In Harrisburg, the electoral assault of pro-Trump lawyers

The Capitol in Harrisburg has become, for two days, the mirror of American anger. Judge for yourself: Thursday evening, the seat of government and parliament in Pennsylvania was “under siege” on both sides. At the foot of its main facade and its steps, a hundred supporters of Donald Trump brandished the slogan “Stop the Steal” written in red on signs, against a background of harangues of “Mister Free”, a Republican host from Baltimore who abuses his loudspeakers, his microphones and his hateful refrains towards the Democrats who “rotten America”. On the other side of the imposing building? A farandole of supporters of the Biden-Harris tandem, often dressed in the recognizable yellow sweatshirt, bearing the formula: “Count every vote”. Two Americas. Two battles. One to discredit the results of the presidential election. The other to ask to continue the count and draw the consequences.

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The State Supreme Court, a few tens of meters away, is these days the target of pro-Trump. The police, until then rather quiet, prepared the barricades to bar the street and protect if necessary its magistrates (five Democrats, a Republican and an independent). “Mister Free”, aka Scott, brought tents and blankets. “We’ll never let go. He is our president. The one the Americans have elected ”, defends, at his side, the former non-commissioned officer Kristen Schoeffl, whose husband serves with the“ Marines ”in neighboring Maryland. Just before speaking, the young woman and her fellow protesters watched Donald Trump’s intervention, denouncing Pennsylvania as one of the most corrupt states in the country. Everyone applauded, then prayed that “God will punish those who steal the votes of the people.” Logic: the Capitol in Harrisburg is one of the privileged targets of those whom the outgoing president designates as his “army”: the teams of lawyers paid by his campaign to demonstrate that the vote in Pennsylvania was “fraudulent” .

Peter M. agreed to speak to us. A member of a New Jersey law firm, he does not want to give us his card, referring for any official quote on Justin Clark, Donald Trump’s deputy campaign manager. On Wednesday, Peter was at the Philadelphia airport, during the short press conference given by Rudolph Giuliani, the former mayor of New York and the candidate’s main legal adviser, and by his own son, Erik Trump. A demolition in good standing of the Commission responsible for supervising the organization of the poll in Pennsylvania, where the executive is Democrat and the legislature has a Republican majority. “Our job is to collect everything we can to prove the problematic process of the count,” explains Peter, saying he only speaks to us out of respect for the “Swiss democratic tradition”. “Our observers, for example, were unable to enter the rooms where the results were gathered on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday, at the Philadelphia Convention Center. We also have evidence that piles of ballots were left unattended during breaks. We are fighting against a system. ” Kristen, she talks about ballot boxes full of military votes found in trash cans. She shows us on her phone an article from the pimedia.com website, acquired from the Republicans. Problem: the info goes back to October 2 and concerns damaged, therefore abandoned, bulletins.

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Near him, a young woman in a tight suit takes out her cell phone to show us the image of a scrutineer pushing suspected observers behind a security cordon. It is because of this that the controversy arose, in Pennsylvania, on the need to have binoculars to observe the count, which Donald Trump denounced from the White House. Victory: A Philadelphia court on Thursday allowed observers to come closer. “We are not crazy. We have the right ”, continues our interlocutor, shrugging his shoulders in front of the posturing and belching of the supporters of the candidate, nearby. “Do you think you would accept, in Switzerland, that hundreds of thousands of ballots arrive after election day and still be counted?”

“Legal” and “illegal” bulletins

A name circulates in the corridors of the “State Building” which adjoins the Capitol, where the offices of Governor Tom Wolf are located: that of James Schultz, a lawyer now based in Philadelphia after having been Trump’s lawyer in the White House at the start of his term. He is, for the Democrats, the “brain” of this army whose goal is twofold: to accredit the idea that mail-order ballots, however arrived within perfectly legal deadlines, are “illegal”, therefore to be thrown away. And put maximum pressure on the teams responsible for counting the votes. Omar Sabir is one of the electoral commissioners, and deputy mayor of Philadelphia, Jim Kenney. His version is obviously quite different: “These lawsuits aim to re-examine the question of postal votes by the Supreme Court of the United States, which chose on October 20 not to call into question the judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States. State (authorizing “absent” voters to send their ballots at the latest on the day of the vote, postmark being taken as proof). And the accusations on the refusal of the observers? “Where are they? Have you seen these repressed observers? The controversy covered a few meters. We worked well with those who were duly accredited. But we also saw arriving, in the night after the vote, people whom we did not know. ”

