Thread by @alanfeuer

In 15 minutes or so, a hearing will begin in federal court in Atlanta in a lawsuit seeking to halt certification of the vote in Georgia. Here’s a quick primer on the case.

The suit, filed by the lawyer L Lin Wood, alleges that the vote in GA was “suspect and tainted with impropriety” largely by how elections officials handled absentee/mail-in ballots.

Wood says the problems stem from an agreement reached in March b/t the GA secretary of state & the state’s Dem party which essentially strengthened the procedure for verifying mail-ins. He claims that agreement violated state law.

Wood also claims that GA’s recount/audit of the vote—the results of which are supposed to come out today—was flawed.

As proof, he cites two GOP poll workers in his motion for injunctive relief. Neither is terribly convincing.

One of the workers, Amanda Coleman, says she showed up the recount at 9 am on 11/15 and wasn’t able to get on the counting floor to watch. But, according to her affidavit, it seems that’s b/c there were too many volunteers already there.

The other worker, Maria Deidrich, said she didn’t like the way the recount was done. Some ballots were in stacks, others in rows, she said. People left ballots on tables as they went to get food. Old people working there lost track of the count, she says.

The motion for injunction also quotes Susan Voyles, a recount auditor who claims she saw many unusually “pristine” ballots that seemed to be machine-marked. Most, she says, were for Biden.

To counter this, lawyers for the Dem party say that the agreement changing the way mail-ins were handled is totally legal and moreover was reached…8 months ago. Why is Wood complaining about it now? they ask.

Dem lawyers also say that even though Wood “takes issue w/every absentee ballot cast in the state, he fails to identify even a single absentee ballot he claims was wrongly counted.”

As for the poll worker claims, the lawyers say, you can’t throw out an entire election b/c of complaints from two monitors who didn’t like what happened to them on “a particular hour of a particular day.”

“The whole effort,” the Dem lawyers write, “appears to be little more than a transparent effort to delay the certification of the election.”

I'll be making periodic updates during the hearing.
Stay tuned...

One potential wild card:

This suit also dips its toe into the Dominion voting machine conspiracy theory. There are no formal claims about the machines in the filings BUT...

The docket contains a partly redacted affidavit from someone claiming to be a former Venezuelan military official who says the machines were used to rig elections in his country.

Judge Steven Grimberg has taken the bench.

Ray Smith, lawyer for Wood, starts by alleging due process and equal protection violations. He wants to stop certification and to do ANOTHER recount of the vote w/even closer scrutiny.

Smith is arguing that under the settlement agreement (see above) signature verification of mail-ins wasn't done or wasn't done well.

Now he's rehashing the Rudy Giuliani argument that Jimmy Carter, James Baker and the NY Times have all said mail-in ballots are prone to fraud.

Judge Grimberg asks what Wood's standing is to bring this claim.
Smith says Wood was directly impacted as a GA voter and that his vote was "diluted" b/c elections officials mishandled the mail-in ballots overall.

Judge asks so any voter could bring this claim under voter dilution theory? Yes, Smith says.

What's the emergency nature of this, judge asks?
"What caused this emergency on behalf of your client to bring this motion this week?"
He notes that settlement agreement is 8 months old.

Smith says the claim wasn't ripe until after election.

Judge says Smith's argument is a procedural one that could have been brought a day after the settlement agreement that he's claiming is defective and illegal.

What evidence do you have that this settlement agreement has impacted the election? judge asks.
Smith talks about the procedure created by the agreement but doesn't offer any evidence that the agreement affected the election, as he's claimed.

Again: judge says the agreement set up a process to verify signatures on mail in ballots.
"What evidence," he asks again, "do you have that that process was overwhelmed by the number of absentee ballots?"

"I understand that's your argument," the judge asks the lawyer, "but what's your evidence?"

Smith has moved on to his claims about GA's recount being flawed.

He's claiming that monitors at the recount were denied "meaningful access" and says that numerous affidavits attest to this.

Smith is claiming that GA election officials have the ability to take pictures of ballots through machines but haven't published them. So no one knows, he says, if it's been fair.

It meaning the GA recount.

What is the constitutional claim Wood is bringing in the recount?
Due process, Smith says.
Can you explain what due process violation has occurred? judge asks.
Does Wood have a constitutional right to have the recount monitored?

Smith says Wood has a constitutional right to a fair election.
What authority are you relying on, judge says.
Smith says Baker v Carr.
(I don't know that one...)

Smith introduces Susan Voyles, the recount auditor mentioned above, as a witness.

Voyles says she's been a poll manager for more than 20 years and says the recount was "unusual." She says there were no procedures in place if people saw irregularities or had concerns.

Voyles says most of the ballots looked "typical" where edges were worn and you could tell people had handled them. But...there was a particular batch that stood out to her, she says, b/c they were "pristine."

