Though “[s]everal left-leaning groups have sued to block the former president from the state’s ballot on 14th Amendment grounds,” Tom Ozimek of The Epoch Times reported in November, “Trump Listed on Michigan Primary Ballot,” as the headline states.
The primary was yesterday. Trump won. As expected.
But he appeared on the primary ballot only with legal wrangling. Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, was under a lot of pressure to keep Trump off the ballot. Which she resisted, explicitly stating that she thought the maneuver to allow state officials to prohibit Trump from appearing on ballots because of the 14th Amendment’s “insurrection” clause was
Michigan’s voting system is now quite complicated. First, it’s an open primary state, so there will always be strategic voting, where partisans will cross lines to sabotage opponent parties. Though in the case of Trump, there is some irony here, since Trump benefitted in 2016 from such voting by Democrats, thinking he was the candidate easiest to beat in the general election.
Michigan sports a hybrid system for selecting partisan candidates to appear on the general election ballot. “More of Michigan’s 55 delegates to the Republican National Convention (RNC) will be awarded,” explains Nathan Worcester, also of The Epoch Times, “through the caucus process than through the primary vote — 39 as opposed to just 16.” But there are dueling conventions for caucusing, and it’s quite a mess.*
Michigan also now offers early voting at special voting sites. Is it a sign of a healthy democracy that there are so many ways to vote?
It sure doesn’t seem healthy that national partisan politics almost kept a Republican candidate off a primary ballot. Could the solution be to take parties’ candidate selection entirely out of state balloting?
Demote major parties from their current favored position to paying their own way.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* In the Democratic Primary, President Biden won big against Dean Phillips, a largely unknown congressman from Minnesota, and author Marianne Williamson. But, with roughly half the vote counted, a not insignificant 14 percent of Democrats snubbed the president (and the field) by voting “Uncommitted.” Many were no doubt protesting the president’s policies concerning the Israel-Hamas War; in the county containing the University of Michigan, 20 percent voted uncommitted. Yet, even in rural counties across Michigan, more than 10 percent of Democrats opted for uncommitted.
Illustration created with PicFinder and Firefly
—
See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
4 replies on “Parties Demoted”
The Republicans and Democrats are willing to sacrifice some control over their own nomination processes in order to have state-sponsorship of primaries, which sponsorship entails a filtering that inhibits the ascent of other parties to challenge them. These two parties jointly control every state legislature. Decades have been spent in inculcating the idea that state-sponsored and administrated primaries make elections more democratic, and most American states have no mechanism for citizens to place reform measures on the ballot anyway.
Is it not disheartening that so many Americans appear to be more concerned about the Israel-Hamas War than they are about the invasion at our own border?
The ‘uncommitted’ vote should not be overplayed. Biden had no real opposition in the Democratic primary, Dean Phillips notwithstanding. They’re voting against Biden’s policies on Hamas, but most will vote for him in November anyway. Given Michigan’s importance as a battleground state, few of the ‘uncommitted’ are likely to switch sides or stay home. That would be self-defeating.
“Complicated.”
Also means more ways to skew the results.
Not that anyone would want to do that.
Source: Madison County election integrity project
This “nugget” was gleaned from Gabriel (CFO) Sterling’s testimony on 1/16/24 (pg 147) but is corroborated by Michael Barnes (CES) testimony on 1/11/24.
https://www.scribd.com/document/700879184/Curling-v-Raffensperger-Transcript-Volume-5A#fullscreen&from_embed
It’s obvious from the transcripts of Gabriel Sterling and others that the Halderman Report was NEVER utilzed by the Secretary of State’s office to MITIGATE SECURITY VULNERABILITIES OF DOMINION ICX BMDs because as of Feb 2022, Gen Counsel Ryan Germany was the ONLY person to have actually read it! (see attached pic)
The timeline is long but worth reading to understand how we arrived at where we are today.
A timeline of events
7/31/2019 — Dominion Contract signed ($107 million)
Aug/Sep? — Dominion equipment received by state of Georgia
10/7/2019 — Fortalice Solutions conducts two day cybersecurity assessment of BMDs (arranged by CIO Merritt Beaver)
11/27/2019 — Fortalice Solutions written report detailing the results of the October cyber assessment. (CIO Merritt Beaver claims to have never seen it, has no clue as to the results, but assumed the report went to Dominion Voting systems. (This is a bit confusing, as he did not initially offer “details” of this information, but only after “pressed” by the Court’s (Judge Totenberg’s) questions did he acknowledge that cybersecurity for Georgia’s voting system was outsourced to Dominion, effectively since 2019.)
