Dershowitz: Trump May Seek to Deny Biden 270 Electoral Votes, Put Election in Congress

T. Belman. Dershowitz must have said these things before Giuliani and Powell announced on the weekend that they had the requisite evidence and intend to switch all battleground states.

BY JACK PHILLIPS, EPOCH TIMES  November 15, 2020

Senate Impeachment Trial Of President Trump Continues

Legal counsel for President Donald Trump, Alan Dershowitz speaks during impeachment proceedings against U.S. President Donald Trump in the Senate at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 27, 2020. (Senate Television via Getty Images)

Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz predicted that President Donald Trump will attempt to settle the election in a way not seen since the 19th century.

In an interview with Newsmax, the longtime legal expert said Trump no longer is attempting to reach 270 Electoral College votes but will instead focus on denying Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s chances of getting 270 votes.

“Let’s look at the big picture: The big picture now has shifted,” Dershowitz told the website. “I do not believe that President Trump is now trying to get to 270 electoral votes. I think he thinks that’s out of the question.”

Trump hasn’t signaled in public about his chances of securing 270 votes due to several legal challenges.

“What he’s trying to do is to deny Joe Biden 270 votes, by challenging in Pennsylvania, Georgia, in Nevada, in Michigan, in Arizona,” Dershowitz said, adding that not allowing Biden to reach 270 out of 538 votes would eventually force House state delegations to vote, where Republicans have an advantage over Democrats. Currently, the GOP has a 26-23-1 state delegation majority in the House of Representatives.

“If he can keep the Biden count below 270, then the matter goes to the House of Representatives, where, of course, there is a Republican majority among the delegations of states, and you vote by state if it goes to the House,” Dershowitz said. “He’s trying to follow the playbook of three elections of the 19th century.”

Dershowitz noted that a number of things would have to align perfectly for Trump to win under that circumstance.

“You need a perfect storm for it to work,” he said. “You need to get enough states, enough state attorneys general, or state departments, or whoever, secretaries of state or governors that are Republican that legitimately refuse to certify the results because they’re under challenge on the day the Electoral College meets by statute.”

“If on that day, Biden doesn’t have 270 votes—you don’t get to vote two or three times on that; as far as the Constitution’s concerned, it’s one vote—and if the one vote doesn’t give the leading candidate 270 electoral votes, then automatically it goes to the House of Representatives, where a whole new process takes over, and a process that clearly favors President Trump,” added the former law professor.

Trump’s campaign or legal team hasn’t publicly stated whether that strategy is in play. Currently, his lawyers have a number of lawsuits filed in several battleground states, including at least one that is slated to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Dershowitz served on Trump’s legal team during the Senate impeachment trial earlier this year.

Other Interpretations

According to a Reuters article on Nov. 4, “Normally, governors certify the [election] results in their respective states and share the information with Congress.”

However, it noted, “some academics have outlined a scenario in which the governor and the legislature in a closely contested state submit two different election results. Battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and North Carolina all have Democratic governors and Republican-controlled legislatures.”

“It is unclear in this scenario whether Congress should accept the governor’s electoral slate or not count the state’s electoral votes at all,” Reuters said, citing experts.

It further cited the 1876 disputed election, in which three states appointed “dueling electors” that triggered Congress to pass the Electoral Count Act of 1887, which means that “each chamber of Congress would separately decide which slate of ‘dueling electors’ to accept.”

Republicans are in control of the Senate, and Democrats are in control of the House.

“If the two chambers disagree, it’s not entirely clear what would happen,” the article says, citing experts.

In regard to some of these Electoral College laws and scenarios, “it is fair to say that none of these laws has been stress-tested before,” Benjamin Ginsberg, a lawyer who represented the Bush campaign in 2000, told the news agency.

A contingent election could also be in play, where neither candidate reaches 270 votes. The Reuters article echoed Dershowitz in saying that it means that the 50 House delegations—of which the GOP has a majority—would vote on the president, while the vice president would be chosen by the GOP-controlled Senate.

Jan. 20 is when the term of a current president ends. If the dispute isn’t ended by then, according to law, the House speaker is named president for the interim.

November 16, 2020 | 62 Comments »

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12 Comments / 62 Comments

  1. @ Edgar G.:
    Edgar, you don’t know how near to the mark you are. The acapella is the only instrument I can play; but I do have a good memory for psalms and scripture songs. I’ve often sung them on my own, and sometimes even in the church that gave me the “left boot of fellowship”. Often, I’ve gone to the open mike to sing them, not even able to call them to mind, save a few words. I would just open my mouth and start singing, to no accompaniment, and the song would come out.

    I think most of the scriptures I remember, I heard in song, nearly always from Tanakh. My favorites were composed by Joel & Nancy Severson, and Paul Johnson, who used to play and sing them around a campfire. On of them was from Psalms 61-62:

    O God, hear my cry; attend unto my prayer.
    From the ends of the earth I will cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed.

    Chorus:
    Lead me to the rock that is higher than I
    Lead me to the rock that is higher than I

    For Thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy.
    I will abide in Thy tent forever.
    I will trust in the covert of thy wings;
    I will trust in the covert of thy wings.

