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Showing posts with label 2016 recounts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2016 recounts. Show all posts

Friday, December 9, 2016

Green Party Funds To Become Awash With Money From Recounts As They Get "Refund"

After Michigan Recount 

Scuttled, Jill Stein to Get

 Huge Refund

The Green Party candidate will get a partial return, but her campaign

 wants the full amount to apply to Wisconsin, Pennsylvania recounts.



By Beth Dalbey (Patch Staff) - December 9, 2016 10:40 am ET 





After Michigan Recount Scuttled, Jill Stein to Get Huge Refund




















After a federal court judge scuttled Jill Stein’s historic recount of
 Michigan votes in the 2016 presidential election, the state will return
a portion of the $973,250 the Green Party candidate paid to re-
tally the 4.8 million ballots in 7,786 in-person and absentee precincts.
The recount had been underway for three days and 26 counties had
 begun counting ballots before it was stopped Wednesday by U.S.
District Judge Mark Goldsmith, who tied his decision to a Michigan
 Court of Appeals decision that found Stein had no legal standing
 to request the recount.
Stein’s campaign said the refunded money will be applied to ongoing
 recounts in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Stein requested the
 recounts in the three battleground states that swung the election
to President-elect Donald Trump after a prominent group of election
 attorneys and computer scientists, including J. Alex Halderman of
 the University of Michigan, said they had found “persuasive evidence” that the election results could have been hackedby a state actor.
Though no evidence of hacking was found, some vulnerabilities were
discovered in Michigan’s election process. Stein also had raised
questions about 75,000 Michigan ballots that showed no vote in the
 presidential election, higher than any other presidential election in

 the state’s history.
David Cobb, a spokesman for Stein’s campaign, told the Detroit Free
 Press the problems that showed up with ballots that couldn’t be
recounted are “a national disgrace.”
“We see that in Detroit, half of the votes were ineligible to recount
 because of antiquated state laws,” Cobb said. “Just as we were gearing
 up to discover something wrong going on, the court stopped us.”
Michigan Secretary of State spokesman Fred Woodhams told the Free
Press that Stein will have to pay for the precincts that had been counted.
 It’s unclear how many precincts had been counted in the 26 counties
 that had begun, but the total was 1,364 in Wayne, Oakland, Macomb
 and Ingham counties at a cost of about $170,500.


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Stein’s Michigan attorney, Mark Breer, told the Free Press that it’s fair
that the campaign pay for the precincts that were recounted but said
Stein should get a refund for those that were deemed unable to be
recounted.
However, Stein campaign spokeswoman Margy Levinson said the
 full amount should be returned, pending a longshot chance that the
Michigan Supreme Court, which has a Republican majority, orders
 the recount to resume.
The appeal before the state Supreme Court is of the Appeals Court
 decision that Goldstein should never have allowed the recount. The
 high court hasn’t said it will hear the appeal, but two Michigan
 justices who are on Trump’s short list of possible U.S. Supreme
Court nominees have disqualified themselves in the event that the
 appeal is allowed, The Detroit News reported.
They are Chief Justice Bob Young and Justice Joan Larsen. Brewer
had argued in court filings that the pair have “substantial personal
and professional interest in the election of Trump as president.”
Trump was declared the winner in Michigan by 10,704 votes on
 Nov. 28.
Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr Commons
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Friday, December 2, 2016

Challenges To Recount Mounted In Pennsylvania, Wisconsin. Michigan Challenge Has Been Denied

Trump Backers Go to Court to Block Vote Recounts in 3 States

By MONICA DAVEY, JULIE BOSMAN and STEVE EDER
Ballots were stacked up as a statewide presidential election recount began Thursday, in Milwaukee.Morry Gash/Associated Press
LANSING, Mich. — Supporters of President-elect Donald J. Trump have filed legal challenges in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan in a suddenly robust effort to stop the presidential election recount efforts there.
Bill Schuette, the attorney general of Michigan, said that the recount, initiated by Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate, put Michigan voters at risk of “paying millions and potentially losing their voice in the Electoral College in the process.”
“This court cannot allow a dilatory and frivolous request for a recount by an aggrieved party to silence all Michigan votes for president,” Mr. Schuette, a Republican, said in a court filing.
A lawsuit against the Wisconsin Elections Commission filed in Federal District Court by the Great America PAC, the Stop Hillary PAC and Ronald R. Johnson, a Wisconsin resident, argued that the recount could “unjustifiably cast doubt” on Mr. Trump’s victory in that state.
The plaintiffs argued that the recount, which began across the state’s 72 counties on Thursday morning, should be halted immediately, in part because there is a substantial chance that it cannot be accurately completed by the deadline of Dec. 12. In 2011, a statewide recount took close to a month.
In Michigan on Friday, where the recount is still pending, the Board of State Canvassers met to consider an objection to the recount by Mr. Trump.
Lawyers for Mr. Trump told the canvassing board, which is made up of two Democrats and two Republicans, that it should not allow a recount to proceed, describing it as needless, too expensive and not required by Michigan law. Besides, Ms. Stein came nowhere near winning the state.

