Tim Alberta is chief political correspondent for Politico Magazine. Just ask once-conservative heroes like Jeff Flake, Justin Amash and Mark Sanford.”. This sign-up form is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. The problem? “They have propagated this narrative of massive fraud, and it’s simply not true. 12. More than any policy enacted or court vacancy filled, Trump’s legacy will be his unprecedented assault on the legitimacy of the ballot box. This, Republicans and Democrats here agreed, was the essential difference between Michigan and other states. Politico Magazine hasn’t yet responded to the Erik Wemple Blog’s request for comment on its story’s durability. He wanted to know about the 38,000 absentee ballots that had just materialized. Others, including McDaniel and Cox and other state party figures, pleaded with Shinkle to stand his ground and insist on a two-week delay. When they huddled with some of their rank-and-file members, an uneasiness gripped some of the people present. It didn’t matter, Cox told them. The small townships in the rural precincts of the county, run by Republican clerks. Student Loan Cancellation Sets Up Clash Between Biden and the Left. Ultimately, the GOP lawmakers felt they were obligated to go. Tim Alberta is chief political correspondent for Politico Magazine. They knew the real gantlet lay ahead. Politico Magazine’s oral history of Air Force One’s nerve-racking flight after the Sept. 11 attacks is more than just a fascinating story. What was going on? The irony of Michigan’s electoral meltdown is that Election Day, in the eyes of veteran clerks and poll workers across the state, was the smoothest it had ever been. WORLD Magazine WORLD News Group. This is why McDaniel has sanctioned her employees, beginning with top spokesperson Liz Harrington, to spread countless demonstrable falsehoods in the weeks since Election Day. That’s the point: There’s a difference between sloppiness and fraud. In reality, the GOP had far more than that, according to sworn testimony from nonpartisan poll watchers inside the TCF Center. Each of the 134 tables had monitors placed at the end, “showing every keystroke that was made,” so that challengers could see exactly what was happening. Get POLITICO Magazine's newsletter featuring the best stories of the week and our Friday Cover delivered to your inbox. There was some relief, then, when in recent weeks McDaniel told multiple confidants that she doubted there was any scalable voter fraud in Michigan. “I was told the number was 38,000,” Spies replied. The RNC will vote in January on the position of chair. But there are obvious incremental steps to take in the name of transparency and efficiency. (James, who was clinging to a small lead that would soon disappear, promptly retweeted this sinister claim. In a savvy move, Chatfield and Shirkey prepared a letter addressing concerns over funding to deal with Covid-19 in Michigan. His self-aware sense of humor is a powerful weapon. Joe Arpaio’s Surprising Legacy in Arizona. This was the source of a monthslong dispute between the Democratic governor, the Democratic secretary of state and the Republicans who control both the House and Senate in Lansing. “This was not any type of valid legal strategy that had any chance at ultimately succeeding.”, “Anybody can sue anybody for any reason. And Trump didn’t have a realistic pathway here,” Brian Calley, the former GOP lieutenant governor, told me prior to the certification vote. An elections worker rubs his head in the closing hours where absentee ballots were processed at the central counting board, Nov. 4, 2020, in Detroit. By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or updates from POLITICO and you agree to our privacy policy and terms of service. Gavin Newsom said, but “my optimism is conditioned on this: more federal support.”. Our elections are prone to a significant amount of human error—and any municipal or county clerk will tell you that concerns over not catching those errors keep them up at night. 4.5 out of 5 stars 150. They told him there was not. Not only did they want to avoid the perception of aiding a system the president was attacking as illegitimate and not only were they skeptical of the Democrats’ concerns of a drawn-out count. Benson and Calley were right that Trump was never going to succeed at altering the outcome in Michigan—or in any of the other contested states, or in the Electoral College itself. Almost every four years, there’s a last-minute panic candidate for the presidency. “We have to see this for what it is. That meant no Republican with career ambitions could accept it, either. Look no further than John James. Having been brought out of retirement to help supervise the counting in Detroit—a decision met with cheers from Republicans and Democrats alike—Thomas had been “thrilled” with the professionalism he’d witnessed during Monday’s pre-processing session and Tuesday’s vote tabulating. VICE. All day Friday, and throughout the weekend, a chorus of Michigan Republican heavyweights tried and failed to contact Van Langevelde. With all 83 counties boasting certified results, the only thing that stood between Joe Biden and his rightful claim to Michigan’s 16 electoral votes was certification from the state board of canvassers. No matter how obvious the outcome—to McDaniel, to the 168 members of the RNC, maybe even to Trump himself—any indication of surrender would be unforgivable. It’s not hard to imagine what would happen then. That was before a daily deluge of dishonest allegations and out-of-context insinuations; before the conservative media’s wall-to-wall coverage of exotic conspiracy theories; before the GOP’s most influential figures winked and nodded at the president of the United States alleging the greatest fraud in U.S. history. Politics & Policy Why it matters: As Joe Biden prepares to take over the White House and preside over what will likely be a divided Congress, President Trump is taking a defiant approach to his departure — making lame-duck moves to settle personal