    Truly my soul waiteth upon my God.
    He only is my rock and my salvation.
    I shall not be greatly moved
    I shall not be greatly moved.

    Trust in Him all of ye people;
    Pour out your hearts before Him.
    God is a refuge unto us.
    God is a refuge unto us.

    God has spoken once; twice have I heard this;
    That power belongeth unto God;
    Power belongeth unto God.

    I will sing praise unto Thy name; I will sing praise unto Thy name.

    (Repeat first verse & chorus)

  2. @ Edgar G.:

    I’ll know more after 4 this afternoon when I listen to the R&R Legal Team on Youtube. I recommended them to our members a wile ago, but have had no response. I suppose we all have our own pet stations and outlets.

    This spokesman lays out all the legal and social connecting activity, shows copies of the filings, suit claims, legal decisions and explores various reasons for the Trump Team doing what it does. Very informative. Lasts 60-90 mins.

  3. @ Sebastien Zorn:
    Excellet enxample of “willfully misunderstanding….Perhaps I should have said that we 3 have things in common. You play viola in a String Quartette, I ran a New Orleans Jazz Band for many years and have played all my life, whilst Michael, now that I think about it, in his dreams must hear the sound of angels playing on harps, the happy dreams of all religious Christians……

  4. Edgar G. Said:

    @ Michael S:

    That’s O.K. Michael, we DO resemble one another as we’re both musicians…..My sentiments are heart-felt.
    Well even the highest mountains crumble to sand after time beyond what we can comprehend, except perhaps, philosophically.

    Didn’t know that about either of you.

  5. Michael S Said:

    @ Michael S:
    Oops. Sorry, Edgar. For some odd reason, I thought your post was from Sebastien. Same sentiments, though — My wife and I pray for you all the time.

    And same sentiments from me, Michael. I am sorry you have been ill and I am glad you are feeling better. Also, thanks for the good word and the smiley emoji from before. I am also glad you are feeling equanimity and are in good company. All the best to you and yours.

  6. @ Michael S:

    That’s O.K. Michael, we DO resemble one another as we’re both musicians…..My sentiments are heart-felt.
    Well even the highest mountains crumble to sand after time beyond what we can comprehend, except perhaps, philosophically.

  7. @ Edgar G.:
    Sebastien, my health has actually been improving steadily through the lockdowns; but neither my wife nor I look to death as a bad thing. We both look forward to getting together again with friends and family, along with our patriarchs. God has all of us here for a season and a reason. The same goes for this country.

  8. @ Michael S:

    Michael- I saw elsewhere that you detailed some very serious health problems. I truly wish the best for you, and that you are around for a very long time. It was very distressing for me to read–for certain. With modern medical aids, something should be able to benefit you…..Think of Dick Cheyney for instance. Ans lately, Bernie Sanders. .Think of the pressures and tensions they must have been and are, under.

    “Col” Bob Sheridan, to whom I’ve listened for many years….You should look him up. You’ll be astonished.

  9. Reader Said:

    quoted Deborah Lipstadt who knows more about this part of history than all of us put together.

    ZOA Condemns Holocaust Lecturer Deborah Lipstadt for Defending & Promoting Biden’s Obscene Comparison of Trump to Nazi Goebbels

    Note: The ZOA does not endorse, oppose, or recommend any political candidates.

    Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) President Morton A. Klein and ZOA Chair Mark Levenson, Esq. released the following statement:

    ZOA strongly condemns left wing Emory University lecturer Deborah Lipstadt’s horrific and absurd defense of Joe Biden’s obscene statement likening pro-Jewish, pro-Israel, Noble Peace Prize nominee President Donald Trump to Nazi monster propagandist Joseph Goebbels. As “Reich Plenipotentiary for Total War,” “Reich Minister of Propaganda,” and Hitler’s appointed successor, Goebbels was a prime architect of the Nazis’ “total war” and the Nazis’ massacre of six million Jews. Yet, sickeningly and wrongly Trump-hater Lipstadt tweeted that Biden’s outrageous analogy was “historically apt.”

    Last week, ZOA demanded that Joe Biden must apologize for his outrageous analogy of President Trump to Nazi monster Goebbels. (See “ZOA to Biden & Jewish Democratic Council of America: Apologize/Retract Offensive/False Analogy of Trump to Nazis,” Sept. 29, 2020) Biden has still not apologized. Lipstadt should join ZOA in demanding that Biden must apologize, instead of defending Biden’s despicable Nazi analogy.

    There is nothing “historically apt” about Biden’s analogy. In fact, President Trump has a long record of combatting and condemning antisemitism and white supremacy, including: Trump’s prosecution of Charlottesville white supremacists (all of the white supremacists that were charged eventually pleaded guilty and received prison sentences); President Trump’s December 2019 “Executive Order on Combatting Antisemitism” to protect Jewish students facing growing campus antisemitism (also see here); and Trump’s decision to end previous administrations’ payments to the Palestinian Authority. By ending these payments, President Trump ended indirect American support for the PA’s official program paying Arab terrorists to murder Jews and Americans.

