It’s an interesting concept. But, will it go anywhere? Even if legally correct, I can easily see most judges not wanting to get involved and trying to punt any suits. However, there is something way, way more interesting in this article
Replace Biden? Some Republicans say that’s illegal and plan to file lawsuits to stop it.
While many Americans may have been stunned by Sunday’s news that President Biden had decided to drop out of the 2024 campaign and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him at the top of the ticket, some Republicans had quietly prepared for that moment.
In fact, they are already preparing to spend millions on lawsuits in key swing states where they believe local election laws forbid swapping out Biden for another Democrat.
In an appearance just hours before Biden announced he was exiting the race, House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana told ABC News that doing so “would be wrong, and I think unlawful, in accordance to some of these states’ rules for a handful of people to go in a back room and switch it out because they’re, they don’t like the candidate any longer.” (big snip)
Wisconsin election law, for instance, is quite explicit on the subject of replacing a candidate after they’ve been selected to appear on a ballot.
“Any person who files nomination papers and qualifies to appear on the ballot cannot withdraw their name from the ballot after filing. The name of that person shall appear upon the ballot except in case of death of the person,” the law states.
For that reason, Wisconsin is seen as one of a handful of states where Republicans plan to file a challenge against Democrats replacing Biden. Two other swing states, Georgia and Nevada, are also on that list.
According to the primary results in Wisconsin, Biden won 87.9% of the Democratic vote. So, he would be the Democrat nominee for Wisconsin, right? That’s who Democrat voters in Wisconsin picked, right? He’s the nominee for the Wisconsin ballot, right?
There’s a simple reason most legal experts believe that the Republican lawsuits have little chance of success: Biden has not yet received his party’s presidential nomination.
During the Democratic primary, Biden earned roughly 99% of his party’s pledged delegates thanks, in part, to the fact that he didn’t face any serious opposition. While those delegates had pledged to vote for Biden at the Democratic convention, they were not legally required to do so under party rules and are unlikely to do so now that Biden has dropped out of the race.
Last week the Democratic National Committee backed off its plan to hold a virtual vote that would have secured the nomination for Biden ahead of the convention. As a result, the party is still without a nominee.
“The Democratic Party did not have an official nominee yesterday, and the same can be said today,” David Becker, a former Justice Department attorney and election law expert, told CNN. “Until the delegates vote, Democratic Party rules state that there is no official Democratic nominee. There was no one to be ‘replaced’ on the ballot because there is nothing to replace yet.”
In other words, the votes of Democrats in primaries are utterly meaningless: the Party will pick the nominee that they want. This is the party that yaps non-stop about Democracy!, yet, votes from voters are quickly discarded. Might voters want to vote for someone else besides Cackles Harris? We’ll never know, because Democrats really are oligarchs: the Elites will tell the peasants what will happen and the peasants will comply.
Regardless, I do not think any judge will actually rule that Harris cannot replace Biden on the ballots, even where the law says it is illegal. Few will want to wade into those waters, knowing that a higher court will shoot it down at some point. Just like many blew off the laws on drop boxes and mail in ballots for 2020, which were way more specific.
Also, a quick note on those saying Harris is ineligible to be president, because she is not natural born: there are multiple thoughts on the subject. Here’s one
So before we so cavalierly accept Senator Harris’ eligibility for the office of vice president, we should ask her a few questions about the status of her parents at the time of her birth.
Were Harris’ parents lawful permanent residents at the time of her birth? If so, then under the actual holding of Wong Kim Ark, she should be deemed a citizen at birth—that is, a natural-born citizen—and hence eligible. Or were they instead, as seems to be the case, merely temporary visitors, perhaps on student visas issued pursuant to Section 101(15)(F) of Title I of the 1952 Immigration Act? If the latter were indeed the case, then derivatively from her parents, Harris was not subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States at birth, but instead owed her allegiance to a foreign power or powers—Jamaica, in the case of her father, and India, in the case of her mother—and was therefore not entitled to birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment as originally understood.
The thing about being a natural born citizen is that it also says that they must be subject to the jurisdiction thereof. That’s in the 14th Amendment. When did her father gain citizenship? He did at some point, but, no one knows when. Her mother never did. Were either permanent legal residents when she was born, or within 9 years of her birth, or, were they still on visas, making them subject to the jurisdiction of other countries? Her dad still claims he is Jamaican first in his brief bio. There’s a lot more in that article, as well as a link to dissension. Some will claim simply being born here makes one a citizen. But, does it make them “natural born”? Courts have, to a degree, ruled against being natural born, and even being a citizen.
Again, regardless of any legality and Constitutionality, almost no court will touch this at this time. It would take months at the soonest, and no court will rule these days that she isn’t eligible, probably not even with rock solid proof. They would not want to interfere. Only if it is against Trump will leftist courts jump in, of course.
Read: GOP To File Lawsuits Claiming Harris Cannot Replace Biden On Some State Ballots »