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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Inside Story of Michigan's Fake Voter Fraud Scandal
How a state that was never in doubt became a "national embarrassment" and a symbol of the Republican Partys fealty to Donald Trump.By TIM ALBERTA
11/24/2020 09:00 PM EST
After five years spent bullying the Republican Party into submission, President Donald Trump finally met his match in Aaron Van Langevelde.
Who?
Thats right. In the end, it wasnt a senator or a judge or a general who stood up to the leader of the free world. There was no dramatic, made-for-Hollywood collision of cosmic egos. Rather, the death knell of Trumps presidency was sounded by a baby-faced lawyer, looking over his glasses on a grainy Zoom feed on a gloomy Monday afternoon, reading from a statement that reflected a courage and moral clarity that has gone AWOL from his party, pleading with the tens of thousands of people watching online to understand that some lines can never be uncrossed.
snip
Van Langevelde is a Republican. He works for Republicans in the Statehouse. He gives legal guidance to advance Republican causes and win Republican campaigns. As a Republican, his mandate for Mondays hearinghanded down from the state party chair, the national party chair and the president himselfwas straightforward. They wanted Michigans board of canvassers to delay certification of Bidens victory. Never mind that Trump lost by more than 154,000 votes, or that results were already certified in all 83 counties. The plan was to drag things out, to further muddy the election waters and delegitimize the process, to force the courts to take unprecedented actions that would forever taint Michigans process of certifying elections. Not because it was going to help Trump win but because it was going to help Trump cope with a loss. The president was not accepting defeat. That meant no Republican with career ambitions could accept it, either.
Which made Van Langeveldes vote for certification all the more remarkable. With the other Republican on the four-person board, Norman Shinkle, abstaining on the final votea cowardly abdication of dutythe 40-year-old Van Langevelde delivered the verdict on his own. At a low point in his partys existence, with much of the GOPs leadership class pre-writing their own political epitaphs by empowering Trump to lay waste to the countrys foundational democratic norms, an obscure lawyer from west Michigan stood on principle. It proved to be the nail in Trumps coffin: Shortly after Michigans vote to certify, the General Services Administration finally commenced the official transition of power and Trump tweeted out a statement affirming the move in the best interest of our Country.
snip
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/11/24/michigan-election-trump-voter-fraud-democracy-440475
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The Inside Story of Michigan's Fake Voter Fraud Scandal (Original Post)
catbyte
Nov 2020
OP
NoMoreRepugs
(9,368 posts)1. I assume the Magat's have started their death threats towards him?
Sneederbunk
(14,275 posts)2. Too late.
The Velveteen Ocelot
(115,578 posts)3. Of course. That's what people get for being good citizens.
From the article:
If this young canvassers rebellion against the entire Republican Party apparatus was surprising, what came next was all too predictable. Within minutes of Van Langeveldes vote for certificationand of Shinkles abstention, which guaranteed his colleague would bear the brunt of the partys fury alonethe fires of retaliation raged. In GOP circles, there were immediate calls for Van Langevelde to lose his seat on the board; to lose his job in the House of Representatives; to be censured on the floor of the Legislature and exiled from the party forever. Actionable threats against him and his family began to be reported. The Michigan State Police worked with local law enforcement to arrange a security detail.
Response to NoMoreRepugs (Reply #1)
catbyte This message was self-deleted by its author.