Trump revues Bush v. Gore in his crusade against voting via mail

The 5-4 decided in Bush v. Gore ended an ordinance of 36 days after the Florida results were too close to call. The quarrel included battalions of lawyers descending on the state, challenging ballots with “hanging chads,” and multiple narratives under the glare of national television. Although the case still resonates politically, and haunts near elections, its legal principle has long been considered a proverbial ticket good for one ride only. The Supreme Court itself has not cited the case since.

However, as tensions rise over post-in-votes, Trump continues to persist with his unsupported statements of fraudulent votes, and his legal team raises Bush v again Gore, some Democratic advocates question whether the case can be less than single -ride ticket and more like the axiomatic principle that, in the words of the late Justice Robert H. Jackson, “lies like a loaded weapon ready” to bring forward in a moment of need.

When the Supreme Court stopped the 2000 bills in Florida, and the Republican Texas Gov. Bush told the White House about Democratic Vice President Al Gore, declaring that county standards for assessing voters’ intentions on disputed votes varied too broadly to be honest. The court said the variations violated the equal protection guarantee of the 14th Amendment.

Yet the Conservative majority of five justices also expressed their opinion in Bush v. Gore as “limited to the present circumstances, for the problem of equal protection in electoral processes generally presents many complexities.”

As a result, legal commentators have criticized Bush v. Gore long seen as a decision born out of the political moment rather than one that provides a solid precedent. Judges of the lower court have only sporadically referred the case.

In Nevada’s lawsuit against the Secretary of State, attorney William Consovoy, who has been at the forefront of much of the Trump lawsuit, wrote that the post-in-regulation lacks “minimal procedural safeguards” and “form unique equal treatment of Nevada voters in counties.”

Consovoy declined to comment on the Trump campaign’s lawsuit strategy if the use of Bush v. Gore.

Accounts, unchecked chads and the Brooks Brothers riot

The Bush v. Saga Gore demonstrated how a close, controversial race could push the country apart, even in a less polarized time.

That was a sign of the chaos and confusion that would occupy the country in the next five weeks. When the narratives began, the tales differed. A Florida state certificate issued in late November, issued by a Republican secretary of state, put Bush ahead with as many as 357 votes out of nearly 6 million sold-out votes.

The courts refused to take the bank to permanently stop their unsigned opinion from the Florida accounts. The same conservative majority of five justices had temporarily blocked the bills three days earlier, also over protests from liberal dissenters.

The final decision found that Florida standards for assessing disputed votes varied from province to province, resulting in “arbitrary and different treatment” among voters.

In the majority were Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas. Dissenting were Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.

That familiar conservative-liberal stance raised complaints of partisan politics.

Stevens, the senior Liberal at the time, wrote: “While we may never know with complete certainty the identity of this year’s presidential winner, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear. It is the confidence of the nation in the judiciary as an impartial custodian of the rule of law. “

The Supreme Court has in no subsequent ruling after Bush v. Gore referred, according to a search of the court’s website that includes the texts of cases. The single-issue quote appears transiently in a footnote in a solo dissenting opinion by Thomas in a 2013 Arizona Arizona voter registration dispute.

Even in a purely neutral vein, the case would have as much precedence as any other Supreme Court decision and legal acts would be free to use it if they believed it was convincing to make their case.

Lawsuits in Nevada and New Jersey

In the Nevada claim filed on August 4, Consovoy mainly protested rules that may count the number of late votes and, separately, that require different numbers of polling stations in urban and rural areas based on province within the province.

Nevada officials have demanded that the lawsuit be dismissed. A U.S. magistrate has yet to rule on the motion.

The Democratic National Committee, Democratic Congressional Campaign Commission and Nevada Democratic Party were allowed to intervene in the Nevada case, under a U.S. district court ruling issued Friday. In their motion calling for intervention, Democratic groups had declared the Trump trial “a hodgepodge of claims” that are not “viable.”

Filed by attorney Marc Elias, a veteran of many Democratic campaign battles, the motion describes the Trump lawsuit as “an attempt to undermine the state’s effort … to protect Nevada voters during a public health crisis” . “

A separate complaint from the federal court of the Trump campaign was filed on Tuesday against New Jersey, after Gov. Phil Murphy explained that all residents were sent to vote in November. Residents may still vote in person, but through preliminary papers vote to check on double voting.

The Trump campaign presents several legal grounds, including those based on Bush v. Gore’s equivalent protection rationalization. Murphy’s order, Trump advocates argue, “will result in the counties of New Jersey using varying standards to determine what a legal preliminary vote is.”

Overall, the complaint is consistent with Trump’s public outcry over attempts to discredit emails. It refers dozens of times to potential voter fraud and warns that the New Jersey plan arising from a public health crisis presents “a recipe for disaster.”

While Trump continues to vote on mailing-in-votes, it is no longer difficult to imagine Bush v. Gore-inspired legal behavior and even a possible repetition of the milestone case in the mantle of Trump v. Biden. How the current Supreme Court would govern dispels ready prediction, moreover the chance that Chief Justice Roberts would play a crucial role as he has in recent important cases.

It is clear that for supporters of the late conservative icon – Trump included – the mantra no longer holds.