Donald Trump’s legal army looks like him. Much of his offensive is posturing to occupy media attention and … slow down the counting operations Rudolph Giuliani has asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to halt altogether, so far unsuccessfully. “Their language is coded. By speaking like Trump of “legal” and “illegal” ballots, they induce the idea that part of the votes counted does not meet the criteria provided for by the law of our state, which is absolutely false “, adds Omar Sabir.

Each American state is sovereign as regards the rules of the ballot. Pennsylvania, for example, allows postal votes but not advance votes, as in Texas where voters could go to the polls the last week of October to avoid queues. The local Democratic administration, faithful to the “Biden” line of health prudence, also encouraged remote voting, due to the epidemic. While Donald Trump asked his voters to mobilize on November 3. Result: a predictable majority of Democratic ballots among the “absent”.

The search for the grain of sand

So is it really a matter of law? A prominent Washington lawyer, familiar with elections in Europe, gives us his version: “In Pennsylvania, as in other states where lawsuits are piling up, Trump’s army of lawyers is playing on two fronts: on the one hand, accusation of fraud, which assumes intention, which is very difficult to prove even if there has been in the past in this country, everyone knows that. Hence the accusations (for the moment without proof) of corruption of the local Democratic administration. On the other hand, the search for a grain of sand, administrative or technical error, which will disrupt the electoral machine, to justify a new count. With the hope that the criteria for this future counting, if it is imposed in one State, will then be different in another to justify the intervention of the Supreme Court, called to rule in the event of disagreements between the States of the Union”.

A legal labyrinth lined with a house of cards. The irony is that the slowness of the count denounced and considered suspect by the Trumpists is in reality … caused by them. “Everyone is protecting themselves,” confirms Ed Barnes, a deputy returning officer in rural Pennsylvania. “Everything is checked several times. The watchword is to make no mistakes. ” Our Washington lawyer adds: “It’s a race against time. Trump must find something concrete, solid, to support his thesis and seriously derail the electoral train before Biden is proclaimed president, which seems to be looming. And yet, all will not be settled. The good scenario for Trump is a very limited victory for Biden, acquired thanks to a single state or two, on which the head of state can unleash all the legal artillery. If the Democrats are three or four states ahead, with a large margin of large voters, his lawyers will quickly speak into a vacuum. Much of the public, even among Trump voters, will agree that the gap is too big. ”

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On the forecourt of the Capitol in Harrisburg, “Mister Free” has finally agreed to exchange, after thirty minutes of rap to the glory of “Donald”. Impossible to know his last name. The muscular man looks with his goatee like an officer of the Civil War, whose national museum – Civil War Museum – is located on the heights of the city. Mister Free admits “having a totally voluntary mission”: to give voice “to be heard” inside the building. Weird all the same. The day before, this professional agitator was absent. It happened as soon as Giuliani and others came to Philadelphia. And now he is at work, with slogans, loudspeakers, background noise and propaganda material under the windows of the judges of the State Supreme Court. Who says army says intimidation? “Our lawyers want the law to prevail. It is essential in this state where our Constitution was signed in September 1787. Pennsylvania has a historical responsibility vis-à-vis the people of the United States, ”he blurted into the microphone.

Behind him, a young “Latino” woman, molded in a star-studded T-shirt, sways on a wall of the building, with a large American flag in hand. A journalist from Patriot News, the Harrisburg daily, is listening. Mister Free knows that Pennsylvania’s results are due this Friday at the latest. Donald Trump’s lead dropped from 700,000 votes during election night to less than forty thousand Thursday night, US time. “We are here to warn loud and clear all those who hear us: examine these complaints, otherwise …”. If not ?

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