Trump files first election lawsuit in chilling sign of what’s to come
The election fraud lawsuits have started again.
...
But Trump chose to stoke the flames Wednesday morning, posting on Truth Social that "Pennsylvania is cheating, and getting caught, at large scale levels rarely seen before."
"Law enforcement must act, NOW!" he added.
Bucks County officials confirmed to NBC Philadelphia that they had been notified of the lawsuit, but did not provide further comment. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, meanwhile, shot back at the Republican presidential nominee, highlighting that Trump and his allies have spent the last four years actively corroding public trust in U.S. elections---and that they are currently warming up their second conspiracy to undermine the 2024 election results.
https://newrepublic.com/post/187714/donald-trump-election-lawsuit-chilling-sign-pennsylvaniaOpen linkView original on lemmy.world671
Comments135
How?
Where?
When?
By doing what exactly?
"Gish Gallop."
It's a debate technique. You overwhelm the opposition with an endless stream of half truths, exaggeration's, lies, and tangents that make it impossible for them to get their point across.
Bannon during Trump's term referred to this as "flood the zone with shit". Essentially just putting out such a large volume of nonsense that people just give up, you break their will to vote/argue/oppose you/fight back/correct the record.
Bannon is clearly advising Trump again, now that he’s out of jail.
I see he's applying for a second term them.
He’s already waiting for another trial regarding defrauding people about funding the wall between the US and Mexico.
Oh no, that poor dude. Anyway.
The thing that sucks is that it's so effective. It literally lead to Biden dropping out of the race. Trump spewed a bunch of bullshit really fast in their debate and Biden just froze up because it was so much.
I liked how Kamala handled it in their debate by basically saying "Look, I told you this guy was going to spout a bunch of nonsense." You've gotta call out the technique when you see it.
I didn't watch the Biden debate, did the moderators fact-check?
Barely. It's almost impossible to fact check against the gish gallop technique, because Trump just spits out a dozen lies a minute.
You just call it for what it is, bullshit. Just call it out right there. "You may Gish Gallop as much as you wish, but I am going to talk policy to the people." Its fucken crazy anyone entertains that sewage.
Yeah that's basically what Harris did during the debate. It was great!
Trump made Biden scream “we beat Medicare” over and over? Biden didn’t face pressure to step down because he “froze up.” Don’t believe your lying eyes, I guess?
I legitimately can’t imagine why anyone would think the election would be going better right now if Biden hadn’t stepped down.
He didn't "scream" it, and he said it one time, clearly tripping two thoughts together.
Whatever else you might think about him or what that says about him, at least get that much right, lying about him "screaming" that "over and over" does nothing to help your point
The clip I saw might have had a bad audio quality or something or I might just be misremembering, it sounded like yelling when I watched it the last time it was relevant (months ago, when he was still running). ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Either way, pretending it didn't happen by way of downplaying it is ridiculous.
"I stated a patently false thing that can be easily refuted as a fact, but you... YOU are being ridiculous!"
That's you. That's what you sound like right now.
We see Trump consistently make an outright lie, and in the same breath pivot to a personal attack such as “she’s a nasty woman.” This is another technique that adds something controversial after the lie so that the focus is on the controversial topic instead of the lie.
It makes it harder to peel what he says apart and puts space between the current point of conversation and the lie
The most fucked up thing is that Trump isn’t doing this necessarily intentionally. He’s just so crazy, that this is how his brain works.
Trump once said that his personality hasn't changed since was a child.
He talks like a little kid; words just spew out without any rhyme or reason.
I absolutely believe he is doing it intentionally. He will lie and promote violence any time he thinks it will help him do as he pleases or avoid consequences.
Yes, it’s in his very nature, but let’s be honest: he knows exactly what he’s doing
I just can’t believe that he’s that intelligent or in control of the things coming out of his mouth.
He can be a stupid, racist, sexist miser and evil at the same time. And there’s a 200% chance he’s not the smart one strategizing everything. He’s, as you say, not that smart. But smart enough to follow simple directions and regurgitate his hateful shit on cue.
