Teahadist Chris McDaniel ain’t going down without a fight:
Chris McDaniel, the Tea Party-backed U.S. Senate candidate who lost the Mississippi Republican primary runoff, filed a legal challenge to the result on Monday, alleging that he fell short in the June 24 vote because of election fraud.
McDaniel submitted a 28-page legal challenge and supporting documentation with the state’s Republican Party, outlining what he claims are thousands of instances of voter fraud. The party’s executive committee has 10 days to decide whether to hear the case.
Joe Nosef, the state Republican Party chairman, said shortly after the filing that he had not yet reviewed the challenge and could not comment on what the committee intends to do.
If the committee fails to act, McDaniel would seek a judicial review in one of the state’s chancery courts, said his attorney, Mitch Tyner.
McDaniel lost the runoff to incumbent U.S. Senator Thad Cochran by more than 7,667 votes. Cochran faces a Democratic opponent in the November general election.
According to the challenge, some 15,000 votes were fraudulently or inaccurately cast. The most egregious violations came from Hinds County, home of the state capitol, Jackson. The challenge requests results from Hinds County be omitted entirely.
“We anticipate that after they review the challenge that they’ll see that Chris McDaniel clearly, clearly won the Republican vote,” Tyner said at a news conference held outside his Jackson office. “I say that very assuredly because that’s what the mathematics show.”
Notwithstanding that it doesn’t matter who won the Republican vote because Mississippi has open primaries, something that still has not dawned on the McDaniel campaign, but what do they actually mean when they talk about the “Republican vote?” I’ll give you one guess, and I’m betting you all can nail it in one (WARNING- link to Tucker Carlson’s online commode):
Still refusing to concede, Chris McDaniel’s team issued a press release late last week saying that the Mississippi GOP is “prohibited from recognizing Thad Cochran as their nominee for U.S. Senate in accordance with the rules of the Republican National Committee” — because Democrats participated in his election.
But a first draft of that same release, obtained by The Daily Caller, twice called out “black Democrats” as the culprits.
While both references to “black” were stripped out of McDaniel’s public press release, the “1st Draft” refers to “black Democrats” and talks about Cochran campaign soliciting “black Democrat votes.”
“Thad Cochran lost Republican votes in the runoff, but made up the difference with black democrat votes,” the early version says.
I was really wrong about blah people having the summer off. At any rate, McDaniel has every reason to fight, fight, fight, and probably can find a friendly little court that will rule his way and keep this clusterfuck a rolling along, much to my amusement. And why does he have every reason to fight? Dollar dollar bill, yall:
Over the last few years we have seen the rise of a new grifter—the political grifter. And the most important battle being waged today isn’t the one about which party controls the House or the Senate, it’s about who controls the Republican Party: the grifting wing or the governing wing.
Today’s political grifters are a lot like the grifters of old—lining their pockets with the hard-earned money of working men and women be promising things in return that they know they can’t deliver.
Political grifting is a lucrative business. Groups like the Club for Growth, FreedomWorks and the Tea Party Patriots are run by men and women who have made millions by playing on the fears and anger about the dysfunction in Washington. My former House colleague Chris Chocola is pocketing a half-million dollars a year heading the Club for Growth; same for Matt Kibbe heading up FreedomWorks (and I don’t think Kibbe’s salary includes the infamous craft beer bar that FreedomWorks donors ended up paying for). The Tea Party Patriots pay their head, Jenny Beth Martin, almost as much. These people have lined their pockets by promising that if you send them money, they will send men and women to Washington who can “fix it.” Of course, in the ultimate con, the always extreme and often amateurish candidates these groups back either end up losing to Democrats or they come to Washington and actually make the process even more dysfunctional.
Palin led the way- and made millions, and the grifters took note.
Pogonip
Today is the president’s birthday.
Eric U.
unfortunately, minorities in the U.S. never have any time off at all
srv
The Koch’s should setup a billion dollar kickstarter to fund a parallel government.
All the teahadi losers could then form a Confederate Congress.
jheartney
Political grifting certainly did not start with Palin. It’s at least as old as the Republic, and probably older. It may or may not be the second oldest profession, but it’s less honorable than the oldest, given that prostitutes generally have to deliver the services they promise.
DWD
Do you figure that Steve really knows that the battle is long-since over but he’s got to pretend otherwise, or does he really believe that there’s still a “governing wing” in the Republican Party?
Violet
Is he a Count?