scores and enacting final measures to put a lasting stamp on the U.S. government. “We have a duty to certify this election.”, Like a good attorney, Van Langevelde meticulously questioned a number of expert guest speakers to ascertain if they had dissenting views of the board’s authority under state law. (Livonia, which is 95 percent white, had more poll-book irregularities than Detroit, which is 80 percent Black. There is little cause for optimism. Because the two Democrats would obviously vote in favor of certification, a manic gush of attention turned to the other Republican member, Aaron Van Langevelde. You’ll … Because of this, and because of the sweeping transformation of the party—not just ideologically or stylistically, but mechanically, with MAGA loyalists now installed in state and local leadership posts across the country—the question of loyalty will continue to define the Republican identity for years to come. The disregard for institutional norms. There remained hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots to be counted in the large, Democratic strongholds of Detroit, Lansing and Flint. There were valid concerns about some inconsistencies in the balancing of Detroit’s poll books; and yet, those inconsistencies were minimal relative to the 2016 election, when Trump won by a margin 15 times smaller—and when the board voted unanimously to certify the result. But he succeeded in convincing America that a loss, no matter how conclusive, may never again be conclusive enough. Because of the overflow, election officials ultimately decided to lock down the complex, starting with the glass-encased canvassing room where the tabulation work was being done. The body did not have power to audit or investigate or recount; that could be done only by distinct bodies after certification was complete. She was met with some confusion; there were already plenty of Republicans there, as scheduled, working their shifts as poll challengers. “I’m not too worried about the end result in Michigan. That didn’t stop Trump from buying in. How Pence’s Camp Persuaded Trump to Pick Their Guy as VP. But the circumstances surrounding the Michigan GOP leadership’s secret huddle with Trump were anything but normal. They never win. Gov. Perhaps most important, Trump’s allies in Michigan proved to be more career-obsessed, and therefore more servile to his whims, than GOP officials in any other state he has cultivated during his presidency, willing to indulge his conspiratorial fantasies in ways other Republicans weren’t. Some viewed his relative youth as an asset, believing he wouldn’t risk throwing away his future in the party. “It took a lot of courage for him to do what he thought was right and appropriate, given the amount of pressure he was under,” said Brian Calley, the GOP former lieutenant governor, who told me days earlier that he had never heard the name Aaron Van Langevelde. ), Tweeting out siren emojis, Jenna Ellis, the attorney for Trump’s campaign, announced: “BREAKING: This evening, the county board of canvassers in Wayne County, MI refused to certify the election results. As in tough, demanding, challenging. “As John Adams once said, 'We are a government of laws, not men.' Huge win for @realDonaldTrump.”. Featuring hard-hitting reporting and original ideas about the stories that matter most in Washington — and beyond. Kindle Edition. POLITICO Magazine. She spun and exaggerated and played the game, but she was generally viewed as being above board. The aversion to etiquette and the bottomless appetite for cultural conflict. Just before 9:30 a.m., Biden overtook Trump in the tally of Michigan’s votes—and suddenly, a switch flipped on the right. People were raising objections—such as to the transferring of military absentees onto ballots that could be read by machines, a standard practice—that betrayed a lack of preparation. 113K likes. That’s right. Tapped by the president-elect to take over the Republican National Committee—on the not-so-subtle condition that she remove “Romney” from her professional name—McDaniel morphed into an archetype of the Trump-era GOP sycophant. All for following his conscience and defying the wishes of Donald Trump. Billions of dollars won’t guarantee him a place in the Democratic race. There is no immediate way to make Americans appreciate this distinction, no instant cure for the flagging confidence in our elections. In conversations with more than two dozen Michigan insiders—elected officials, party elders, consultants, activists—it became apparent how the state’s conditions were ripe for this sort of slow-motion disaster. Throughout this wild year, the Bridge Michigan team has worked hard to bring you data-driven, fact-based reporting about the issues that matter most to our state. The true insanity was saved for Detroit. Van Langevelde did little to disappoint. It’s a PR strategy to erode public confidence in a very well-run election to achieve political ends,” Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, said in an interview last week. In this Nov. 3 photo, election inspectors are reflected in a window as they begin processing ballots while a voter outside arrives to drop a ballot into an official box on Election Day at City Hall in Warren, Mich. | AP Photo/David Goldman. No outcry over precincts opening late or closing early. McDaniel was a case in point. If you can spot the joke. The Federal Trade Commission has frozen pay and hiring, explored ways of shrinking its staff, and may need to bring fewer expensive cases, its executive director says in internal emails. Only in the late stages of the race, when Republican state senator (and former secretary of state) Ruth Johnson suggested a meager concession—allowing 10 hours of absentee ballot processing before Election Day—did the GOP throw a bone to election workers. Than they were there for, ” Gov Republicans here believe. ” prepare you the... Bottomless appetite for cultural conflict winner of the nation—and of the GOP lawmakers felt they on. 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