He isn’t required to understand his behaviors in order to perform them. All his behaviors could have been shaped through early trial and error. Behaviors that got him a desired result became reinforced. He could’ve tried a lie+insult combo as a kid and got exactly what he wanted.
Repeated enough, the behavior could become second nature.
Its completely intentional. His supporters eat it up.
He doesn’t have to be intelligent; he just has to be smarter than his voters. That’s the point
Sealioning is the layman’s unmoderated form. If you don’t let the other person speak or respond you always get to ‘win’.
It’s interesting how adversarial the nature of some people is.
Or a more modern and apropos term, "shit spewing".
Verbal diarrhea from Dysentery Donnie.
For more on all these tactics: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY7v0VkYRbANnTnzkA_HMFtQ
The only actual election interference I have heard about and people actually being charged is by the Republicans.
A lawsuit filed is not proof, I could file a lawsuit saying my neighbor stole my house. My house is still where it was but I could claim it's not and bring a lawsuit. I would lose but it's the principal of the fact that there is a suit that looks official and people think lawsuits means it's real.
Anyone can sue anyone for anything in this country. It may get tossed out right away but you can still file the lawsuit.
The general talk is that since being shot at he’s even more impulsive than prior.
They have mountains of evidence, stacked to the ceiling with all the evidence from the 2020 election and Hunter's laptops
Boxes and boxes of the stuff. All marked top secret. He's seen them too!
They have concepts of evidence. Many people said so, and the orange utan saw it on tv, or read it online. He's just reporting what people are saying
So this proof of election cheating is in Hunter Biden’s laptop? Makes about as much sense as any of this.
He’s likely shitting himself beyond the usual for not understanding Puerto Rican citizenship and voting.
You see, he doesn't have evidence, but he has concepts of evidence.
I thought they were already getting caught?
Its so weird to see this unfold now where they know they can't win in any legitimate manner so they are doing stuff like this before the election is even over. Its like, hey guys we only need the election to have a pretense that cheating is going on, which we all know is happening, but we blame it on the other side and seize power.
There was already an instance I read about yesterday where some former representative was caught on camera stealing ballots from a test machine and then telling someone else that the counts were fucked up (because he stole the ballots) so they want to create their own reality where the election is rigged...
I honestly think it's going to work... They're either going to get lucky and hate wins the day outright, or they'll force a win through ratfuckery... :(
I saw that one too. Even if the media reports on it truthfully with headlines that don't ragebait readers by withholding the fact that it was a R stealing R test ballots, MAGAots are just going to cherry pick "R ballot stolen" and raise their pitchforks.
Objectivity and truth doesn't matter to the Qult of bigots, unfortunately.
It's not even the stealing of votes that was the point of his actions, he stole them and then pointed to the machine as the issue telling someone "fucked count." He is trying to get people to believe that the voting machines can't be trusted to properly count which is exactly the point. If/when they lose they'll point to things like this as an example of how the election was "stolen" to justify them stealing the election...
God I hate these people...
Thanks for clarifying that, I misunderstood. Given what you said, it sounds like somebody needs the book thrown at them.
I don't pretend to be able to predict the future, but Trump tried this same thing four years ago and couldn't pull it off - and he was actually still the President at that time. Seems like it would be even more difficult for him to do it this time as an ex-president, especially considering that he's now so old and senile that he can't even paint himself orange properly any more.
It's not up to him to install himself, but to have people work on his behalf at the state level. That is what failed the first time, but they've since "corrected" by having as many "election deniers" work in the departments necessary to mess with the states/counties vote counting. If they can get enough people gum up the works and to push enough lawsuits to drag this out they can then go to the SCOTUS to ask for them to essentially say "it's been long enough, you have to stop counting." in an event similar to Bush V Gore. :(
For anyone not paying attention this is the game plan
And with the usual ambiguous word salad too.
