Kyle Cheney, the Politico DC reporter, has published a solid summary that brings to date what he among others, has dubbed us as leading the ‘Hamilton Electors’. Politico:
With Democrats increasingly pointing to Clinton’s large lead in the popular vote as evidence that the Electoral College system needs rethinking, an attorney working with anti-Trump electors said he’s preparing to file suit within two weeks on behalf of Micheal Baca, a Democratic elector from Colorado.
The effort is part of a coordinated legal fight to dismantle the 29 state laws that force electors to support their party’s nominees. The lawyer, who spoke on condition of anonymity while the legal strategy is being finalized, said he anticipates similar suits in about half a dozen states.
A court victory taking down or weakening laws that “bind” electors to their states’ popular vote, the attorney said, would signal to electors across the country that they can’t be punished for voting their conscience. The Constitution, he said, should prevent states from forcing electors to cast votes against their will.
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The suits would be predicated on a 1952 Supreme Court ruling in Ray v. Blair. In that case, the court held that electors may be forced to take oaths to support their party’s candidate — but the justices explicitly left open the question of whether those oaths could be enforced if an elector ultimately makes a different decision.
“[E]ven if such promises of candidates for the electoral college are legally unenforceable because, violative of an assumed constitutional freedom of the elector under the Constitution … to vote as he may choose in the electoral college, it would not follow that the requirement of a pledge … is unconstitutional,” the justices wrote.
One of the greatest impediments facing so-called “faithless electors” is the existence of laws in 29 states that force electors to support the will of their states’ voters. Those laws, though, have never been enforced — and most either carry light fines or no penalty at all, with no method for forcing the recalcitrant electors to switch votes.
In the meantime, across the nation in various states, like what my fellow Colorado Electors, Electors are talking and/or meeting privately, this number is larger than the reported six, but the precise number is unknown because Electors among other things they are unwilling at this time to go on the record, and two, none of us have been officially certified as Electors. That takes place when our respective state’s elections become certified. This is important since that certification provides us legal standing as the “actual electors”.
A majority of Colorado Electors have scheduled a meeting over this holiday and from there we will formulate a consensus and action plan. (We have not been able to reach a few in our delegation to confirm their willingness to meet at the proposed time and place.)
When there is something more to report, I am willing to post it here, as well as distribute whatever reports or news to the media and press. That is all, enjoy your giblets gravy and turkey’s.