U.S. Supreme Court justice orders Pa. counties to separate, but keep counting, late-arriving mail ba

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Philadelphia Inquirer

In a move that could signal the U.S. Supreme Court is one step closer to intervening in a fight over Pennsylvania’s grace-period for late-arriving mail ballots, Justice Samuel Alito on Friday ordered all counties to keep separate any ballots that came in after Nov. 3 and instructed state officials to explain by Saturday why the court should not step in. Many, if not all counties, were already complying with his demands.

Alito’s order came in response to a state GOP filing earlier in the day which urged once again that the court to overturn a ruling by Pennsylvania’s highest court that allowed counties to count ballots received up until 5 p.m. Friday — as long as they had been postmarked by Election Day. The justices had declined an earlier push seeking their intervention, but noted at the time that they might be open to considering the issue down the road.

So, Boockvar had advised counties to segregate — but still count — any mail ballots that came in after Nov. 3 so that if the U.S. Supreme Court were to take up the case they could be easily isolated. It is unclear whether they will be included in the final tally. Republicans told the court Friday that Boockvar had been unable to verify that local election boards had been following that advice.

In his order, Alito noted that the court did not know until today there was a question over whether counties were complying with Boockvar’s guidance. But he stopped short of granting the GOP’s request that those ballots not be counted at all until the wider court could decide whether to weigh in on whether to take up the issue. Alito’s order gave the Department of State until 2 p.m. Saturday to file a response.


Read more: https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/live/elections-2020-results-candidates-updates-news-pennsylvania-20201106.html#card-456200423

[elleng]

1. 'Many, if not all counties, were already complying with his demands.' so nothing changed.

[groundloop]

2. HOWEVER, GOPers are asking that some legally cast votes be thrown out

GOPers are asking that some legal ballots, postmarked on or before election day but for whatever reason (i.e. DeJoy) not received until after Tuesday be discarded. THAT is total bullshit and another desperate attempt to rig the election for tRump, although it seems that it's too little, too late.

[elleng]

5. Won't happen.

[Maeve]

18. Even if it does happen, it will be too late for them, as you said

Those horses left the barn quite a while ago

[BumRushDaShow]

3. The GOP wants to waste as much time and money as they can

on frivolous stuff so that they can deflect attention away from their collapse. Fortunately nearly all the judges they have appeared before have facepalmed and threw their cases out.

[elleng]

6. Will happen.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

15. Okay, but how many ballots are being separated?

[Bleacher Creature]

4. Good thing Biden won't need those votes.

He'll have enough if you only include those votes received by 11/3.

[BumRushDaShow]

7. Although we're trying to get it beyond the automatic recount range

for some states. Here in PA, a recount triggers if the difference is less than 0.5%.

[Bleacher Creature]

9. I think he'll still be ok.

One of the Nates (I can't remember which one) estimated that Biden will win this hr current count be at least 100K, which would be about a 1.5% margin.

[BumRushDaShow]

11. Yeah even Bob Casey was using that number

apparently a non-profit organization (Voter Project I think?) had done a deep dive and came up with the estimates.

[Xipe Totec]

8. In other words, I order you to keep doing what you are already doing. nt

[bucolic_frolic]

10. They're not ordering segregation for no reason

They plan to do something with those ballots.

They don't want to meddle in voting and civil rights, in gerrymandering, and let the states run elections as they see fit, but they're listening to Trump's lawyers on state voting laws.

Sounds to me like they don't want to rule on anything lest it affects other states as well. They'll wait until the end, aggregate the cases and see if they rule just enough to create victory for Trump.

[Polybius]

12. They're gonna steal this

Just watch, all mail-ins will be rejected nationwide (except absentee).

[aggiesal]

13. This is a nothing burger ...

The PA Secretary of State (?) was on MSNBC and he said that order was issued months ago and that PA was following the order.
This was just to get a news story like this in the papers again.

***************
*** SQUIRREL ***
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[BumRushDaShow]

17. If it was a guy, it might have been the PA Attorney General

The SOS is Kathleen Boockvar.



And agree with the -

[aggiesal]

19. The person on MSNBC was a male, state official. ...

I'll have to look it up.

Maybe working out of the SOS office.
Spokesman or Asst. SOS?

[aggiesal]

20. See response #14. n/t

[BumRushDaShow]

21. Yeah I saw that DeminPennswoods had mentioned Shapiro's appearance on MSNBC

and he is the PA Attorney General, who was recently re-elected!

[DeminPennswoods]

14. Josh Shapiro, our Atty Genl, was on MSNBC

explaining that all Alito did was tell PA to do what the PA Supreme Court and Sec of State had already told the counties and what the counties were doing: seperate those ballots and keep counting.

[bucolic_frolic]

16. Voter suppression is the crime here. Not the other way around.

I don't see how the SoS can be faulted for enabling citizens to vote, which is, after all, the point of elections. Interpreting law so more may have their ballots counted is a crime?

[Steelrolled]

22. Let it play out in courts

Follow the process. It will show the strength of our system, contrary to those (on the left and right) who claim it is compromised. And the outcome will not change.