Did the 2020 presidential election in four states follow the Constitution, or not?
That is the question 126 Republican members of Congress, including myself, asked the Supreme Court of the United States in an amicus curiae brief in Texas v. Pennsylvania, et al. The amicus brief asked the court if the U.S. Constitution was followed in the November 2020 election in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
This is an important question that needs to be answered, for this election and all future elections.
The U.S. Constitution clearly states that presidential electors must be appointed according to rules established by each state’s legislature. In other words, state law determines how presidential elections are conducted.
This did not appear to happen in at least four states during the 2020 election.
In Georgia, state law prohibits the counting of absentee ballots until after the polls open on Election Day. In clear violation of the law, and thus the U.S. Constitution, the State Election Board, not the legislature, allowed processing of ballots up to three weeks before Election Day.
In Pennsylvania, state law states that the deadline for a county board of elections to receive a mail-in ballot is 8 p.m. on Election Day. Instead of following state law, judges, without any authorization by the Pennsylvania General Assembly, usurped legislative power by extending that deadline to three days after Election Day.
In another violation, Pennsylvania’s secretary of state violated Pennsylvania state law, and thus the U.S. Constitution, by removing the state law mandate that requires all applications for absentee or mail-in ballots for non-disabled and non-military voters be signed by the applicant.
Michigan state law requires that all absentee ballot requests be requested by the voter through a careful and secure application process requiring a signature. The Michigan secretary of state violated this law, and thus the U.S. Constitution, when she instead set up a website where people could request an absentee ballot.
In Wisconsin, state law prohibits the use of unmanned drop boxes for ballots. Nevertheless, the non-legislative Wisconsin Elections Commission and other local officials unconstitutionally created hundreds of drop boxes to collect absentee ballots, including the use of unmanned drop boxes.
The amicus brief concludes, "Our constitutional republic has endured for nearly two and a half centuries based on the consent of the governed. That consent is grounded in the confidence of our people in the legitimacy of our institutions of government. Among our most fundamental institutions is the system of free and fair elections that we rely upon, and any erosion in that foundation jeopardizes the stability of our republic."
I couldn’t agree more.
Rep. Debbie Lesko is a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives, representing Arizona's 8th congressional district.
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