Hey, you heard about all this incredible cheating? Cheating. Cheating! Vote cheating is bad, it's so bad. Never seen anything so bad I tell you. But the police does nothing. Nothing! You think vote cheating is ok? I don't think people should be allowed to get away with it!
Etc etc etc ad nauseam.
Not enough capslock
SAD!
The election is RIGGED. Votes are being STOLEN from PROUD AMERICANS. You go to the poles and they throw away YOUR vote. But not when your vote is for BIDEN, no. The IMMIGRANTS are voting illegally and he counts their votes. But not for hardworking AMERICANS. And NOBODY stopped him. We WON'T let that happen again! HILLARY stole the vote! GO OUT THERE. COUNT THE VOTES. THE TRUTH WILL WIN.
We're seeing in real-time why maintaining a coherent, unified, transparent voting system and communicating how and why it's secure against tampering is so important. It needs to be difficult to sow doubt in the election, and you can only achieve this through simple to understand and explain methods.
Because if the average person can be convinced it's not secure and legitimate, then it doesn't matter what the reality is.
This is why I'm so sick of people pointing out the defamation lawsuits from the voting machine companies as some kind of win for the democratic process.
Voting machines have been just one of the many ways the Republicans have sown doubt over the results. Stop using voting machines, obviously (in my opinion. There's also 2 great videos from Tom Scott on the topic)
Important things to get right:
And obvious move away from FPTP, but everyone is already calling for that.
Armchair citizen under the American empire, giving you my 2¢.
Quite a lot of the misinformation out of PA stems from a willful ignorance of how all this stuff works.
For example... the voter registration drives turning in invalid registrations:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/voter-registration-probes-launched-crucial-keystone-state-counties-amid-claims-potential-fraud
"District attorneys and election officials in both Lancaster County and York County are looking into potential election-related fraud after authorities received large batches of voter registration materials from a "third-party organization." Both York and Lancaster counties have more registered Republican voters than Democrats, according to state data, with York Republicans holding a 63% majority in the area and Lancaster Republicans at a 61% majority."
When you do a voter registration drive, you are legally obligated to submit all registrations, valid or not. The only entity with the legal authority to reject registrations as valid is the State Secretary of State office.
This is because, back in the day, parties would do registration drives and just shit-can any registration for opposing parties.
Now, even if some dumbass fills out a registration for "Mickey Mouse" or "Superman", it STILL has to be submitted to the Secretary of State for rejection.
That's not "voter fraud".
Look how much time and text it took to refute a few tiny bullshit utterances. Its impossible even if it was desireable, which its not. He needs to be in custody and in 24/7 solitary with zero internet access. He's a goddamn terrorist
Yeah, they know that. That's the fucking point.
Y'all need to unify your federal election into an actual federal election. Not 50 separate ones.
It would be a lot harder to pick and choose battleground states for lawsuits if you 1. Change the voting system yes, but also and importantly 2. Have consistent rules and voting infrastructure across the whole country.
Having to understand 50 separate election rules makes it way easier to sow doubt.
I am aware there are also some federal laws on voting, but still.
I tend to agree, at a minimum there should be federal regulations for federal elections, but the problem is that it's impossible without a constitutional amendment making that definition. :(
The idea of ANY amendment even getting started with the 290 vote super majority in the House is just beyond us right now. :(
Election reform, supreme court reform, term limits, should all be top of mind.
Yeah :( Big sad, both for you as a citizen of the US (I presume), and for me, as someone under the thumb of the US's sphere of influence.
Stay safe out there next week. I'm presume it's gonna get wild.
I'm in Portland so we're getting ready.
If Trump wins, it will be antifa/anarchist rioting.
If Harris wins, it will be free Gaza/anarchist rioting.
https://www.kgw.com/article/money/business/portland-businesses-prepare-potential-unrest-election-day/283-61c551a3-d1bb-43e0-aad0-990d2ce2f5a8
Basically, there will be rioting. Fortunately far enough away from where I live...
Hasn't even lost yet and he is already being a sore loser.
