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Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin

(107,111 posts)
Thu Feb 10, 2022, 04:09 PM Feb 2022

Hawley proved he's not just antidemocratic in coup attempt. He's also a sloppy lawyer

A prime example of bad lawyering is when a lawyer loses a possibly winnable case because he misses an important legal deadline. A recent decision by a Pennsylvania court suggests that is essentially what Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri did when he waited until Jan. 6, 2021, to oppose Pennsylvania’s “no excuse” mail in voting law on the floor of the U.S. Senate.

Late last month, by a 3-2 margin, a lower court in Pennsylvania decided in the McLinko v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania case that the state’s no-excuse mail-in voting law conflicted with a provision of the state constitution. But all of the five lower court judges, Republicans and Democrats, unanimously reaffirmed what the Pennsylvania Supreme Court had previously ruled in the December 2020 case of Kelly v. Pennsylvania: that after an election is held, the no-excuse mail-in votes must be deemed legally valid because it is legally too late to disqualify those votes. But that is exactly what Hawley tried and failed to do on Jan. 6.

In addition to being legally invalid, Hawley’s objection to the Senate certification of Pennsylvania’s Electoral College votes for President Joe Biden was inequitable and antidemocratic. Hawley challenged the legitimacy of America’s 2020 presidential election, and sought to cancel millions of votes legally cast by the people of Pennsylvania, on the basis of a legal argument that had already been rejected by the highest state and federal courts. Hawley falsely suggested that the United States, the longest continuous democracy on the planet, allowed its citizens to cast and count millions of illegal votes for the most powerful political office in the world. By improperly seeking to discredit and disallow Pennsylvania’s electoral votes for Biden, Hawley collaborated with Donald Trump’s corrosive effort to convince the American people — and the world — that America’s presidential election was improper and illegal.

As a matter of law, Hawley was wrong to base his attack on Pennsylvania’s votes on a legal premise that had already been rejected by the state’s Supreme Court in the Kelly case. As a trained lawyer, Hawley must have understood that the argument he made on the floor of the Senate had already been rejected by the judiciary on the basis of an overriding procedural doctrine, the doctrine of laches, which applied equally to Hawley’s untimely objection.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/hawley-proved-not-just-antidemocratic-110000414.html

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Hawley proved he's not just antidemocratic in coup attempt. He's also a sloppy lawyer (Original Post) Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin Feb 2022 OP
He knew Rebl2 Feb 2022 #1
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