I don’t write many diaries, but I wanted to post one here in the hopes that people will bookmark it for the unrest that will undoubtedly come on Election Day. This has some moving parts, and I’ve seen bits and pieces that pointed to one part or the other, but I hadn’t seen anything that pointed to Trump’s plan as a whole, when it comes to winning the election.

Before I start, though, I’d like to refer to this excellent, unnerving diary: What The Electoral Reform Act Changed. If you haven’t read it yet, I encourage you to do so; it explains well how the Electoral Reform Act closed the legal loopholes that were exploited in the run-up to January 6. Will Trump and his ilk try to steal the election again? Of course they will! But fortunately they can’t do it the same way as in 2020. Those gaps have been closed.

So what’s the plan then? In short, it means claiming victory anyway and trying to enforce the case through the legal system. These are the components I observe:

• NOW: Appeal to the “Christian nationalist” voice.
  Not that they are counting on votes to transfer them, but the only demographic they are trying to appeal to are the people who would be “in power” if they managed to pull this off.
• NOW: The polls
  I know we’re all hung up on elections and worry when a poll doesn’t go “our way,” but I feel like this is a mistake. Right now, the Trumpsters are “flooding the zone” with polls tied to right-wing groups. (I read somewhere that out of 30 polls in a month, 21 were associated with right-wing pollsters.) The point of these polls is not to reflect what is happening on the ground. That’s important. The purpose of the polls is to paint a picture that Trump is ahead. Remember those Christian nationalists from the previous point? They are the people the Trumpists are trying to fool into thinking that victory on election night is certain, that all “normal” people will vote for Trump, etc. Trump doesn’t actually have to do that. are forward. He just has to look like that. This provides justification for the endless “the election was stolen” rhetoric we encounter.
• ELECTION NIGHT: Trump announces victory.
  Whatever happens, Trump will declare victory on election night. For the purposes of this bullet point, the actual votes don’t matter. It doesn’t matter whether he’s in front or behind. As soon as he can declare victory, he will.
• ELECTION NIGHT: Shenanigans begin. Search for:
  
  • ‘Stop the count! “Continue counting!”
    Depending on whether Trump is ahead or behind, he will call on several states to halt or continue their counts. (Special note: Did you notice the passing case, just decided by the 5th Circuit, that votes in Mississippi would only be counted if they were received by Election Day, regardless of whether or not they were postmarked before the election ? I will see that material again, and here it will come into play. I expect an attempt at a national ban.)
  • “The Democrats cheated!” Be prepared to hear this non-stop for a while.
  • Lawsuits: Lawsuits are on the horizon to try to overwhelm the legal system. Lawsuits are underway to try to delay certification. Lawsuits are underway to disqualify votes/voters. There will be swarms and snowstorms and mountains of lawsuits, cases from horizon to horizon as far as the eye can see. In any case, some will be filed purely to try to delay the proceedings.
  • Intimidation of poll workers/voters
    I know the Justice Department is looking into this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if random, homegrown groups of so-called “poll watchers” pop up here and there all over the country, trying to bully real poll watchers, or to find the “wrong kind.” to deter voters.
  • Delay/denial of certification
    This is a big one. Expect to learn more about the certification process in different provinces than you ever imagined. However, also note that this was one of the areas specifically addressed in the Electoral Vote Count Reform Act. They will certainly try, but if luck holds, this loophole will have been successfully closed (fingers crossed!).
    • Related: “December 8 is the new January 6” An important date to remember is the “Safe Harbor” date of December 8. This is the date on which all states are located must have their electoral roll certified and submitted. If I remember correctly, it was on this date that the Supreme Court intervened and gave the presidency to George Bush. One of the Trump team’s big goals in delaying certification will certainly be to try to get everything as close to December 8 as possible. The closer they get to December 8, the more likely the Supreme Court will intervene. Which brings us to…
  • Big Goal #1: The Supreme Court
    You could say that Trump has six Supreme Court justices in his pocket. One of the main goals of the campaign is to get one of the many, many, many lawsuits they have filed (and will continue to file) before the Supreme Court. Trump expects the Supreme Court to simply declare him the winner. For the purposes of this diary, I won’t go into how likely or unlikely that is in practice. I’m just saying that I believe the Trump team’s plan is to “spike the ball,” with the Supreme Court essentially crowning him king regardless of what the actual vote count is.
  • Big Goal #2: House of Representatives
    Another plan (I’ve seen this in diaries occasionally) involves trying to send the election to the House of Representatives. If the electoral votes were tied and no one reached 270 (for example, if both candidates had 269 votes), the House could essentially vote on the winner, one vote per state. Since there are more Republican states than Democratic states, Trump’s team expects this would go their way if they could get it through the House of Representatives.

    Of all the far-flung plans the Trump team has proposed, this House of Representatives probably has the greatest concentration of plot holes. This particular fantasy has already been debunked in several other journals, so I won’t go into detail here. However, I would like to point out that the Speaker of the House of Representatives will not necessarily be the current Speaker, Mike Johnson. Mike Johnson has indicated that he would refuse to certify an election unless Trump were the winner all members of the House of Representatives (including the speaker!) ends at the election. Mike Johnson won’t be able to deny anyone anything unless he wins his own seat And the Republicans retain control of the House And he is re-elected as Speaker of the House of Representatives. It could happen, but it’s not as certain as he makes it out to be.

Remember, Trump is Trump. He dreams of being a dictator (remember how on that deadly day he wanted to lead the insurgents of January 6? He expected it to be his triumphal coronationHowever, not only does he dream of becoming a dictator, but winning the elections is the only hope he has of staying out of prison. He will absolutely fight like a rat in a poke. Expect every state to be challenged, every charge to be challenged, every certification to be dragged through the courts.

Our fight will not be over on Election Day. We will have to keep fighting until the next president is actually sworn in. I have complete confidence that we will get there; but expect a lot of bumps along the way.

The main point of all this is: the wider the vote count, the harder it is to pull this all off successfully. If you haven’t voted yet, please do so.

Thank you.