Seanly
Yeah, I could use some serious scratch to pay for the deductibles for medical care, get out of debt & redo my kitchen. Maybe I should start a conservative PAC. Per Palin, I can siphon off a lot for myself & donate 1% to some wingnuts. At this point, I’d have no qualms about separating fools from their money.
Mike J
McDaniel claims that of the 85,000 people who voted in the Democratic primary, 15,000 of them voted again in the Republican runoff. I find that very, very hard to believe.
PsiFighter37
So, shall we place bets on which one of these grifting outfits McDaniel joins after inevitably resigning from the State Senate early?
Violet
Your last link is broken. Here is the link: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/08/tea-party-grifters-109675.html#ixzz39T50VYx0
Mike J
BTW, dollar dollar bill link broken. Here it is.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/08/tea-party-grifters-109675.html#ixzz39T50VYx0
I owe Violet a Coke.
PsiFighter37
Fucking clown:
Maybe he could pray to find the strength to work more than 1/3 of the days in a year, averaging 28 piddly hours a week, and earning a cool $170k helping Congress become less popular than STDs.
Violet
So let’s say that McDaniel is right and there are a bunch of
blackDemocratic voters who voted for Cochran. They aren’t all going to vote for Cochran in the general election are they? Are these folks dependable voters? Any new voters among them that got energized by this ridiculous primary challenge and voted and now can be convinced to turn out for whoever the Democrat is in the general?Jade
Welcome Back John,
I missed you while you were off enjoying your vacay. There are not enough honest fat white men in the world. When all of this is over you will be all brand new and taking butt selfies in the bathroom like Kim Kardashian.
Dee Loralei
@Violet: I love you for that.
That is all…..
OK off to play a game of chance with my son in a local free league.
Villago Delenda Est
Perhaps McDaniel should conslut with David Vitter on hiring some assistance with changing his diapers.
maya
@srv:
or, the Avondale [AZ] Presidency
Villago Delenda Est
@jheartney: Karl Rove took hundreds of millions from various marks in 2012 and failed to deliver. Must be a good life for scum like him.
Kay
@Mike J:
I don’t think he’s claiming even that. He’s claiming 3500 were double and 9000 some are “irregular” and then there a bunch of absentees he doesn’t want counted. I think that’s where they got to 15,000.
He has to make it bigger and throw up a lot of smoke because 3500 isn’t big enough to
change the outcome and 15,000 is.
Suffern ACE
I think the only fair solution is to allow both to be on the ballot this fall.
Villago Delenda Est
Palin has been following the Newt Gingrich playbook. Gingrich has made quite the fortune since his resignation in disgrace from the Speakership after totally tanking the ’98 midterms.
Villago Delenda Est
@PsiFighter37: That whirring sound you’re hearing? Madison and Jefferson revolving at high velocities in their graves.
JPL
@PsiFighter37: Maybe they could read the constitution and realize that it doesn’t begin and end with the 2nd amendment.
Kay
@Suffern ACE:
He wants to be declared the winner. There are “irregularities” in 9000 votes so that’s more than he needs.
Clearly. Or clearly clearly as his lawyer says.
Villago Delenda Est
Who boasted of having the mathematics in 2006? Just sayin’….
Suffern ACE
@Kay: it’s backed up by math.
Villago Delenda Est
@Suffern ACE: She blinded me…with science!
Kay
@Suffern ACE:
I’m not sure but I think “irregularity” means “votes cast by black people”
It’s a term of art in Tea Party election law.
PhoenixRising
Where do I send my small but significant donation to support Chris McDaniel’s fight for what’s right?
Encouraging him seems like a good idea.
metricpenny
John,
That’s two posts in a row that you’ve admitted being wrong about black people getting the summer off. Just so you don’t make the mistake of voicing that prediction again, just remember that black Americans never get time off from this kind of shyt.
Go back and re-read Ta-Nehisi Coates’ essay, The Case for Reparations.
We don’t get time off because white supremacy reigns in this country.
Suffern ACE
@Kay: yeah. It looks like they are trying to throw out votes in certain districts where certain people live.
NotMax
IIRC, the results of the runoff have been certified by the state.
D58826
OT but glad to see that Pentagon is being so careful about the ammunition that the taxpayer has supplied:
Certainly would not want those mortar rounds to sit around past their ‘use by date’. I’m glad the God loves America.
Mike J
@Kay:
Sheesh.
The answer is simple. The Mississippi Republican party should stop sitting around eating bon-bons all day, get up, get a job, and hold their own elections without asking Uncle Sugar to pick up the tab for them. Then they could choose their leaders any way they wanted, like a poll on the Stormfront web site.