Imagine idolizing this loser.
"I DIDN'T LOSE YOU CHEATED!!!"
"We haven't begun yet, sir"
"Sorry, habit"
He's riling up his base. People are going to die for this skidmark
You ain't fucking kidding. Cities are about to get raided by hillbillies & rednecks with guns on trucks. I wish I was exaggerating.
No. Remember after Jan 6 when the badass freedom-fighters promised ominous "actions" in state capitals on Biden's inauguration day? That day came and went, and at the few "actions" that did happen attendance was in the dozens. When those chickenshit couch farts saw their revolutionary heroes getting methodically tracked down and arrested by the FBI, they stayed home and shook their tiny fists at their TVs. That pathetic bunch of cowards love to talk badass, but when faced with actual personal risk they couldn't civil war their way out of a Walmart.
I’d caution this sentiment. I don’t expect highly organized violence and I don’t think anyone else here should either. What you’re going to get is basically random acts of domestic terrorism. We’ve already see several ballot boxes set on fire and that’s the kind of thing this crowd will perform.
Well that and I really do think that polling places are in danger and so do a lot of cities. Again I doubt they’ll face organized attacks but look at the election in 2020. Several polling places were attacked and formed large crowds demanding the voting be stopped. It’s not unreasonable to think those crowds get violent this time around and maybe even attack lines of voters.
But the ultimate thing is that people should expect the absolute worst. The people in 2020 did not feel like an election had been stolen. Their extremist groups had no time to organize. Now they have that time. And now their beliefs are stronger than ever. Do not underestimate how awful the US will be from now till January.
I've got some terrible news for you, about the political contingent common to plenty of big cities. It won't be hillbillies and rednecks tearing shit up. It'll be city cops, state troopers, and the deranged failsons of used car dealers.
Together. Obviously.
You don't even know how many inner city black folks love Trump, huh?
Ain't just white trash that's gonna try putting him in power
Uhh...yeah, it is.
I was just listening to some interview talking about how, while it was Dems' efforts that pushed the pandemic stimulus checks through Congress, it was Trump's signature on the check, and that was believed to have had a big impression on demographics no one would ever expect to go with the party of billionaires.
Edit: I should add that I only expect the votes coming from more diverse sources than what might be intuitive, not that all of those voters would be persuaded to go all-out "proud boys".
Well, you do have a right to bear arms... protect yourselves 😥
From The Guardian:
I went to drop off my ballot on Saturday and when I got there, not to the main office in Doylestown, but one of the smaller remote offices, and there was a huge line all the way across the front of the building and I was wondering what the heck was going on.
As I was getting to the end of the line, a person came over and asked if I already had my ballot, and when they saw it, they said I could go right in and drop it off. There was only one couple ahead of me there.
I had been wondering what the line was for, and now that makes sense. The Republicans had made the mail in ballot more complicated than necessary during COVID, so now they seem to feel it biting them as their potential supporters have been screwed by it.
Pennsylvania does not start counting votes before election day. Nobody has any clue as to who is voting for whom.
They've broken the system and want to say "look at this broken system, we can't trust it!" To me that just shows we can't trust you!
I really hope Pennsylvanians do the right thing. These people need to be stopped.
“Democrat election officials are seeing our numbers. They’re seeing our turnout. They are seeing us breaking early vote records across Pennsylvania,” he said. “They are terrified. And they want to stop our momentum. We are not going to let them suppress our votes.”
This is the shit that is INFURIATING to me... They broke the system thinking it would hurt Democrats but now that it's affecting them they just blame Democrats which also helps them in the end... God I hate these people so much
Yup, same nonsense as when they sabotage the Post Office and talk about how that doesn't work. The votes against immigration reform and then the yelling about that not working. Won't cut spending or raise taxes but complain about deficit spending.
They want you to want to throw out our current system so they can replace it. That's why it's important to understand the right people to be mad at. If you get mad at anyone other than them themselves, they win.
