower rates of adherence to social distancing, mask-wearing and other public health measures, according to AP VoteCast.... Thirty-six percent of Trump voters described the pandemic as completely or mostly under control, and another 47% said it was somewhat under control.... Meanwhile, 82% of Biden voters said the pandemic is not at all under control."

Luke Broadwater & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: “Democrats wept, cursed and traded blame on Thursday during an extraordinary party confab to dissect the disappointing results of this week’s elections, agreeing on little except that they needed a 'deep dive' into how they had ended up with painful losses that weakened their House majority instead of the big gains they had boldly predicted. In a caucus meeting held by telephone that was their first group conversation since Election Day, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Representative Cheri Bustos of Illinois, who led the party's campaign arm, defended their efforts. Democrats expressed frustration over the loss of eight of their members -- and a net loss of six seats, with 36 races still undecided -- that had left them with a slimmer margin of control.... During the call, which lasted three hours and previewed divisions among Democrats over how to wield their power and define their message, Ms. Bustos conceded that things had gone badly awry. She said she was 'gutted' and 'heartbroken' by the losses."

SharpieGate II. Geneva Sands, et al., of CNN: "False claims that using Sharpie pens could invalidate ballots in Arizona prompted a top Department of Homeland Security official on Thursday to urge people to stop spreading disinformation online connected to the so-called "#SharpieGate" rumors[.] Those rumors fueled outrage among protesters Wednesday night, and prompted a lawsuit -- joined by the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee -- filed against Maricopa County election officials. Rumors began to spread on social media Wednesday that voters in the battleground state of Arizona who used Sharpie pens on their ballots wouldn't have their votes counted. That confusion prompted state officials, election monitors and a top Trump administration official to push back on'#SharpieGate' rumors."

David Ingram of NBC News (at 8:13 pm ET): "Twitter banned an account associated with Steve Bannon on Thursday and YouTube removed one of his videos after the former Trump adviser called for the beheadings of two federal officials. Bannon, in a video for his podcast recording, had said he wanted to behead FBI Director Christopher Wray and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government's top infectious diseases expert. Bannon said he would 'put the heads on pikes' as a 'warning to federal bureaucrats,' referencing Tudor-era England."

The Trumpidemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here: "For the second day in a row, the United States on Thursday recorded over 100,000 new coronavirus cases in a single day as daily records were broken across the country. The country burst across the 100,000 threshold of reported cases a day earlier, the first time it had done so since the pandemic began. The total count of new infections Wednesday was at least 107,000, according to a New York Times database. By Thursday evening, the count in the U.S. had hit more than 108,000. Twenty-three states have recorded more cases in the past week than in any other seven-day stretch. [NBC News is reporting the number of new cases Thursday was 120,000.] ~~~

~~~ "A quarter of a million coronavirus infections have been reported at colleges and universities across the United States, according to a New York Times survey, as schools across the nation struggle to keep outbreaks in check. The bulk of the cases have occurred since students returned for the fall semester, with more than 38,000 new cases reported in the last two weeks alone. And the numbers are almost certainly an undercount."

The Commentariat -- November 5, 2020

Afternoon Update:

Joe Biden made a brief statement late Thursday afternoon:

Mrs. McCrabbie: 12:40 pm ET: Updates in vote totals for the undeclared states generally are going in Biden's direction, except for Arizona, where the changes -- so far -- are not critical. However, Biden has not overtaken Trump in Georgia (where it looks like a stretch to suppose he will) or Pennslyvania, where Trump's margin continues to diminish with every ballot dump. Biden's margin has increased in Nevada.

Biden is expected to speak again this afternoon. Trump is in his hideyhole & hasn't been seen since his early-morning crazy-rant Wednesday, tho occasionally he limbers up his Twitter thumbs & emits plaints like "STOP THE COUNT!" & "STOP THE FRAUD!" Very presidential.

The New York Times' live election updates Thursday are here. The Washington Post's live updates, which are free to non-subscribers, are here.

~~~~~~~~~~

Election News

Arizona. The newest batch of votes dropping in Arizona (@9:15 pm ET Wednesday) are mostly same-day drop-off votes from Maricopa (Phoenix) County. The first batch heavily favored Trump, & Biden's lead was cut from about 93K to 80K. It has since been cut to about 68K. Despite the AP's call for Biden, it appears Trump could still take Arizona.