Iowa Old Lady
@Kay: “Declared” the winner? Like W? Perhaps the new R way.
Villago Delenda Est
@Suffern ACE: At best, those particular votes should only count for 3/5ths of a regular GOP vote.
PhoenixRising
We gays, OTOH, are getting a pretty easy summer, as they go (compared to 1986).
But only those of us who are also white. Racial bias never sleeps, in part because it’s a side effect of a broader paranoia.
Villago Delenda Est
@D58826: As long as Israel’s check clears, the taxpayer should be happy.
Suffern ACE
@NotMax: yeah. I assume it’s over. However, if there is luck, his supporters will start a movement to stay home in the fall. But my guess is they’ll be harassing voters at the polls instead.
Iowa Old Lady
@Villago Delenda Est: I would be very surprised if most of that check weren’t drawn on aid from us.
Mustang Bobby
@PsiFighter37: If I got one of those I’d send it back along with a copy of “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” with a note: “If you’re going to go with fantasy for inspiration, at least go with one that’s got a few laughs.”
Mustang Bobby
@Kay: Another term of art is “disrespectful,” as in President Obama is disrespectful of Republicans. It’s the new “uppity.”
Roger Moore
@DWD:
Well, misgoverning is a kind of governing, isn’t it? I think there really is a wing of the party that wants to do something with, or rather to, government, and there’s a wing that just sees the existence of government as a way of separating rubes from their money.
That said, the way forward is clear. The only fair way to let the voters have their say is to let both Cochran and McDaniel on the ballot. That way nobody is prevented from voting for the candidate of their choice.
Tommy
I could use some help.My mom doesn’t have a computer. Strange My brother is a Cisco guy, I do web sites for a living. You’d think teaching mom to use a computer would be easy, but you would be wrong.My parents cell phone is like from the 80s. Mom is pissed off. Wants a newer phone.
Well long story short I just got a new tablet. Will send my old one to mom, There is a whole lot of shit going on I fear I confuse her, Where I need help is what are the 3-4 apps I can give her where she can seem empowered? Use the device?
Roger Moore
@JPL:
Maybe, but most likely not. Reading is hard! Let’s go grifting!
scav
That “inaccurately cast” vote dodge is going to be so useful as it is so freaking all purpose. “They” clearly must have “meant” to vote for <fill-in-the-blank>. Apply repeatedly. Elections are clearly broken if the destined and inevitable leaders aren’t on the proper podium at the end.
Roger Moore
@Tommy:
Angry Birds.
Iowa Old Lady
@Tommy: If she doesn’t use a computer or smart phone, nothing will seem easy to her. So she needs something that she’ll be motivated to use.
Maybe something with taking and storing pictures?
Is she a granny? Skype is easy to use if someone else initiates it and guides you a little the first time.
An older woman at the gym likes to make and print her own greeting cards. I don’t know what app she uses though.
I take it she doesn’t surf the web or YouTunes or anything.
ETA: Roger may be joking but games are good because they let her learn the hand motions. Solitaire? Sudoku?
dmsilev
@Tommy: Is she a reader? The Amazon Kindle app would be a good start in that case, especially if you load in a few old favorites for her.
Edit: How about crosswords? The NYTimes crossword app + a one-year subscription (which includes 15 or 20 years worth of their archives).
El Caganer
@Villago Delenda Est: I am assuming “conslut” was intentional. If it wasn’t, it should have been.
Tommy
@Iowa Old Lady: I should have said this. Mom wants to text. Just interact.
C.S.
Anyone else surprised that Chocola et al. are only getting paid in the $500k range? Sure, it’s good loot, but I always figured places like Club for Growth would start at $750k for their top doggies.
Maybe the success of the Palin grift has jaded me somewhat.
Kay
@Iowa Old Lady:
I think he has to do it this way because he wouldn’t have enough genuinely (well, remotely possible) disputed ballots to call for a re-run even under “double voting in two primaries” which appears to be unenforceable anyway.
So he’s going with “have a court declare me the winner”
Why not? Just go for broke!
I actually think it’s repulsive how they are constantly accusing ordinary individuals of fraud. I think the winner, what’s his name, should defend his voters from what is really a smear.
Villago Delenda Est
@El Caganer: You assume correctly, sir.
Violet
@Tommy: The old classic for teaching older people how to use a computer was Solitaire. Not sure if Angry Birds is today’s substitute. You know what your mom might like.
