Tag Archives: freedom

A Misapprehension

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John Yoo, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R, KY), and others, are suggesting that, given the apparent irregularities (because I’m being polite) in several States’ ballot acceptance and counting procedures, “the courts may decide the election.”

McConnell, et al., misunderstand the situation. The courts won’t decide anything. This election has been decided by American voters. It may take the courts to enforce our decision, though.

There would seem to be strong cases, too, for reversing those…irregularities. Our Constitution’s Article I, Section 4 says pretty explicitly that State legislatures set the Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections… and that Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations. There’s no wiggle room there.

State non-legislative officials—elections board commissioners, Secretaries of State, governors, et al.—do not have the legal capacity to alter States’ laws, for instance, deadlines for receiving ballots, requirements regarding signature comparison and witness signatures on absentee ballots and mail-in ballots. They do not have that capacity even under the guise of emergencies like the Wuhan Virus situation.

In particular, the virus situation was in full bore by last spring, and both Congress and the States’ legislatures have had months in which to adjust election laws to account for the virus’ impact—and they universally chose to make no adjustments.

Those non-legislative officials’ adjustments are not merely illegal, they’re unconstitutional.

Full stop.

An Electoral College Thought

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Spitballing here.

The Left worries that the Electoral College abolished, because its use renders the popular vote for President/Vice President irrelevant. The Right argues that that preserves representation of the States qua States in the election of our President and Vice President. That was the intent of our Founders when they wrote our Constitution, and the intent of We the People when we ratified it.

Under our current Electoral College setup, each State gets a number of President/Vice President electors equal to the sum of the number of Representatives it’s allowed in the House and the two Senate seats it has in the Senate.

Here’s a thought that emphasizes both the popular vote and the States’ equal representation in the selection of President/Vice President.

Do away with the Electoral College as it stands, and replace it with a one State, one President/Vice President vote, and that vote is determined by that State’s popular vote. If a State’s popular vote favors one candidate, that State’s Electoral vote goes to that Presidential/Vice Presidential candidate.

That provides truly equal State representation in the election—just as each State has, by design, equal representation in the Federal Senate—while that representation is determined by that State’s popular vote.

Of course this would require a Constitutional amendment.

Another Thought on Defunding

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This one concerns the US Marshals Service.

The US Marshals Service released a statement Friday noting they have recovered 27 missing and exploited children in Virginia as a result of what they called “Operation Find Our Children.”

There’s this, too, from Jeffrey Rosen, Deputy Attorney General, concerning “Operation Find Our Children” more generally:

While this Virginia operation is the most recent recovery of endangered and missing children led by the US Marshals Service this year, we have also recovered more than 440 kids in Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, Louisiana, and other states. Because of this initiative, the recovered children are now out of harm’s way.

This is the sort of thing that will be lost should the Progressive-Democrats’ police defunding movement reach the Federal level.

This list of local police agencies that have been supporting “Operation Find Our Children” illustrates the depth of the risk from the Left’s police defunding movement:

  • Metro Transit Police Department
  • Virginia State Police,
  • Alexandria Sheriff’s Office
  • Chesterfield County Police Department
  • Chesterfield County Sheriff’s Office
  • Fairfax County Sheriff’s Office
  • Hampton Police Department
  • Henrico County Police Department
  • Norfolk Police Department
  • Prince William County Police Department
  • Portsmouth Police Department
  • Richmond City Police Department
  • Roanoke City Police Department
  • Virginia Beach Police Department
  • Virginia Department of Corrections

A Response

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Recall that Twitter had censored a tweet by Customs and Border Patrol’s Mark Morgan, Senior Official Performing the Duties of Commissioner (i.e., Acting Commissioner), both deleting his tweet and suspending his—CBP official—Twitter account.

Here is the offending tweet, as quoted in a letter to Jack Dorsey, Twitter CEO, by Acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolfe:

CBP & US Army Corps of Engineers continue to build new wall every day. Every mile helps us stop gang members, murderers, sexual predators, and drugs from entering our country. It’s a fact, walls work.

Here is Dorsey’s response, through his censors:

You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.

The disconnect between Dorsey’s response and Morgan’s tweet is so obvious and blatant that Dorsey can only be committing rank censorship and his response considered deliberately dishonest.

