Given the opportunity, should the democrats expand the Supreme Court?

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Should the democrats expand the Supreme Court?

  • Yes

  • No


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SMOGZINN

Lifer
Jun 17, 2005
14,359
4,640
136
It has been explained.

Mail in ballots have rendered this election a disaster. The full SCOTUS will be needed to rule on a great many things - to determine the outcome of this election. From that perspective, filling the seat cannot wait. Not even for a minute.

Why? SCOTUS can operate just fine with it's current makeup. Did you know that the first SCOTUS as set down by the First Congress had 6 Justices, and only required a quorum of 4 of them to render a decision?
 

Jaskalas

Lifer
Jun 23, 2004
35,547
9,779
136
How have mail in ballots rendered this election a disaster?

First and foremost, a partisan split has already occurred.
In North Carolina, 643,400 voters have requested an absentee ballot as of Sept. 3. Of those requests, 337,362 were made by registered Democrats and 103,620 by registered Republicans.

Which leads us to:

The Nightmare Scenario That Keeps Election Lawyers Up At Night
A “red mirage” on election night and a post-election “blue shift” could lead to an unprecedented constitutional crisis just as the Supreme Court is in turmoil.


Second, the rejection rate of mailed in ballots will be higher than Trump's margin of victory from 2016.
Tens of thousands of mail ballots have been tossed out in this year’s primaries. What will happen in November?

There is a demographic bias in ballot rejection. Think you might want to challenge which ballots get counted or tossed out?
Still think the SCOTUS will not be called upon to decide 2020? Bush V Gore is nothing by comparison.


Bonus: Do not open until Election Day: State laws will delay counting mail-in votes
14 States do not even authenticate the ballots until after the deadline. Let alone count them. Leading to a big post-election fight.
 

brycejones

Lifer
Oct 18, 2005
29,626
30,156
136
It has been explained.

Mail in ballots have rendered this election a disaster. The full SCOTUS will be needed to rule on a great many things - to determine the outcome of this election. From that perspective, filling the seat cannot wait. Not even for a minute.

Oh rubbish
 

K1052

Elite Member
Aug 21, 2003
52,124
45,152
136
First and foremost, a partisan split has already occurred.
In North Carolina, 643,400 voters have requested an absentee ballot as of Sept. 3. Of those requests, 337,362 were made by registered Democrats and 103,620 by registered Republicans.

Which leads us to:

The Nightmare Scenario That Keeps Election Lawyers Up At Night
A “red mirage” on election night and a post-election “blue shift” could lead to an unprecedented constitutional crisis just as the Supreme Court is in turmoil.


Second, the rejection rate of mailed in ballots will be higher than Trump's margin of victory from 2016.
Tens of thousands of mail ballots have been tossed out in this year’s primaries. What will happen in November?

There is a demographic bias in ballot rejection. Think you might want to challenge which ballots get counted or tossed out?
Still think the SCOTUS will not be called upon to decide 2020? Bush V Gore is nothing by comparison.


Bonus: Do not open until Election Day: State laws will delay counting mail-in votes
14 States do not even authenticate the ballots until after the deadline. Let alone count them. Leading to a big post-election fight.


Different states have different processes for accepting, curing (if available), tabulating, and eventually offically counting ballots. NC for example will report basically everything on election night because they tabulate securely ahead of time. Late ballots are only accepted till the 6th I think.

As to the numbers here is what's going on as of now:


More than a quarter of requested ballots have already been returned and it is not even October yet. It seems highly probable that basically the entire mail vote in NC will be returned and accepted by late next month.
 

ch33zw1z

Lifer
Nov 4, 2004
39,665
20,229
146
First and foremost, a partisan split has already occurred.
In North Carolina, 643,400 voters have requested an absentee ballot as of Sept. 3. Of those requests, 337,362 were made by registered Democrats and 103,620 by registered Republicans.

Which leads us to:

The Nightmare Scenario That Keeps Election Lawyers Up At Night
A “red mirage” on election night and a post-election “blue shift” could lead to an unprecedented constitutional crisis just as the Supreme Court is in turmoil.


Second, the rejection rate of mailed in ballots will be higher than Trump's margin of victory from 2016.
Tens of thousands of mail ballots have been tossed out in this year’s primaries. What will happen in November?

There is a demographic bias in ballot rejection. Think you might want to challenge which ballots get counted or tossed out?
Still think the SCOTUS will not be called upon to decide 2020? Bush V Gore is nothing by comparison.