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“This recount petition is absolutely unprecedented in the history of Michigan election law,” said Gary Gordon, a lawyer for Mr. Trump and his campaign.
A lawyer for Ms. Stein, Mark Brewer, said Mr. Trump’s campaign was making a “desperate attempt” to avoid a recount. “I would remind everybody that the original source of the allegation that this election was rigged was Mr. Trump,” Mr. Brewer told the board.
The Michigan board split, 2-2, along party lines, meaning the recount objection failed.
Lawyers for Mr. Trump and his allies are also seeking to halt legal proceedings by Ms. Stein to contest the statewide election results in Pennsylvania.
Lawrence J. Tabas, general counsel of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania, said in an interview on Friday that Ms. Stein’s lawyers had fallen short of demonstrating that there was fraud or illegal action in the Nov. 8 election. “They know they have no claim,” he said.
“This action by Jill Stein and her supporters — I couldn’t even call it a Hail Mary pass, because that would be insulting to the Hail Mary pass,” said Mr. Tabas, who along with other lawyers, submitted a lengthy brief filed in Pennsylvania court on Thursday.
The recounts bids are widely viewed as having little chance of making a difference. But Ms Stein, in a statement, said the challenges to them were an effort to put “party politics above country.”
“In an election already tainted by suspicion, previously expressed by Donald Trump himself,” she said, “verifying the vote is a common-sense procedure that would put all concerns around voter disenfranchisement to rest. Trump’s desperate attempts to silence voter demands for recounts raise a simple question: why is Donald Trump afraid of these recounts?”
Ms. Stein has raised millions of dollars for an effort to force recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, states that have recently voted Democratic and where Mr. Trump won by relatively thin margins.
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Thursday, December 1, 2016

Will Trump Win Recount Contest?

Donald Trump Expected 

to Contest Michigan Vote

Recount

The president-elect’s formal petition to stop the recount expected by 

end of day Thursday.



By Beth Dalbey (Patch Staff) - December 1, 2016 1:26 pm ET 






President-elect Donald J. Trump is expected to officially object
 Thursday to Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s request for a
laborious hand-recount of the state’s nearly 4.8 million ballots.
 Trump was declared the winner of the state’s 16 electoral votes
 by a margin of 10,704 votes on Monday.
Fred Woodhams, a spokesman for the Michigan Secretary of State
Office, said the objection would be filed by the end of day Thursday.
Stein filed her recount request Wednesday, along with a check
for $973,250 to cover the costs to recount ballots in Michigan’s
 6,300 precincts.
Secretary of State Ruth Johnson said Wednesday the recount
 will cost more than $5 million, most of it to be borne by
Michigan taxpayers. The state Republican party went further,
 suggesting costs could soar to $12 million.
The recount was expected to begin Friday, but Trump’s request 
could delay it, perhaps until Tuesday, The Detroit News reported.
Trump has been critical of the recount request, calling it
 “ridiculous” and “a scam.”

“This recount is just a way for Jill Stein, who received less than 
1 percent of the vote overall and wasn't even on the ballot in
 many states, to fill her coffers with money, most of which
 she will never even spend on this ridiculous recount," the
 president-elect said in a statement.
Ronna Romney McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Michigan
Republican Party, has called the request by Stein a “temper
 tantrum” that won't change the outcome of the vote. Stein
 and her attorneys have acknowledged there is no evidence
of fraud or impropriety, but raised questions about 85,000
 ballots with “blank votes” in the presidential race — more
 than enough to make up for the difference separating
 Trump and Clinton.
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Recounts May Make Trump Reconsider His Decision Not To Persecute Hillary