An easy e-mail app, whatever that might be, would help her join the modern world. Agree with the book suggestion–a Kindle might be better for that though.
What does your mom like to do? Gardening? Music? Reading? Grandkids? Hiking? Travel? Figure out what she likes then find an app that fits it.
If mom is not familiar with spam and scammers and phishing, then make sure she understands those things or the tablet is locked down so she can’t hand out her credit card and bank info to just anyone.
PurpleGirl
@PsiFighter37: I want to know which version of the Bible by which publishing house he sent. And how did he pay for all those books?
Villago Delenda Est
@Mustang Bobby: It is of course, keeping with the wingnut habit of projection on a 24/7 basis that makes the octoplex down at the mall look like home movies.
Iowa Old Lady
@Tommy: Btw, my local public library runs free computer classes during the day, including some very basic stuff. If that’s true where your mom is, she might check it out.
Tommy
@Iowa Old Lady: She is a grandmother. I’ve always thought it would be so nice if she could skype. I can count my family members on one hand. For us to talk more …
Violet
@Tommy: She just wants to text? Why get her a tablet? You can get her an app to text but it’s not the same as on a phone where it’s built in. Does she really want a tablet?
Kay
@Mustang Bobby:
They’re just kind of high maintenance people now, Republicans. I don’t even read half of what they’re mad about anymore.
This one I follow because it’s so perfect. The voter fraud bullshit is biting the establishment right in the ass. Good. I hope the Tea Party contests every GOP primary. But they won’t. They’re only contesting this one because the voters fit the fraud narrative.
Tommy
@Violet: Your question scares me.I talk to my mom almost daily. I do not know what she likes to do.I am stunned I don’t know this.
Villago Delenda Est
Noisemax continues to get its facts from some alternate universe:
Dinesh D’Souza on Box-Office Hit ‘America’. Watch Newsmax TV Now, DIRECTV 349, DISH 223
“Box Office Hit” in the “yes, it’s on at least one screen, and one mook paid to get in” sense.
Violet
@Tommy: Well go find out, then. Your mom is a person, not just your mom. Find out who she is.
Also, rather than sending her your old tablet, find out what she wants from a phone or tablet or whatever. What does she really want to do with it? Then get her that thing–the one that fits her needs best. A new one. She’ll feel special that you got her a new one and will actually enjoy it more because you got her what she really wants. If she wants a phone, get her a phone. You can always give her your old tablet later if she finds she wants one.
DWD
@Roger Moore: I think there’s a wing of the Republican Party that might be interested in engaging with the concept of governing, but it already lost the fight with the grifters and now it’s in full retreat.
Tommy
@Violet: Enough said. I can listen.
Origuy
My mom was using a computer back in the AOL days. She learned to use Family Tree Maker and email. Did quite a bit of the family genealogy.
Roger Moore
@Origuy:
Well, my mom has been using a computer since we got a TRS-80 CoCo. She used it mostly for word processing, rather than programming like the menfolk.
Elizabelle
@Origuy:
We have a friend whose AOL address is her first name and last initial.
Early adopter.
Ruckus
@PsiFighter37:
You know now that I think about it an STD would be preferable to any republican in either house. Most STD’s can be cured……
Belafon
@Villago Delenda Est: In the restroom at work last week and someone started talking about America and how he realized his agreeing with it was nearly like a religious experience. I could not get out of the rest room fast enough.
Anne Laurie
@Tommy: Your mom (depending on her eyesight and/or hand dexterity) might actually be a candidate for those ‘phablet’ phone-tablets that are all the rage in places where people can’t afford a laptop and a phone…
Ruckus
@Tommy:
Have an acquaintance who uses a tablet for his phone, email and surfing. He builds websites, like you do, and has a real powerful laptop but has no phone. He can’t put the tablet up to his ear like a phone but other than that it works great. If I recall correctly it’s an iPad but I don’t know if he uses a cell service but I’d bet it’s VoIP.
J R in WV
This is a test. Never mind, it worked!
dr. luba
@Violet:
No, I think it is Candy Crush Saga.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
Don’t know if it was posted here, but Alison Grimes tore Mitch to shreds at some podunk hoedown. It was epic.
NSFW, because Wonkette
cckids
@jheartney:
True, though she is close to the most shameless about it, considering the heights she once attained. Not everybody gets to be a VP candidate.
I understand that the Newt practically runs seminars on how to do it.
ETA: Or, what Villago Delenda Est said @ #21
danielx
Hell, and all this time I thought it was between the nihilists and the nihilists with Tourette’s Syndrome.