These ballots felt different, she says, and reminds the court that she's handled ballots for 20 years.
There were 100 ballots in this batch and 97 of them were for Biden, 1 was for Jorgenson and 2 were for Trump.
Very unusual, she says.

To recap, this witness is alleging that 97 ballots for Joe Biden in Georgia "felt" different to her and struck her as "very unusual."
She offers no proof--or even any suggestion--that anything untoward happened with these ballots. Just that the ballots were somehow...off.

No further questions for Ms. Voyles from plaintiff's lawyer.

Voyles under cross is describing seeing monitors at the recount being chastised by county officials when they drew close to watch.

Dem party lawyer wants to ask questions as an intervenor and Smith objects b/c they're not a relevant party.
The judge reminds Smith that the Dem party was a party to the settlement agreement he's challenging.
Dem lawyer gets to ask questions.

Not so much from the Dem lawyer after all.

Voyles dismissed.
Smith has moved on to arguing that this year's GA recount had a historically lower ballot reject rate and suggests there's something suspect about that.

Lawyers for the state are arguing that Smith as a lawyer for the plaintiff can't serve as a fact witness.

Russ Willard, a lawyer for the state, says that Smith hasn't established the elements of a vote dilution claim and has given no evidence that the signature verification process he complained about was flawed.

Willard now says L Lin Wood lacks standing in this case, the claims he brought are moot and he meets no elements for injunctive relief.

Wood can't ask for a new recount anyhow, he notes, because only a losing candidate can ask for a recount.

Willard says Wood has adopted "a scattershot approach" to try to drag in as many arguments as possible.
But has only made "generalized allegations about being a voter and a Republican party donor."
That doesn't confer standing, Willard says.

His complaint is really against county election workers but no county elections workers are named in the suit, Willard says.

Willard is now saying that Wood only complained about the settlement agreement changing the signature verification process after "his candidate" lost.

"The election is over and rather than accept that his candidate lost, plaintiff seeks the largest disenfranchisement of voters since the poll tax and the promulgation of Jim Crow laws," Willard says.

There's been a lot of anger and angst recently, Willard says. He understands Woods frustration but adds that doesn't justify the "manufacture of specious allegations."

Kevin Hamilton, a lawyer for the Dem party, says no court has ever entered the sweeping relief that Wood seeks--the invalidation of statewide election results.

Hamilton notes that Wood's vote dilution theory has been rejected by several courts just in the past week alone.
Any changes in the voting process, he says, don't affect any individual voter but rather affect all voters. So no one person's vote is diluted.

Turning back to standing, Hamilton says Wood's argument that he has it because he donated to the Republican party doesn't hold water.

"Plaintiff cites no cases for that proposition and I don't blame him," Hamilton says. "Because there are none."

(Even as this hearing has been going on, the Trump campaign lost two more lawsuits--one in AZ and another an appeals case in PA.)

https://twitter.com/marceelias/status/1329532256684306433

https://twitter.com/marceelias/status/1329542027495825410

On the one hand, Hamilton says, there is L Lin Wood who has articulated no injuries even after waiting 8 months to file his suit
On the other hand, he adds, there are millions of GA voters who would be disenfranchised if Wood's request to invalidation the election succeeds.

Plaintiff's lawyer, Ray Smith, gets the last word.
Smith believes he's provided a lot of testimony (i.e. one witness) as well as affidavits (which is correct) to prove his case.
He's now saying if standing is problem, he can add the Trump campaign...?

Judge Grimberg cuts him off to say that only L Lin Wood as a plaintiff is before him at the moment, adding that it's "significant" that the Trump campaign isn't a plaintiff.
Smith says he can add the campaign as a plaintiff....
"That's not before us today," the judge says.

Arguments are done. We're taking a 10 minute recess, per judge's order.

We're back in Atlanta.

DECISION: Federal judge DENIES L Lin Wood's motion for a temporary restraining order to invalidate the results of the Georgia election.

This is the third legal defeat today for plaintiffs challenging the integrity of the election.

Judge Grimberg, in Atlanta, bases his decision largely on the question of standing.

Judge Grimberg, for what it's worth, was appointed by President Trump.
He is, however, dismantling this lawsuit, suggesting that if the campaign had joined the suit it would have changed his analysis of standing.

Judge also notes that this attempt to invalidate the election is belated.
Wood questioned the validity of a settlement agreement b/t GA Dems and the state to change the process of how ballot signatures are verified.
That agreement was reached 8 months ago.
Wood sued last week.

"It appears to me that the plaintiff fails to state a claim that could w/stand a motion to dismiss," Judge Grimberg says.
I.e. there isn't an evidentiary basis for the suit.

NOW: A federal judge appointed by President Trump is denying, almost line for line, a lawsuit filed by a proxy in Atlanta to invalidate the election results in GA.
No standing.
No constitutional violation.
Untimely.
Evidence only of isolated issues.

"No basis either in fact or law."

Hearing adjourned. Out.