The New York Times' live election updates Wednesday are here: "President-Elect Biden delivers very presidential remarks Wednesday afternoon: "The undecided presidential election entered a new phase on Wednesday as former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was declared the winner of Michigan and Wisconsin, two key swing states that President Trump won four years ago.... The president found himself with few paths remaining to winning the 270 electoral votes needed to win re-election. By Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Biden was holding slim leads in several key states that, if they hold, could propel him to the critical Electoral College threshold and the presidency. The lingering uncertainty of the 2020 campaign was perhaps unsurprising in an election with record-breaking turnout where most ballots were cast before Election Day but many could not be counted until afterward.... With millions of votes yet to be counted across several key states -- there is a reason that news organizations and other usually impatient actors were waiting to declare victors -- Mr. Biden was holding narrow leads in Arizona and Nevada. If Mr. Biden can hold those states, the former vice president could win the election even without Pennsylvania, which has long been viewed as a must-have battleground state."

President-Elect Biden delivers very presidential remarks Wednesday afternoon:

MEANWHILE. Jim Rutenberg & Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: "With his political path narrowing, President Trump turned to the courts and procedural maneuvers on Wednesday in a last-ditch effort to stave off defeat in the handful of states that will decide the outcome of the bitterly fought election. The president's campaign intervened at the Supreme Court in a case challenging Pennsylvania's plan to count ballots received for up to three days after Election Day. The campaign said it would also file suit in Michigan to halt the counting there while it pursues its demands for better access for the observers it sent to monitor elections boards for signs of malfeasance in tallying ballots, modeled on a similar suit it was pursuing in Nevada. On Wednesday evening, Mr. Trump's team added Georgia to its list of legal targets, seeking a pause in the counting there in the wake of allegations by a Republican poll observer that a small number of ineligible ballots might be counted in one location. In Wisconsin, which along with Michigan was called on Wednesday for his Democratic opponent, Joseph R. Biden Jr., the president's campaign announced it would request a recount." ~~~

~~~ Amanda Holpuch of the Guardian: "With millions of votes waiting to be counted in the US presidential election, Donald Trump has effectively threatened to sue his way to re-election. As of Wednesday evening, the president and his campaign had promised to bring the election to the supreme court, sued to halt vote-counting in three battleground states [-- Michigan, Pennsylvania & Georgia --] and requested a recount in [Wisconsin]. But at this moment, there is no evidence the campaign's legal challenges will have a bearing on the election result under the law. Instead, the concern is how litigation plays in the court of public opinion, where the suggestion of fraud in one battleground state could cast doubt on the whole election." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Ron Klain pointed out on MSNBC Wednesday that Trump's suit to halt the vote count in Michigan is a particularly stupid distraction: Biden is ahead & has been declared the projected winner. ~~~

~~~ Rick Hasen: "What to make of all of this [litigation]? First, the effort is to slow the vote in places where the Trump campaign is behind so that these states are not called for Biden leading to a call of the Presidency for him should Biden reach 270 votes. Optically that makes it very hard for Trump. The concomitant effort is to push for further counting where Trump is behind to help him reach 270. On top of that, the hope is that these Hail Mary legal plays could lead to court intervention to throw out votes and help Trump capture one of these states. This is possible but very unlikely.... Finally, and most disturbingly, the effort is perhaps one to cast doubt on the legitimacy of a Biden presidency should he win. We always knew Trump would claim without evidence that fraud cost him the election. These suits let him pile up what might appear to some supporters as evidence but are actually unsupported assertions of illegality."

Isaac Stanley-Becker, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump, his son and top members of his campaign on Wednesday advanced a set of unfounded conspiracy theories about the vote-tallying process to claim that Democrats were rigging the final count. Eric Trump tweeted a video, first pushed out by an account associated with the far-right QAnon conspiracy theory, that purported to show someone burning ballots cast for his father. The materials turned out to be sample ballots.... Trump's son and others, including White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, claimed falsely in tweets later hidden by warning labels that the president had won Pennsylvania -- even though no such determination had been made. And the campaign's spokesman, Tim Murtaugh, claimed without evidence that crowd control at a processing center in Detroit was an effort to thwart Trump's chances of reelection."

Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "With no winner declared in the 2020 presidential race, President Trump appeared in the White House just after 2 a.m. on Wednesday to brazenly claim he had already won the election - and to insist that votes stop being counted even though the ballots of millions of Americans had yet to be tallied. Speaking with a mix of defiance, anger and wonder that the election had not yet been called in his favor, the president recounted his standing in an array of battleground states before falsely declaring: 'Frankly, we did win this election.' No news organizations declared a winner between Mr. Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr., and a number of closely contested states still had millions of mail-in ballots to count, in part because state and local Republican officials had insisted that they not be counted until Election Day. Mr. Trump said, without offering any explanation, that 'we'll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court,' and added: 'We want all voting to stop.' No elected leader has the right to unilaterally order votes to stop being counted, and Mr. Trump's middle-of-the-night proclamation amounted to a reckless attempt to hijack the electoral process as results in key battleground states were still not final, something without precedent in American politics." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "Addressing the nation from the White House about 2:30 a.m., Trump challenged the integrity of the vote to an unprecedented and breathtaking degree. The president said the ongoing vote count in Georgia, Pennsylvania and other key battleground states amounted to 'a major fraud on our nation,' and he vowed to file lawsuits to stop it. Claiming a conspiracy to keep from declaring him the victor, Trump said: 'This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country. We were getting ready to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ David Bauder & Lynn Elber of the AP: "In a stunning scene in the middle of the night, news organizations rebuked ... Donald Trump after he falsely said on live television that he had won reelection even as votes were still being counted.... CBS News' Nora O'Donnell said Trump was 'castrating the facts' by 'falsely claiming that he has won the election and disenfranchising millions of voters whose ballots have not been counted.' 'Donald Trump is losing right now both in the popular vote and the electoral vote and there are many states left to be called,' ABC News' George Stephanopoulos said. Said NBC News' Savannah Guthrie, 'The fact of the matter is we don't know who won the election.' Guthrie had interrupted Trump's speech to tell viewers that several of Trump's statements were not true.... 'This is an extremely flammable situation and the president just threw a match into it,' said Fox News Channel's Chris Wallace." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Mark Sherman of the AP explains what's going on to Fuckface von Clownstick: "... Donald Trump says he-ll take the presidential election to the Supreme Court, but it's unclear what he means in a country in which vote tabulations routinely continue beyond Election Day, and states largely set the rules for when the count has to end. 'We'll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court -- we want all voting to stop,' Trump said early Wednesday. But the voting is over. It's only counting that is taking place across the nation. No state will count absentee votes that are postmarked after Election Day.... Joe Biden's campaign called Trump's statement 'outrageous, unprecedented, and incorrect.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Zoe Tillman of BuzzFeed News: "In the early hours of Wednesday..., Donald Trump declared: 'We will be going to the Supreme Court.' That's not how the courts work, though. With rare exceptions that don't apply to the election, no one can simply bring a case to the US Supreme Court.... Regardless of whether the Trump campaign's lawsuits succeed in stopping any ballots from being counted, they've underscored Trump and his campaign's efforts to falsely question the lawfulness of ballot counting that extends beyond Election Day -- something that happens in every election. On Wednesday, dozens of Michigan residents tried to disrupt ballot counting at a site in Detroit, spurred by fake information that spread online of widespread fraud."

Max Greenwood of the Hill: "Joe Biden said early Wednesday that he is on track to win the 2020 presidential election, as vote returns show a narrowing, yet still viable, path to victory for the former vice president. Speaking to supporters at a drive-in election night event in Wilmington, Del., in the early hours of Wednesday, Biden urged patience while election officials across the country tally outstanding ballots. But he projected confidence in his chances of capturing the White House, laying out a path to victory that runs through Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. 'It may take a little longer,' Biden said to honking car horns. 'As I've said all along, it's not my place or Donald Trump's place to declare who won this election. It's put to the American people. But I'm optimistic about the outcome.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

The Long Arm of Trump's Personal Lawyer Bill Barr. Katie Benner of the New York Times: "The Justice Department told federal prosecutors in an email early on Wednesday that the law allowed them to send armed federal officers to ballot-counting locations around the country to investigate potential voter fraud, according to three people who described the message. The email created the specter of the federal government intimidating local election officials or otherwise intervening in vote tallying amid calls by President Trump to end the tabulating in states where he was trailing in the presidential race, former officials said. A law prohibits the stationing of armed federal officers at polls on Election Day. But a top official told prosecutors that the department interpreted the statute to mean that they could send armed federal officers to polling stations and locations where ballots were being counted anytime after that.... [The DOJ official] sent his email about half an hour before Mr. Trump made reckless claims including falsely declaring himself the winner of the election and began calling for election officials to stop counting ballots.... The new legal interpretation about armed officials at vote-counting locations appeared to be another example of the attorney general mirroring Mr. Trump's public posture, former Justice Department officials said."

