Worst moment of the debate

[struggle4progress]

... Trump: I'm urging my supporters to go into the polls and watch very carefully. Because that's what has to happen. I am urging them to do it. As you know, today, there was a big problem. In Philadelphia they went in to watch. They were called poll watchers -- a very safe, very nice thing. They were thrown out. They weren't allowed to watch. You know why? Because bad things happen in Philadelphia, bad things. And I -- I am urging -- I am urging my people. I hope it's going to be a fair election. If it's a fair election...

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/30/politics/polls-donald-trump-election-first-debate/index.html

[struggle4progress]

1. Fears of voter intimidation follow Trump's call

Battle Creek, MI, USA / WIN 98.5 Your Country | WNWN-FM | Battle Creek, MI
Syndicated Content
Sep 30, 2020 4:03 PM

By Michael Martina and Andy Sullivan

(Reuters) - U.S. Democrats and nonpartisan election experts on Wednesday denounced President Donald Trump's calls for his supporters to act as ad-hoc poll watchers in the November election, saying they were an oblique call for illegal voter intimidation.

While U.S. election conduct is governed by a patchwork of state and federal laws, they generally apply strict rules of conduct to partisan election monitors, who are not supposed to interfere in the electoral process ...
Some 40 states require partisan election monitors to be formally accredited ahead of the election, and many limit the number who can be at a particular location.

"Most states allow for parties and candidates to have some degree of measured poll watching," said David Becker, director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research. "We need to also have functional polling places where voters feel safe."

The national Republican party for more than three decades was limited by federal courts from mounting national voter monitoring operations after instances of voter intimidation. That ban was lifted in 2018 ...

https://wincountry.com/2020/09/30/fears-of-voter-intimidation-follow-trumps-debate-call-for-his-backers-to-monitor-polls/

[BeckyDem]

2. He has plans for the governors of red states to invalidate the results if necessary.

How many will do the right thing?

[Thekaspervote]

17. Governors cannot invalidate elections or election law...red or blue

[BeckyDem]

19. You watch them, the governors and their minions.

Advocates Decry Georgia Supreme Court's Decision Allowing Governor to Invalidate Election Results
BY ASHER STOCKLER ON 5/16/20 AT 12:03 PM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/georgia-supreme-court-elections-1504585

[struggle4progress]

3. Debate remark puts white supremacy at focus of campaign

By JANET HOOK and EVAN HALPER
Los Angeles Times
Published: 9/30/2020 5:23:40 PM

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s volcanic debate performance put the president’s sympathy for white supremacists in the campaign spotlight Wednesday, heightening a sense of menacing chaos in the campaign that threatens to undercut other Republicans up for reelection in a year that was already a challenge for the GOP ...

On CBS’ This Morning, for example, former Republican Party chair Reince Priebus tried to avoid commenting on Trump’s remark about the Proud Boys, claiming he hadn’t heard him say it ...

https://www.concordmonitor.com/Trump-s-debate-remark-puts-white-supremacy-at-focus-of-campaign-36543137

[struggle4progress]

4. Fact-checking comment that poll watchers were 'thrown out' of Philly polling places

by Jessica Calefati, Posted: September 30, 2020- 4:30 PM

... Trump’s accusation is full of misinformation.

Under state law, poll watchers in Pennsylvania may only observe voting at traditional polling places on Election Day, and they must be certified by the state to do so. But the state hasn’t designated any Republican poll watchers yet — that’s typically done a few days before an election. And even if the state had, those people wouldn’t be allowed to watch anything until Nov. 3 ...

On Tuesday afternoon, a woman arrived at the satellite office inside Overbrook Elementary School in West Philadelphia, and told a supervisor she was there to monitor “the integrity of the election.” The supervisor told her she was not allowed inside the building unless she wanted to use the office’s services ...

The woman told The Inquirer she had been hired by the Trump campaign to monitor the West Philadelphia site and calmly stated she had a right to be inside. Once again: She did not. No poll watchers in Pennsylvania will be allowed until Nov. 3 ...

https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/trump-debate-philadelphia-poll-watchers-fact-check-20200930.html

[struggle4progress]

5. Philadelphia Developing Anti-Voter Intimidation Plan

Alison Durkee
Forbes Staff


TOPLINE Philadelphia will develop an “interagency plan” to prevent Trump supporters from intimidating voters at the polls, Mayor Jim Kenney told the Philadelphia Inquirer Wednesday, after President Donald Trump singled out the city on the debate stage Tuesday night when telling supporters to “go into the polls and watch very carefully” ...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2020/09/30/philadelphia-developing-anti-voter-intimidation-plan-after-trump-tells-supporters-to-watch-the-polls-debate/#7368ac3fad86

[panader0]

6. trump can go take a flying f**k at a rolling donut..... no one is scared of his bluster.