The other side of this coin which drives me nuts is when the GOP representatives who vote against things like the Infrastructure Act then claim credit for the money and projects being done in their districts. Bitch, you can't vote against something then take credit for it when it benefits you! Two faced fuckers, every single one of them
Oh totally, it's like, we got your actual vote right here!
This has been their process for... ever. They cut funding to government agencies (eg. FEMA), then when said agency has a hard time doing their job. they point a scream that the agency can't do it's job and should therefore have it's funding cut. Rinse, lather, repeat. And right wing voters fall for the sham every 👏 single 👏 time 👏.
They're anti-education for a reason...
Nice of him to get all the denial stuff started early so both sides have a nice heads start.
/s
On a serious note though, dems can weapons this
“Trump is a sore loser even before people vote”
But they won’t.
The thing about wrestling in the mud with a pig is that the pig likes it.
If the democrats hadn't been pussies for two decades before Trump and effectively welded power, we wouldn't have had Trump.
Pig tends to not like it as much if the end result is you cook some bacon.
Also, the thing about not wrestling in the mud with a pig is, you're bitch-made.
I dunno, when she said at the debate that people were getting bored and leaving his rallys early, that was straight out of the trump playbook, and he did not seem to like it at all
She should challenge him to a duel. His pro guns strong man fans will have to watch him give excuses as to why he can't show up. Could be legal in Washington and Texas I think as fair fights are considered legal there if supervised.
/Joking in case it wasn't obvious.
High road allll the way to losing. Yeeehaw!
Just learned to fucking wrangle a pig in the mud. It’s been done.
Blame Weird Old 34's enablers for not holding him accountable when they had the chance: Moscow Mitch McConnell, the conservative SCOTUS Justices, Merrick Garland's slowness, and so many more!
34? Eisenhower?
No, 34 as in the number of felony counts he was found guilty of
Bingo! I wish more of the electorate were up to date on current events in an election year. It boggles my mind that people are actually supporting a 34 count convicted felon who will be sentenced in New York in November. And what is he convicted of? Election interference! He's deceived the voters about his past of sleeping with a porn star!
We have a US Constitution that sets this high bar that one is innocent until proven guilty by a jury of one's peers. To not respect that is to disrespect the Constitution. We expect the President to keep an oath to keep the laws of the land, you know, that whole Law and Order thing? How can you hire a criminal to work for you whose job is to keep the rule of law and defend it?
It's so nuts that this election is so close. Shame on the media for giving this disgusting adjudicated rapist so much air time every day.
The last good republican president.
That sounds like a form of dementia.
“Grandpa used to be a top notch line worker before he got the Merrick Garland’s slowness.”
if the courts werent so loaded in his favor those suits could be more easily dismissed.
If the Democrats had any balls Biden would court-marshall him and charge him for interfering in international affairs pertaining to both Israel and Russia. Skip the courts, he served the executive branch, head of the military, take him to a military court.
Best I can do is a court-TJ-Maxx
Fun TJ Maxx fact: in England the stores are called TK Maxx, apparently because "TJ" means "tug job".
Great now that's all I'll think about when I hear TJ Maxx.
Brit here. Never in my life have I heard the phrase tug-job. In my life.
What do they call Ross?
Ross Don for Fewer
This is by design. Im feeling it iny loins. This whole thing has been a cold civil war. "Look how far down we can fall, you should vote for reasonable candidates". I swear this is just to keep the American people in line and accountable.
Edit: also this forces a higher voting turn out. A byproduct of all of this is more activism.
If you wait until the last minute you might have to wait in line with the other procrastinators. This is not cheating or fraud it's just common sense. But it tracks for Boomers to throw a tantrum if the world doesn't magically accommodate them and they have to wait for anything.
They did not have any facts to present but they feel like cheating is occurring. That's enough for a lawsuit right?
Chlling? More like pathetic.
It is, but it's part of their plan to make the election seem rigged. It's part of the whole 'repeat a lie enough and people will believe it' strategy. Unfortunately, if it wasn't working this race wouldn't be so close.
