[hedora]

They’re voting on an amendment to exempt candidates for federal office from warrantless surveillance. It is expected to pass.

That way, the executive branch can tamper with state and local elections with impunity.

The supreme court just heard oral arguments in a case where Trump’s lawyers argued he was allowed to shoot people for no reason in public. (Really. This is not hyperbole.)

Presumably the next step is to (perhaps selectively) cancel elections (or some ballots) because “emergency”, and then refusing to step down if the resulting impeachment somehow succeeds (which it won’t).

[streb-lo]

I think your last point is a bit of a leap, but I agree we have seen constant undermining of the institutions built to make the United States a free country during this administration.

What I find most interesting is the complete hijacking of a large portion of the conspiracy crowd such that this is all permissible to them, as long as it keeps the Other out of the power structure.

[hedora]

I’m not sure it’s that big of a leap. Gore won the vote in Florida, but the courts installed Bush. The ballots were illegally transported from Ohio to Indiana and back, and then favored Bush in 2004 in a way that was a statistical anomaly. Both those elections were the first I can remember where the exit polls didn’t match the outcome of the election (and the bias was only in crucial districts in swing states).

2016 was a total catastrophe of an election. The courts intervened in one primary earlier this year, in bid to get a conservative judge elected. That backfired, fortunately.

The Senate is intentionally blocking funding for election security, and now, with COVID, they’re refusing to provide funding to allow mail in ballots in many states.

Some of the leaders responsible for underfunding the election have publicly said they are withholding the funding because the republicans will lose if there is high turnout this fall.