Dorsey ultimately backed down under public pressure and restored Morgan’s access to his account. Notwithstanding, Wolfe wrote his letter to Dorsey, and he didn’t pull many punches. Here is that letter; note, too, the footnote:

October 30, 2020
Mr. Jack Dorsey
Chief Executive Officer
Twitter
1555 Market Street, Suite 900
San Francisco, CA 94103
Dear Mr. Dorsey:
I write to you about Twitter’s recent censorship of Mark Morgan, the Senior Official Performing the Duties of Commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Not only was Twitter’s act of censorship unjustified—the tweet is supported by data—it is disturbing.  As the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other Federal agencies continue to rely on Twitter to share important information with the US public, your censorship poses a threat to our security.
Hours after you concluded testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on October 28, 2020, Twitter suspended Mr. Morgan for tweeting: “CBP & US Army Corps of Engineers continue to build new wall every day. Every mile helps us stop gang members, murderers, sexual predators, and drugs from entering our country. It’s a fact, walls work.” Twitter’s moderators, apparently triggered by the tweet, emailed Mr. Morgan to say, “You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.” The Acting Commissioner’s tweet did none of these things.  Read it. Watch the video.
The fact that the tweet was removed and the account locked is startling.  It is hard to understand how anyone believed Mr. Morgan’s tweet promoted violence, threats or harassment.  Especially considering that the facts about the border wall system support the tweet.
Whether you know it or not, CBP guards the front line of the American homeland.  CBP repels and arrests thousands of violent criminal gang members each year. CBP rescues young girls who are forced into cross-border sex trafficking.  CBP intercepts dangerous drugs and contraband, including enough of the opioid fentanyl to kill every man, woman, and child in the United States several times over.  CBP fulfills the United States’ most obvious and essential law enforcement and national security responsibility to the people of our country.  Your company may choose to be ignorant of these facts, but it is no less censorship when you choose to suppress them.
There was no reason to remove Mr. Morgan’s tweet from your platform, other than ideological disagreement with the speaker.  Such censorship is disturbing.  Twitter’s conduct censoring US government officials also endangers the national security.  It is dangerous and damaging when any publisher arbitrarily and unfoundedly decides, as it did here, that the facts and policies of a particular Presidential Administration constitute “violence”—in order to censor them. And in the case of Twitter, this can cut off an essential mode of communication between US Government officials and the public. In doing so, Twitter is sabotaging public discourse regarding important national and homeland security issues.
Further, it is clear that Twitter’s gross censorship was intentional, not accidental.  Twitter notified CBP that it had censored Mr. Morgan’s message and locked his account.  In response, CBP communicated with Twitter’s office of government affairs, and also appealed Twitter’s censorship decision.  But Twitter denied the appeal.  And Twitter’s office of government affairs ignored CBP’s communications.  Only after CBP reached out to Twitter’s office of government affairs a second time and went public with this censorship, then finally Twitter admitted its bad judgment and unlocked the account.1
I call on you to commit to never again censoring content on your platform and obstructing Americans’ unalienable right to communicate with each other and with their government and its officials, including the thousands of law enforcement officers at the DHS who work vigilantly and diligently to protect your safety every day.
Sincerely,

Chad F. Wolf

Acting Secretary

[Footnote] 1: Adding insult to injury—and insult to Americans’ intelligence—Twitter then spread disinformation by misrepresenting Twitter’s intentional censorship. Specifically, “[a] Twitter spokesperson confirmed that Morgan had been locked out of his account but said ‘the decision was reversed following an appeal by the account owner and further evaluation from our team.'”  Caitlin Oprysko, Trump’s Border Chief Slams Twitter for Locking His Account After Border Wall Tweet, POLITICO (Oct. 29, 2020, 03:05 PM), https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/29/mark-morgan-twitter-border-wall-tweet-433617. It makes the false impression that Twitter’s appeal process remedied a mistake, but in fact Twitter’s appeal process failed. Twitter actually denied CBP’s appeal. Twitter only reversed itself after controversy and embarrassment escalated.

This sort of thing, by Sundar Pinchai and John Hennessey at Alphabet and Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook as well as by Dorsey, will continue, though—this response regarding Morgan’s tweet will simply be a one-off used by those three to claim purity—unless and until these social media platforms are brought under control and their censorship ended. That will take pressure from us citizens on them and on the folks we elect to represent us and our positions in government to rein them in.

The letter also can be read here.