Hey, remember yesterday's blog post?
It was only yesterday so you probably should remember.
Anyway, it touched on some subpoenas sent out in early December. They were mostly about Trump's post-election loss fundraising but they also mentioned Trump's "fake elector" scheme.
And, as we all know, St Sen Doug Mastriano was named as the Trump White House "point person" for Pennsylvania (what an alliteration!!) for that scheme.
The headline of the blog post was ""Can Someone PLEASE Ask Doug Mastriano About This?" and so I emailed the link to his attorney, Timothy Parlatore, Esq.
I asked:
Any comment for the blog?
And he answered:
The Pennsylvania alternate slate of electors is clear on its face that it is an alternate slate, to be used in the event that the primary slate is invalidated. Any inquiry into “fake” electors in Pennsylvania is a waste of time.
We've touched on this before, haven't we?
This is what was written at the head of the "fake elector" certificate from the good GOP folks in Harrisburg:
WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, on the understanding that if, as a result of a final non-appealable Court Order or other proceeding prescribed by law, we are ultimately recognized as being the duly elected and qualified Electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America from the State of Pennsylvania, hereby certify the following...
Other states also participating in the scheme started their certificates this way:
WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, being the duly elected and qualified Electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America from the State of Nevada, do hereby certify the following...
So the PA GOP certificate added this:
..., on the understanding that if, as a result of a final non-appealable Court Order or other proceeding prescribed by law, we are ultimately recognized as...
Which is what Attorney Parlatore was referring to, as far as I can tell.
But given all that, you have to ask yourself, why did they feel the need to add that text?
Could this have been the reason?
In Pennsylvania, which Biden won by more than 80,000 votes, the Trump legal team's "point person" for this effort was Mastriano, according to The Times. Although a Trump loyalist who spread false claims of voter fraud, Mastriano had to be reassured that the scheme was not "illegal," per emails sent between the former president's campaign staff.
"Mastriano needs a call from the mayor. This needs to be done. Talk to him about legalities of what they are doing," Christina Bobb, a former on-air personality with the far-right One America News Network who assisted the Trump effort, said in a Dec. 12 email, referring to former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. "Electors want to be reassured that the process is * legal * essential for greater strategy."
And given that Giuliani has already been subpoenaed to discuss this, the ground really hasn't shifted much at all, has it?
But I'm not a lawyer but Dan Abrams is and this is what Jerry Lambe wrote at Dan Abram's "Law & Crime" website about Doug's involvement with Trump's "fake elector" scheme:
Pennsylvania State Sen. Doug Mastriano, a Republican whose district surrounds Gettysburg, on Saturday announced that he and his colleagues in the GOP-led state legislature have planned to introduce a resolution to appoint a new slate of electors to cast the state’s Electoral College votes next month — in essence an attempt to undo the certified results of the 2020 election in his state. Mastriano cited what he believes to be “mounting evidence” that the 2020 election was “compromised.” Legal experts, who for weeks have noted that such an approach would violate the U.S. Constitution, immediately castigated Mastriano for continuing to back President Donald Trump’s baseless claim that he won Pennsylvania and somehow has a miraculous, viable path to electoral victory.
And then there was this:
Mastriano’s efforts would also be a violation of the U.S. Constitution, which provides that Congress set the date on which electors are to be chosen.
“That day this year was Nov. 3,” wrote Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig in a USA Today op-ed outright rejecting the theory. “And if any state selected its slate of electors on a day other than Nov. 3, it would violate federal law, and that slate could therefore not be counted.”
University of Texas School of Law professor Steve Vladeck, a constitutional law expert, said Mastriano’s “insane” comments were simply lies.
“Never in my life did I think that I’d see elected officials in the United States acting in such nakedly, indefensibly anti-democratic ways — and blatantly lying about why. It’s not going to matter, but this is insane — and anyone not condemning this nonsense is complicit in it,” he wrote.
Any comment, St. Sen Mastriano? Attorney Parlatore?