    ZOA and Morton Klein, as a child of holocaust survivors, strongly opposes the abuse of Holocaust analogies by anyone, because this demeans the unmitigated horror perpetrated by the Nazis on the Jewish people and many others. However, it is especially disgraceful that Deborah Lipstadt defended Biden’s false analogy. Lipstadt, as a public debunker of Holocaust deniers, has a special obligation to maintain her credibility, and to not defend Biden’s false Holocaust analogy.

    Unfortunately, Lipstadt also seriously damaged her credibility, reputation, and even dignity by promoting the false, offensive Jewish Democratic Council of America (JDCA) video ad analogizing President Donald Trump to Nazi murderers. On the day that the JDCA released its horrific split-screen ad, showing President Trump side-by-side with Nazi scenes, the JDCA held an accompanying briefing by Professor Lipstadt. Lipstadt was one of the only Jewish voices endorsing this horrendous JDCA ad. The JDCA has also ignored ZOA’s demand that the JDCA must retract and apologize for this ad, and other widespread condemnation of the ad. Even the leftist ADL condemned the JDCA ad (after ZOA urged the ADL to do so).

    Moreover, these are not isolated incidents. Prof. Lipstadt has been dishonestly maligning President Trump for some time, in a similar manner. In her 2019 book, “Antisemitism Here and Now,” Lipstadt wrongly calls President Trump an “antisemitic enabler” and falsely and misleadingly claims that Trump equated “neo-Nazi, KKK, and white supremacist marchers with those who had come to protest against them” (the infamous Charlottesville hoax). As we and many others have often noted, President Trump’s “very fine people” statement solely referred to peaceful protestors who had differing views about removing a Robert E. Lee statue, and President Trump specifically excluded and absolutely condemned neo-Nazis and white supremacists in the next sentence.

    In the very same breath as his “very fine people” statement, President Trump said: “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally.” (See here (includes video) and here and here.)

    During her speech at Tufts University in September 2019 (video), Lipstadt again falsely and negligently perpetrated the “Charlottesville hoax” about Trump’s statements. At minute 26:40, Lipstadt clearly referring to her misinterpretation of Trumps statement that there were “fine people on both sides,” she declared: “Nice people don’t march in Charlottesville chanting Jews will not replace us. Nice people don’t come to marches sponsored by the alt-right, an overtly racist antisemitic entity. And they certainly don’t march with tiki torches, which is a direct linkage back to the Third Reich.”

    But in fact, Trump condemned the neo-Nazis and KKK members who marched with tiki torches, chanting that Jews will not replace us, and Trump never called neo-Nazis or white supremacists “nice people” or “fine people.”

    Furthermore, would Donald Trump ever dream of praising as fine people the Jew hating, murderous neo-Nazis when his daughter is an Orthodox Jew, his grandchildren are Orthodox Jews, and his son in law is an Orthodox Jew? This is beyond ludicrous, ridiculous, and obscene!

    And at minute 40:25, Lipstadt reiterated her absurd claim that the president is an “antisemitic enabler” and “makes people believe it’s okay to put a swastika on the door.” Lipstadt claimed that, although the president wasn’t “involved” with the Pittsburgh and Poway shootings, “but when you read their stuff, they [the shooters] all think he’s [President Trump’s] on their side.”

    Wrong Ms. Lipstadt! In fact, when you read the “stuff” written by the neo-Nazi white supremacist shooters at Poway and Pittsburgh, it is clear that they hated President Trump, because of the President’s love for the Jewish people and the Jewish state, and because of Trump’s condemnations and prosecutions of the Charlottesville neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

    An hour before shooting innocent worshipers at the Poway Chabad, shooter John Earnest posted a screed on 8chan calling President Trump “that Zionist, Jew-loving, anti-White, traitorous c-cksucker.”

    The Pittsburgh synagogue shooter, Robert Bowers, hated Trump for being surrounded by Jews. The shooter wrote on Gab: “There is no #MAGA as long as there is a kike infestation [in the Trump Administration].”

    The Pittsburgh shooter also posted an anti-Trump image depicting a man in a yarmulke giving Trump orders, while Trump replies, “Yes, sir.”

    The Pittsburgh shooter also agreed with a Gab post that claimed that Trump “betrayed Americans in Charlottesville, by comparing them with a violent mob.” Bowers responded: “For the record I did not vote for Trump, nor have I owned, worn, or even touched a MAGA hat.”

    Bowers also shared a post criticizing Trump for having federal prosecutors bring federal charges against Charlottesville white supremacists.

    ZOA again reiterates that we do not endorse or oppose any candidates. In light of the fact that many ZOA members are children, descendants, or relatives of Holocaust survivors or victims, we simply cannot abide by the abusive Holocaust analogies and false antisemitism portrayals espoused by Joe Biden, the Democratic Jewish Council of America, and Deborah Lipstadt.

    https://zoa.org/2020/10/10441391-zoa-condemns-holocaust-lecturer-deborah-lipstadt-defending-promoting-bidens-obscene-comparison-of-trump-to-nazi-goebbels/