[Le Roi de Pot]

9. Never heard of that expression

[crickets]

20. Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions.

"Take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut! Take a flying fuck at the moon!"

[struggle4progress]

16. I'd rather he took a flying fuck at a wood chipper

but I'm tired and grumpy right now

[struggle4progress]

7. Nevada AG: People who follow Trump's advice will be prosecuted

Nevada's attorney general said he would prosecute people who follow President Donald Trump's advice to go to polling places and monitor votes being counted, accusing the president of encouraging voter intimidation ...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/people-who-follow-trumps-advice-and-hang-around-watching-polling-places-will-be-prosecuted-nevadas-attorney-general-says/ar-BB19zCUk

[LisaL]

8. Good.

NT

[Cha]

22. OH that's a Good one.. trump doesn't give

his rat's ass.. he wants fucking Chaos.

Can we say "BACKFIRE!"?

[spanone]

10. That alone should be enough to impeach his sorry ass.

[dustyscamp]

11. We won the election. Elections have consequences," Trump said at the top of the debate.

"We have the Senate, we have the White House, and we have a phenomenal nominee."

[Cha]

23. To trump.. Dems WON the BLUE Wave MIDTERMS..

Elections have Consequences.. you got yourself IMPEACHED for being being a Traitor.. trying to extort a foreign government to Manufacture Dirt on Hunter & Joe Biden.

[Blue Owl]

12. This is all bullshit

His "watchers" can't look over the shoulders of people as they cast their votes. An unless they are registered poll workers, they cannot be allowed access to cast ballots, scan information, etc. tRump is just blustering and floundering as usual...

[struggle4progress]

15. Or maybe he's signaling that his next Supreme Court nominee will be a Proud Boy

[struggle4progress]

13. Proud Boys moment snowballing

BY CALEB ECARMA
SEPTEMBER 30, 2020

... By Wednesday afternoon, the president was attempting to backpedal. “I don’t know who the Proud Boys are,” he told reporters. “They have to stand down and let law enforcement do their work.” He did not condemn the group, which founder Gavin McInnes has described as his “gang,” explaining its mission statement by saying: “We will kill you: that’s the Proud Boys in a nutshell.” While McInnes has made plenty of vehemently racist comments over the years, including repeatedly saying the N-word and shouting “Sieg heil!” while throwing up a Nazi salute on air, he appears to be focused on convincing Trump supporters to engage in politically motivated violence. “Fighting solves everything. We need more violence from the Trump people,” he once said. “Trump supporters: choke a motherfucker, choke a bitch, choke a tranny, get your fingers around the windpipe.”

... his Republican allies are doubling down on cleanup duty. Some are claiming the president did not seriously mean what he literally said, including first son Donald Trump Jr., who appeared on CBS News shortly after the contest to assert that his father was simply telling the group “to stand down,” but is “more than happy to condemn” it, despite not doing so when explicitly asked to. “I think he misspoke in response to Chris Wallace’s comment,” Senator Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican, told reporters on Wednesday morning. “I think he misspoke. I think he should correct it. If he doesn’t correct it, I guess he didn’t misspeak.” Chris Christie, a former Trump adviser and governor of New Jersey, told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that he “heard it differently,” adding, “I didn’t read it that way, George, but listen, if you want to read it that way that’s your prerogative.”

... Brian Kilmeade, the cohost of one of Trump’s favorite Fox News programs, criticized Trump for blowing “the biggest layup in the history of debates by not condemning white supremacists” ...

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/09/donald-trump-proud-boys-debate-moment-snowballing

[keithbvadu2]

18. What Trump really meant to say

What Trump really meant to say

[struggle4progress]

21. !

[struggle4progress]

14. Debate callout bolsters far-right Proud Boys

By Paul P. Murphy, CNN
Updated 7:17 PM ET, Wed September 30, 2020

Members of the far-right group the Proud Boys are celebrating comments made by President Donald Trump after he was asked ​to condemn White supremacists, and refused to do so, during Tuesday's presidential debate.

The President instead used ​his allotted time to blame ​what he called "antifa and the left​" for violence and to tell the Proud Boys to "stand back and stand by" ​...

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/30/politics/proud-boys-trump-debate-trnd/index.html

[Totally Tunsie]

24. And then there's this:

Trump readies thousands of attorneys for election fight

A year before President Donald Trump alarmed Americans with talk of disputing elections last week, his team started building a massive legal network to do just that.

Dozens of lawyers from three major law firms have been hired. Thousands of volunteer attorneys and poll watchers across the country have been recruited. Republicans are preparing prewritten legal pleadings that can be hurried to the courthouse the day after the election, as wrangling begins over close results and a crush of mail-in ballots. Attorneys from non-battleground states, including California, New York and Illinois, are being dispatched to more competitive areas and trained on local election laws.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/27/trump-legal-network-election-day-fight-422035

IMO, this is truly bothersome.