It justifies their own cheating and encourages more people to do it
Bonespurs knows this bogus litigation won't even cost him anything, his flock will pay for it.
I would actually call it a ho-hum sign. It's just his fingernails scraping the floor as he gets dragged out of the spotlight to spend the rest of his sad-ass life in court.
This is all about allowing people to vote by mail in ballot??? What the fuck was his 2020 complaints all about???
Entire states vote by mail and they work out fine. It’s a paper record. He should like that after all the voting machine conspiracy crap he’s been floating.
It’s not about what he likes, it’s about what can erode public trust in the process enough that people will reject the entire system and Trump can declare himself president without having to worry about the will of the people.
If he loses PA, he's done.
Kamala is in a similar situation, if she loses PA she will have to win multiple swing states.
It kind of sucks that out of 50 states only a few "matter". It also seems to be that every election year now there is at least one state that doesn't have their shit together and we have to wait a week for results.
This has been part of the Republican long game. Like in Georgia when they wanted mandatory hand counts of every district and then try and compare those against the machine numbers to call count differences out as "obvious ballet tampering", when by the very nature of being human, hand counts are less accurate (especially on that scale). Just doing stuff that at a quick glance and no thought could maybe be perceived as "voting integrity" but is really all about voter suppression and disenfranchisement.
"Doesn't have their shit together"?
Those states voting systems are broken by design, by republicans who broke them, who then turn and immediately complain they are "broken".
Are you really that uninformed?
Here's a conveniently illustrative example of the whole concept, acted out in a small contained incident, including the traitorous idiot clumsily tripping over his own bullshit as he gets caught. https://lawandcrime.com/crime/theyre-coming-after-us-patriots-former-maga-candidate-for-congress-caught-stealing-election-ballots-charged-with-felony-police-say/?origin=serp_auto
One state just "Doesn't have their shit together" huh? Fucking joke.
Holy shit! I just realized you're stalking my posts. Lmao. Get a life.
You're that one poster who just doesn't have their shit together...
Not very surprising, they'll likely push multiple lawsuits in swing states. At least the state justice systems learned from 2020 and 2022 and are expediting these lawsuits to avoid dragging them out and further erode confidence in the electoral system.
LegalEagle published an early access video on Nebula for their paid subscribers explaining the different scenarios to come, and it should show up on YouTube soon.
EDIT: The video is out
Yes, the lawsuits are part of their plan, because they know even when all these cases get thrown out because they got nothing (like last time) that the base (Trump's foot soldiers) will believe Trump saying the justice system is being used against him/them.
Welp, he's right about that part! Just not the way he thinks.
His lawyers deserve what they'll get from doing this -- being unpaid.
They don't need to be paid now. They can get fast-tracked onto the federal courts later.
Didn't it used to be a crime to file frivolous lawsuits?
Add it to the pile.
Is there? Sounds more like a should thing.
Did his file it himself? Because Im amazed that any lawyer will help him without cash up front.
In some states they'll give anyone a license to practice law.
He wants SCOTUS to give him a gift in a state that matters. Virginia was nice but not necessary for Democrats.
Democrats should file a lawsuit every time he does, just because.
Good! Even though Last Year Literally NONE of his Lawsuits went Forward because there wasn't Evidence and then earlier This Year Trump admitted he lost in 2020 I KNOW this year he's going to be RIGHT!
Ironic that the qons always bitch and whine about "lawfare".
More like the typical qon MO, I guess, and not at all ironic at this point...
0-43
trump is a universally understood joke.
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Good. If either side spots bullshit it needs to be called out.
While prima facie, that's true, your reply doesn't mention that anything has been uncovered coupled with the fact that Trump has a history with frivolous and vexatious litigation kinda makes me think this is nothing more than pretext. Though the boy that cried wolf is a parable for a reason. So one shouldn't drop their guard. It's just a shame one man can clog up the court to this extent. There are remedies that courts can take against vexatious litigants, though.