Clinton Is Playing 

With Fire by Backing 

a Recount in 

Wisconsin


ANDREW KELLY

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Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton is playing with fire by allowing her unsuccessful Democratic presidential campaign organization to participate  in an  election recount in Wisconsin initiated by Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein.
Marc Elias, the Clinton organization’s general counsel, said over the weekend that the campaign would take part in the Wisconsin recount without financially contributing to the operation. He also raised the possibility of joining the Third Party in recounts in two other closely contested states,  Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Republican President-elect Donald Trump, seething over what he and his top advisers perceive as Clinton’s  reneging on her pledge to abide by the outcome of the Nov. 8 election, predicted that a recount in Wisconsin and the other states would not alter the results of the election.
“Hillary Clinton conceded the election when she called me just prior to the victory speech and after the results were in,” Trump said in one of a flurry of angry tweets early Sunday. “Nothing will change.”
The Trump team bitterly complained that the recount would be a colossal waste of time and money and serve as a distraction from the president-elect’s efforts to assemble a new cabinet and administration that would carry out his agenda and help reunite a sorely divided country.
More ominously, Trump’s campaign manager and senior adviser, Kellyanne Conway, hinted that Trump might be having second thoughts about  abandoning  a campaign pledge to call for a special prosecutor to investigate Clinton’s mishandling of State Department emails and the questionable fundraising activities of her family’s global foundation.
Trump told the New York Times last Tuesday that he had no intention of pressing for an investigation of Clinton and her family, saying that “I don’t want to hurt the Clintons, I really don’t.” During an appearance today on the ABC News “This Week” program, Conway noted repeatedly that Trump “is being very magnanimous” towards Clinton.” At the same time, she declined to totally rule out the possibility that the Justice Department  would eventually seek such an investigation after Trump takes office.
Conway suggested that Trump’s generosity was being met by a slap in the face from Clinton, who ordered Elias, her counsel, to “join this ridiculously fantastical recount that Jill Stein is engaging in in Wisconsin and perhaps elsewhere.”
Conway didn’t say specifically that Trump would retaliate against Clinton for allowing her organization to take part in the recount, but she left it to viewers to connect the dots.
“I guess the real question is, why in the world can’t the Democrats accept the election results: after Clinton and the news media made a big issue of Trump’s refusal to definitively promise to abide by the results if he lost the election,” she said.
Clinton and her advisers sharply criticized Trump during the campaign for refusing to say definitively whether he would abide by the election results if he lost. Trump warned his supporters that he could only lose to Clinton if the election was somehow “rigged” against him, and he even called on his backers  to be vigilant at the polls for possible fraud.
Elias wrote in a post on Medium  that Clinton’s campaign had received “hundreds of messages, emails, and calls urging us to do something, anything, to investigate claims that the election results were hacked and altered in a way to disadvantage Secretary Clinton,” especially in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin where Trump’s combined margin of victory was only 107,000 votes.
Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chair and newly appointed chief of staff to Trump, fumed during an appearance  on “Fox News Sunday” that the recount was a “ridiculous” fund-raising fraud” perpetrated by a Green Party nominee. He noted that Stein won only 33,000 votes in Wisconsin, compared to Trump’s 1.4 million votes in the state.
“So here we have a person perpetrating a fundraising scheme that has lost by over 1.35 million votes in Wisconsin, attempting to undo [Trump’s] 28,000 vote lead [over Clinton]. It’s never going to happen. It’s a total waste of everybody’s time.”
Stein on Friday filed for a recount in Wisconsin and said she had raised more than $5 million for the effort. She indicated she would be raising more money for similar efforts in Michigan and Pennsylvania, and disputed Trump’s claim that this is a scam. 
“The point to drive home here is that having a secure elections process benefits us all,” Stein told CNN’s “Newsroom.” 
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who challenged Clinton for the Democratic nomination, said the Green Party has a legal right to seek a recount, regardless of how unlikely it was to change the election results. “No one expects there to be a profound change, but there’s nothing wrong with going through the process.,” he told Dana Bash of CNN today.
Sanders, who is taking a prominent role in trying to rebuild and reshape the Democratic party, said the more important question is whether Trump would keep many of his campaign promises that Democrats actually agree with -- such as lowering prescription drug prices and protecting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid from cuts.
“Let’s see if he keeps his word,” Sanders said.
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