9/?/2020 — Dr. J. Alex Halderman demonstrates before the Court (plaintiffs/defendant) in a pre-trial hearing (Curling v Raffensperger) how the Dominion ICX Ballot Marking Device can be hacked with relative ease (This event is acknowledged multiple times in the court transcripts but the exact date in Sep 2020 is not provided..at least that I could discern). It is likely that this is when the Court/plaintiffs ordered a detailed cybersecurity analysis of the Dominion ICX which included a Court order to “surrender” one Fulton County machine to Halderman’s custody for extensive examination.
11/3/2020 — Georgia conducts the “safest and most secure election ever”
7/1/2021 The 96 page Halderman Report on the vulnerabilities of the Dominion Voting system ICX ballot marking device is completed
7/17/2021 The Halderman Report is received by the SoS counsel (and plaintiffs) and placed UNDER COURT SEAL AT THE REQUEST OF THE GA SECRETARY OF STATE.
11/?/2021 While exact date in Nov is not cited, transcript testimony confirms that Curling plaintiffs petitioned the judge to direct the defense (SoS) to disseminate the report within its own organization to individuals responsible for election cybersecurity. While not specifically stated (that I could find), the plaintiffs may have received knowledge that no one in the Secretary of State’s office had received, read, or had knowledge of the report which contained not only detailed points of vulnerabilities, but also M’sITIGATING STEPS WHICH MIGHT REDUCE THE VOTING MACHINE VULNERABILITIES!
1/27/2022 For reasons known only to Sec Raffensperger (Ryan Germany‑1/12/2024), he calls for Halderman to unseal the report that the Secretary of State himself asked to be sealed back in July 2021
https://sos.ga.gov/news/secretary-raffensperger-calls-j-alex-halderman-agree-release-secret-report-and-pre-election
2/?/2022 — Pre-trial depositions of SoS witnesses indicate (or confirm) that as of this date in February 2022, NO ONE from the Secretary of State’s office had actually READ the Halderman Report with the exception of General Counsel Ryan Germany…who is NOT a cybersecurity expert (not even close). Gabe Sterling’s testimony (see pic) indicates that to his knowledge, NOT EVEN THE SECRETARY HIMSELF HAD READ THE REPORT THAT HE CALLED TO BE UNSEALED ONE MONTH PRIOR!
5/24/2022 — DeKalb County District 2 Commissioner’s race results OVERTURNED after HAND COUNT OF READABLE TEXT on ballots! The GA SoS “swept this under the rug”, the GA Assembly did NOTHING, and public officials at ALL LEVELS either never heard about it or IGNORED it! (Good reporting with good links explaining the whole situation)
https://www.ajc.com/politics/miscount-in-dekalb-caused-by-voting-computer-programming-errors/Z5WPVW5UKVBRTMN4TUZGZW2LLM/
6/14/23 — Court unseals the Halderman Report. J. Alex Halderman is now permitted to discuss the report publicly.…and boy does he!
https://twitter.com/jhalderm/status/1669088766718541824
6/14/23 — Not to be “outdone”, Secretary Raffensperger releases “the MITRE Report”, a short, unsigned, unreviewed “rebuttal” to the devastating Halderman Report. State legislators should note that this report, dated JULY 2022 could only have been produced by having a copy of the Halderman Report, which was under Court ordered seal at the time. Secretary Raffensperger VIOLATED the court ordered seal he himself had initiated in 2021.
https://sos.ga.gov/news/raffensperger-update-mitre-report
6/20/2024 — The GA Secretary of State addresses the GA Assembly on the “firestorm” created by the Halderman Report unsealing. While “setting the record straight”, Sec Raffensperger referred to critics of Georgia’s voting machines as “election denying conspiracy theorists”, assuring legislators that our “battle tested” voting system (for which he had refused 3 available updates, all included in the contract) was “secure”.
Rather than being INSULTED by Raffensperger’s ridiculous claims, the GA Assembly found the cover (or excuse) to do NOTHING for the next 6 months, despite public outcry of their constituents!
https://sos.ga.gov/news/setting-election-security-record-straight
6/23/2023 From election hero to zero: Georgia official’s dismissal of security audit could mean trouble in 2024
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/06/23/brad-raffensperger-georgia-dominion-voting-00103298
11/10/23 Judge Totenberg denies MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGEMENT and sets trial date of 1/9/2024
12/20/23 Judge Totenberg RULES that Sec Raffensperger’s highly touted MITRE Report is INADMISSIBLE as court evidence because it contains “no names of the individuals who authored the Report, the individuals’ professional and educational backgrounds, and it is not a published report or learned treatise”
1/9/2024 Curling v Raffensperger (Lawsuit against the Secretary of State of GA for using insecure voting system)
The author of this has “receipts” for everything he included in this email and has offered to share them with any public official concerned with the security of the upcoming election.