Enough nonsense

Stop right there: Michigan attorney general sues to stop recount

Michigan attorney general Bill Schuette is surely going to catch heat for this - criticism that he’s strictly acting out of partisan concern because he’s a Republican. And yes, Schuette is a very partisan Republican and has been one for a long time. And oh yes, he would certainly like to be our next governor. But no matter who he is, his legal argument is awfully solid that there is no valid reason for a recount of the presidential race in Michigan. It would be extremely time-consuming and expensive - and yes, the state would bear a huge share of the cost - and it’s not going to change a damn thing. Plus, the party who demanded it can hardly claim to be a seriously aggrieved party.

That’s Schuette’s position, and he’s asking the Michigan Supreme Court to step right in and put a stop to this nonsense: Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette wants the Michigan Supreme Court to halt a presidential recount in Michigan before it begins. In a court action filed today, Schuette echoes arguments made for President-elect Donald Trump, arguing Green Party candidate Jill Stein, who received just over 1% of the vote in Michigan, is not an “aggrieved” candidate entitled to a recount, and there isn’t time to complete a recount, even if Stein was entitled to one. “If allowed to proceed, the statewide hand recount could cost Michigan taxpayers millions of dollars and would put Michigan voters at risk of being disenfranchised in the electoral college,” Schuette, in a filing signed by Chief Legal Counsel Matthew Schneider, said in asking the Michigan Supreme Court for immediate consideration of his petition barring a recount.

The State Board of Canvassers was supposed to meet this morning to move forward on the recount. Schuette’s motion stops that, at least for now. There’s no guarantee Michigan Supreme Court will agree to bypass the Court of Appeals and go straight to a final and definitive ruling, but given the urgency of the situation - the Electoral College votes in 17 days - this thing can’t be dragged out indefinitely. By the way, even if the recount goes ahead, it’s unlikely to be the hand recount Stein wants. Secretary of State Ruth Johnson has noted that in any recount, the state has the discretion to decide how the recount is conducted - and she has every intention of doing a machine recount if she has to do one at all. Meanwhile, the Michigan Legislature is trying to push through a bill that would require future recount demanders to pay the full cost of the recount. That would not affect situations in which the race is so close that a recount is legally mandated. But that was not the case here. The race was close, with Trump taking the state by just over 10,000 votes, but that’s not mandatory-recount close. And the candidate who came within 10,000 votes of winning is not even the one who demanded the recount, although I would in no way be surprised if Hillary was hiding behind Stein’s skirt so she could claim she was “accepting the results” as she thundered against Trump for supposedly threatening not to do. By the way, I keep hearing people worried that if Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania start recounts as Stein wants, and don’t get them done quickly enough, all three states could lose their electoral votes entirely. This is apparently based on a quote from Michael Haas, administrator of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, from the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel:

Wisconsin’s last statewide recount was in 2011 for a state Supreme Court seat and the outcome did not change. The recount showed Justice David Prosser defeated challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg by 7,004 votes — a slightly tighter margin than the 7,316-vote victory he had in initial returns. That recount took more than a month. This one would have to happen more quickly because of a federal law that says states must complete presidential recounts within 35 days of the election to ensure their electoral votes are counted. This year, that’s Dec. 13. “You may potentially have the state electoral votes at stake if it doesn’t get done by then,” said Haas.

A lawyer with Stein’s campaign has said it wants the recount done by hand. That would take longer and require a judge’s order, Haas said. Let’s deal with this, because from everything I can find the panic over this is almost entirely baseless. What Haas is referring to is that, if there are questions about the certification of the election, Congress could theoretically have the discretion to disregard a state’s results and refuse to recognize its electors. That’s true, technically, but there is zero chance it would actually happen. Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania can all certify the original results - Stein’s recount demand notwithstanding - and the Republican-controlled Congress is certainly not going to turn away their electors because Jill Stein used a well-timed legal maneuver to rend those certifications arguably invalid. I don’t know if that’s Stein’s real gambit here, but if it is, it has zero chance of succeeding. The only thing she’s doing is mucking up the works and causing a lot of extra work for state employees in three states. Hopefully Bill Schuette’s motion to stop Michigan’s recount is successful, and with any luck the other two states manage to avoid this complete waste of time as well. Donald Trump won the election. That’s a fact and it’s not going to change. We have more important things to do at this point than try to re-run a campaign that no one wants going into overtime. Except the losers, I guess. But they lost. Screw them.

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Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain

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