Every time there is a major election in the US, pundits reference the ‘Florida Recount’ that handed the presidency to George Bush instead of Al Gore in the year 2000, clearing the way for a US assault on the Middle East following the attack by Al Queda on September 11, 2001.
The tedious recount lasted for six weeks and was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court — a unique and disappointing outcome for the Democrats.
This year’s mid-term elections have seen an unprecedented number of female candidates running for the House, the Senate, governorships and state houses, many of them black. Four days after the vote, several outcomes are in dispute, the most egregious attack on the democratic system being waged in Georgia, where the man running to be governor happens to be in charge of the voting system. His black female opponent demanded during the election that he resign from the job that gives him control over that process, and she is now demanding a recount, which he, in that capacity, tried to refuse.
Recounts are in process in several other elections in which Democratic candidates are alleging irregularities, electoral rules being very specific as to the conditions that call for this recourse. Unlike most other countries, the role played by the legal system in elections is very detailed, and candidates routinely make use of it when they are not satisfied with the results.
In this particular election, with so many first-time mainly Democratic candidates running, the challenges have multiplied, breathlessly reported by the press. Given the stakes associated with control of either the House or the Senate, this is not surprising, however there are other particularities with respect to US elections. For example there is ‘Gerrymandering’ the redrawing of electoral districts that is carried out regularly by whichever party is in control. It involves the fine art of putting as many of one’s own voters in a given district as possible, in order to boost ones candidate’s chances of winning, results in elections being determined by how many Jewish voters a district includes — or how many Blacks — or college students.
Notwithstanding the ‘historic’ Voting Rights Act of 1965, put forward by President Johnson to bolster the Black vote, ingenious ways are found to deprive minorities of representation, from last-minute moving of polling places, to the requirement that voters present an ID, meaning a drivers’ license, which many poor or elderly do not have. Recently, there was the demand that Native Americans living on reservations, which do not have streets, provide a street address. These strictures lead to legal challenges that eat up scarce resources, unless Pro Bono — or free — legal services offered by a relatively small number of progressive lawyers are available.
The American legal system is a very busy one, bolstered by detailed legislation regarding almost every activity one can think of, which is why so much attention is paid to the appointment and election of judges. The Supreme Court is the final arbiter, and politicians initiate actions knowing they will be challenged in a district court, then in a state court, but hoping that the issue, if broad enough, will ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court. Jurisprudence, or the study of previous decisions, plays a big role in deciding whether or not to undertake a challenge to a political opponent, and pundits need to have significant amounts of ‘case law’ at their fingertips when discussing legal issues.
Beyond the particularities of the America electoral and judicial systems, the recent mid-term elections are being overshadowed by the President’s appointment of a private lawyer as Acting Attorney General, without him being ‘vetted’ by Congress as is required for cabinet positions. This is causing a political storm, due to the fact that Matthew Whittaker publicly floated the idea of denying funding to the Mueller investigation into the Trump campaign’s possible collusion with Russia in the 2016 election as a way of shutting it down, knowing this would draw the President’s attention. Indeed, in December 2017, Trump appointed Whittaker as Chief of Staff to Jeff Sessions. Constitutional and legal experts warn that because of his previously announced position on the matter, Whittaker is legally bound to recuse himself from the Mueller investigation — as Sessions had done for other reasons, (provoking the President’s wrath, and his ultimate dismissal).
And then there is the fact that Trump passed over the man overseeing that investigation, Assistant Attorney General Rob Rosenstein, who should have been moved up. (Another reason why Rosenstein for this was probably that he recently floated to colleagues the idea of wearing a recording device in order to capture Trump in conversations that could lead to his impeachment.)
As President Trump flies off to Paris to participate in the commemoration of the end of the first World War with other heads of state this Sunday — including Vladimir Putin, instead of focusing on the very real threat of World War III between Russia and the US, which would be nuclear, the media continued to talk about Whittaker, as thousands of oblivious Americans took to the streets to protect the Mueller investigation.
Deena Stryker is an international expert, author and journalist that has been at the forefront of international politics for over thirty years, exlusively for the online journal “New Eastern Outlook”.
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