Comrade Dread
Well, McDaniel probably thinks that their votes should only count as 3/5ths of a good white male Republican vote.
danielx
@PsiFighter37:
Hey, you think it’s not work having to grovel to all those people for campaign dollars? I mean, if he doesn’t do that he might actually have to move back to Jackson or Tupelo or wherever and earn a living doing something productive.
Hey, I can dream….
David Hunt
Not quite on topic, but I wanted to welcome you back to posting as well as to say that I hope things are looking up and that they’ll continue to do so.
stonedstats
Same as above, wanted to welcome you back, Cole. I miss your voice.
jake the antisoshul soshulist
What has gotten into Politico lately? Have they gone sane, or are they just pulling for the corporatist wing of the Republican Party.
BruceFromOhio
The dumbfuck shitheads are just starting to figure it out now? Cats in a fracking handbag, I have totally missed the payday.
/heavy sigh
BruceFromOhio
@Jade:
That just totally shaves the cats ass.
catclub
@scav: I read a bit at TPM that gave the text of the law that is used to justify ‘no cross voting of people who voted in the Democratic primary’.
It says that those who vote in the Democratic primary are forbidden to vote in the GOP primary ON THE SAME DAY.
and that ON THE SAME DAY is in the text of the law. Nonetheless, an Attorney General gave an ‘opinion’ in the 80’s that this means the runoff, too. I find it hard to believe that a court would buy this, and even harder to believe that Cochran’s lawyers won’t use it. It means that there are NO forbidden Democratic primary voters when there is a runoff
(on another day).
rikyrah
@Tommy:
Mahjong
Solitude
Angry Birds
Skype
Does she have Netflix
Scrabble
Sudoku
Candy Crush
Pandora
Definitely ebooks not only for her but the grandkids
Ford Powers
??? exactly.
Another Holocene Human (now with new computer)
@Villago Delenda Est: boxofficemojo says it’s taken in a cool $14million gross and I’m pretty sure it’s just a re-edited pile from his 2012 movie so the grift continues. I hope D’Souza’s lawyers are getting paid or if they’re not I hope they sue him. Hehehehe.
Villago Delenda Est
@Another Holocene Human (now with new computer): I wonder how much of the $14 million was wingnut outfits buying blocks of tickets then giving them away.
Lurking Canadian
As funny as McDaniel’s antics are, I find the whole scenario strange and sad. I don’t blame the Democrats of Mississippi for voting for what they believe to be the lesser evil, but seriously, this campaign was Tire Rims vs Anthrax, wasn’t it? No matter who won the primary, the winner was going to be a white Republican Senator from Mississippi. Is there a single issue on which these guys would vote differently ?
Cervantes
@Lurking Canadian: If you’re saying Mississippi Republicans and right-wingers are atrocious and heaven help the state, I could not agree more.
We could sing a rousing chorus of “Mississippi, Find Yourself Another Country To Be Part Of,” except that it’s pretty much what the racists there have wanted for a while.
Berial
@Lurking Canadian: The difference is Cochran has a long history of bringing home the bacon, and since around 40% of the Mississippi economy is federal money that’s VERY important to the state. McDaniel basically wants the federal government to be so broke it doesn’t pay for ANYTHING and he’s willing to let MS suffer for his ideology. It’s fucking ignorant on a national scale.
These tea party types don’t believe in compromise and think ‘winners’ get to rule like kings. They are SHOCKED when that turns out not to be the case and are horrified when they actually lose because that can’t happen. So when they do lose it has to be because the other side cheats, and nothing to do with the non-insane portion of the voting public disagreeing with them. They can’t believe they AREN’T the majority because they get ALL their news from grifters telling them exactly what they want to hear while picking their bank accounts clean.
Berial
@Mike J: It’s even worse than you think. Tyner, a McDaniel attorney, thinks McDaniel won by 25,000 votes.
An yes Yall has been doing a pretty good job of reporting on this. Here’s their link.
If you don’t want to follow the link:
“Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel (R) demanded that the state Republican Party overturn Sen. Thad Cochran’s June primary victory and declare him the winner in a Monday press conference…
…”We anticipate that after they review the challenge that they’ll see that Chris McDaniel clearly won the Republican vote in the runoff,” said McDaniel attorney Mitch Tyner. “Chris McDaniel clearly won the runoff by 25,000 votes. … We’re not asking for a new election. We’re simply asking that the Republican Party actually recognize the person who won the runoff election.””