Giovanni Russonello of the New York Times: "As the results rolled in on Tuesday night, so did a strong sense of déjà vu. Pre-election polls, it appeared, had been misleading once again. While the nation awaits final results from Pennsylvania, Arizona and other key states, it is already clear -- no matter who ends up winning -- that the industry failed to fully account for the missteps that led it to underestimate Donald J. Trump's support four years ago.... It is ... possible, said Patrick Murray, the polling director at Monmouth University, that Republicans' efforts to prevent certain populations from voting easily had a sizable impact -- a factor that pollsters knew would be immeasurable in their surveys.... He added, 'We will never know how many ballots were not delivered by the post office.' But what is now clear based on the ballots that have been counted (and in almost all states, a majority have been) is that there was an overestimation of Mr. Biden's support across the board -- particularly with white voters and with men, preliminary exit polls indicate."

William Saletan of Slate: "It's been a crazy election, and ballots are still being counted, but we can get a few ideas from the exit polls.... First, this electorate seems to have been more conservative than the 2016 electorate. In the 2016 exit polls, conservatives outnumbered liberals by 9 percentage points. In the initial 2020 numbers, the margin is 13 points.... Despite this, Joe Biden held his own by connecting with people in the middle.... Biden won 8 percent of people who said they had voted for Donald Trump in 2016. Trump, in this election, won only 4 percent of those who said they had voted for Clinton. That gap may decide the eventual outcome.... The patterns so far suggest several lessons. One, Democrats are having trouble attracting self-identified Christians. Two, they can't count on the votes of people of color, just because the Republican candidate is overtly racist. Three, they need better turnout on the left. And four, they need to consolidate a majority of independent voters. If they don't fix these problems, they could be looking at difficult maps for a long time to come." --s  Firewalled.

Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times: "... I fret about Trump's efforts to do Russia's work and delegitimize this election, I also keep wrestling with this question: How is it that so many millions of Americans watched Trump for four years, suffered the pain of his bungling of Covid-19, listened to his stream of lies, observed his attacks on American institutions -- and then voted for him in greater numbers than before?"

Fred Kaplan of Slate: "This [election] raises a much broader, more disturbing question. During the campaign, Biden and many of his surrogates, including former President Barack Obama, one of the most popular men in public life, would recount a few of Trump's inadequacies and say, 'This isn't who we are.' Well, maybe in fact, it is.... Trump may wind up defeated, but Trumpism very much endures." --s  Firewalled.

Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "Republicans, buoyed by an unexpectedly strong performance by President Trump in key battlegrounds, grew increasingly confident on Wednesday that they could maintain narrow control of the Senate and make a considerable dent in the size of the Democrats' House majority.... Even as they continued to game out possibilities, Democrats emerged on Wednesday decidedly downcast.... Privately, House Democrats who survived were licking their wounds and contemplating whether leadership changes needed to be made at the party's campaign committee. The losses stung."

Frank Jordans & Seth Borenstein of the AP: "The United States on Wednesday formally left the Paris Agreement, a global pact it helped forge five years ago to avert the threat of catastrophic climate change. The move, long threatened by ... Donald Trump and triggered by his administration a year ago, further isolates Washington in the world but has no immediate impact on international efforts to curb global warming." ~~~

~~~ Mike Murphy of Market Watch: "Hours after the U.S. officially pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement, Joe Biden said that if elected president, he would immediately rejoin it. 'Today, the Trump Administration officially left the Paris Climate Agreement. And in exactly 77 days, a Biden Administration will rejoin it,' Biden tweeted."

The Trumpidemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here: "The United States on Wednesday recorded over 100,000 new coronavirus cases in a single day for the first time since the pandemic began, bursting past a grim threshold even as the wave of infections engulfing the country shows no sign of receding. Nineteen states have recorded more cases in the last week than in any other seven-day stretch. The total number of cases is expected to continue growing into the night as more states and counties report data." Emphasis added.

Way Beyond the Beltway

Brazil. Tom Phillips of the Guardian: "Jair Bolsonaro's eldest son has been formally accused of embezzlement, money laundering, misappropriation of funds and directing a 'criminal organisation' as sleaze allegations continue to swirl around the family of Brazil's far-right president. Prosecutors in Rio de Janeiro announced late on Tuesday that they had filed the charges against Flávio Bolsonaro, 39, a senator whose affairs have been under the spotlight since the eve of his father's January 2019 inauguration." --s