Bonus: Do not open until Election Day: State laws will delay counting mail-in votes
14 States do not even authenticate the ballots until after the deadline. Let alone count them. Leading to a big post-election fight.

I never said the scotus wouldn't be called on, and thanks the reply. Americans get exactly what they vote for. Burning it down never felt so good, right?
 

Jhhnn

IN MEMORIAM
Nov 11, 1999
62,365
14,685
136
It has been explained.

Mail in ballots have rendered this election a disaster. The full SCOTUS will be needed to rule on a great many things - to determine the outcome of this election. From that perspective, filling the seat cannot wait. Not even for a minute.

Don't spread Trump's hype & disinformation. Mail in balloting is a perfectly valid way to have an election. It's how things are done in 5 states & permissible in most others for a long time now. The brouhaha over the USPS has prompted some states to install dropboxes & extend the ballot acceptance period. It's just that more people will use it, so it will take longer to count in some places. That's it. That's the only real difference.

And then, barring some strange twist of fate, we're going to kick Trump's ass.
 

uclaLabrat

Diamond Member
Aug 2, 2007
5,632
3,045
136
Even based on the above data with a 1% rejected rate, assuming a 3:1 margin of d:r mail in ballots, if that reject rate stands that could be the margin in the race, considering biden is up by roughly 1% depending on the poll and MoE.

Its not outside the realm of possibility that biden would ordinarily win the NC but loses it on the reject margins. It'll be a nail-biter.

Hopefully he swings FL and OH on election night and its all over except the rage tweeting.
 

K1052

Elite Member
Aug 21, 2003
52,124
45,152
136
Even based on the above data with a 1% rejected rate, assuming a 3:1 margin of d:r mail in ballots, if that reject rate stands that could be the margin in the race, considering biden is up by roughly 1% depending on the poll and MoE.

Its not outside the realm of possibility that biden would ordinarily win the NC but loses it on the reject margins. It'll be a nail-biter.

Hopefully he swings FL and OH on election night and its all over except the rage tweeting.

The cure system in NC is pretty robust from what I have read.
 

uclaLabrat

Diamond Member
Aug 2, 2007
5,632
3,045
136
I hope so; first read out I saw after a few thousand votes was that ballots from black voters were being rejected at 4:1 ratio relative to white voters.

If biden wins NC by 3% that's probably moot, but if the margin is 1% or less it could prove decisive.

I hope this is all needless worrying but I think its a valid scenario to game out. And I REALLY hope the curing process works!
 

K1052

Elite Member
Aug 21, 2003
52,124
45,152
136
I hope so; first read out I saw after a few thousand votes was that ballots from black voters were being rejected at 4:1 ratio relative to white voters.

If biden wins NC by 3% that's probably moot, but if the margin is 1% or less it could prove decisive.

I hope this is all needless worrying but I think its a valid scenario to game out. And I REALLY hope the curing process works!

My understanding is that the chief issue which causes rejection is witness info. The state is supposed to automatically mail those voters an affidavit to fix the problem.
 
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ivwshane

Lifer
May 15, 2000
33,408
16,798
136
I’m just bumping this thread to see if anyone has changed their mind since this thread started.

I’d also like to point out that what has happened since this thread was created has been the worse case scenario some people came up with.

It’s also obvious that democrats have seeded power to the republicans and are not willing to do whatever necessary to ensure our democracy remains intact. With the Supreme Court now politicized things will start going down hill fast.
 

dank69

Lifer
Oct 6, 2009
37,143
32,549
136
I’m just bumping this thread to see if anyone has changed their mind since this thread started.

I’d also like to point out that what has happened since this thread was created has been the worse case scenario some people came up with.

It’s also obvious that democrats have seeded power to the republicans and are not willing to do whatever necessary to ensure our democracy remains intact. With the Supreme Court now politicized things will start going down hill fast.
That's a pretty extreme way to word the Democrats' position. For all we know every Democrat in Congress except for 2 would be willing to nix the filibuster and expand the court. I haven't kept up though, maybe more than 2 are on the record opposing those things?
 
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ivwshane

Lifer
May 15, 2000
33,408
16,798
136
That's a pretty extreme way to word the Democrats' position. For all we know every Democrat in Congress except for 2 would be willing to nix the filibuster and expand the court. I haven't kept up though, maybe more than 2 are on the record opposing those things?

If the democrats hold majorities and yet cannot get their party to vote in lockstep to save our democracy, that’s failure on “democrats”. To be clear though, that’s not saying that our democracy failed because of democrats. That honor falls on republicans and the democrats they once were and the American people for failing to safeguard their own democracy.
 
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