It’s Official: Congress Has Formally Recognized Joe Biden’s Victory

*After a chaotic day, the election result stood.

Despite the chaotic, violent storming of the United States
Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump, a joint session of
the United States Congress formally recognized Joe Biden’s victory
in the 2020 presidential election early Thursday morning.

Congress had gathered Wednesday to fulfill its constitutionally
prescribed role of counting the electoral votes that were submitted
by the states last month, and they conducted their count properly:
Biden won 306 electoral votes, and Trump won 232.

Initially, most expected the day’s main drama would lie in an
effort from Trump’s congressional allies to object to the results
from certain states. It was always evident that those objections
would fail, but Trump stoked his supporters’ hopes that the day
would somehow turn in his favor — for instance, through some
dramatic intervention of Vice President Mike Pence, who presided
over the proceedings.

But Pence understood that he had no such power to interfere with
the count, and he finally deigned to make that clear publicly just
as Congress was about to begin its session at 1 pm Eastern. A crowd
of thousands soon gathered outside the Capitol, in part because
Trump had encouraged attendees at a rally to head over there.

The count had barely gotten underway — Congress was in the midst
of dealing with Trump allies’ objection to Arizona’s results — when
a mob shoved past security and forcibly entered the US Capitol. So
the count was halted for what turned out to be six hours, as law
enforcement tried to ensure Congress members’ security and clear
the building.

No members of Congress were hurt, but four people died during
the storming of the building, according to DC police — a Trump
supporter who was shot by a Capitol Police officer, and three
others who died of medical complications. Trump was slow to
discourage the chaos (reports suggest he welcomed it) and only told
protesters to go home after they’d been in the building for two
hours. Twitter soon locked Trump’s account because of this.

Finally, Congress reconvened shortly after 8 pm Eastern. Members
concluded their debate and voted on the objection to Arizona’s
results. The Senate voted it down 93-6, and the House voted it down
303-121. The events of the day did spur some GOP senators to drop
their plans to object to Georgia’s results, speeding up the
process. But Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) stood by his plans to object
to Pennsylvania’s results, forcing another failed vote.

In the end, Biden got all the electoral votes to which he was
entitled. But that won’t really be what the day is remembered for.
Rather, the spectacle of thousands of the president’s supporters
disrupting the United States’ peaceful transition of power —
however briefly — could haunt the country for some time.

The disturbing events even started a new round of discussion
about whether Trump should be involuntarily removed from office or
deprived of his powers before his term expires at noon on January
20. And the answer may depend on how Trump chooses to act in his
final two weeks.

Republicans indulged Trump’s lies about a stolen
election for two months. This was the result.
The storming of the Capitol was the culmination of months’ worth of
lies and conspiracy theories about a supposedly stolen election
spread by President Trump — lies that were often indulged or left
unchallenged by top Republicans.

To the GOP’s (very limited) credit, their swing state governors,
state officials, and state legislative leaders refused to use their
institutional powers to actually help Trump steal the election.
Republican-appointed judges also largely spurned Trump’s flurry of
frivolous lawsuits.

But before January 6, relatively few in the party had the
courage to openly debunk or challenge Trump’s false claims. Some
happily embraced them (whether out of genuine belief or cynical
political expedience); others rolled their eyes and avoided
comment. (In a now-infamous quote, an anonymous senior Republican
official told the Washington Post back in early November, “What is
the downside for humoring him for this little bit of time? No one
seriously thinks the results will change.”)

The problem is that not everyone was in on the joke — as those
storming the Capitol, many of whom voiced belief in the stolen
election or in other, QAnon-related conspiracy theories, made
clear.

For the past two months, Trump’s effort to overturn Biden’s win
has focused on various legal mechanisms — state certifications, the
makeup of state elector slates, lawsuits filed in court, attempts
to reject state results in Congress, and Trump’s cockamamie idea
that Pence could unilaterally change the results. Most of these had
already failed, and the Congress-focused efforts were on track to
fail Wednesday.

Now, the means of Trump’s election-stealing effort flirted with
illegality — particularly when he tried to pressure Georgia’s
secretary of state to “find” votes for him. And there was talk,
particularly from Trump ally Michael Flynn, that the president
could go even further, for instance, by using the military to order
a new election.

But the storming of the Capitol by Trump supporters egged on by
the president himself was a wholly extralegal attempt to disrupt
the transition of power. The question is whether it’s a one-off or
the harbinger of a new phase.

This didn’t have to get this bad. It could also have been much
worse.
In addition to being menacing, the specifics of the spectacle that
unfolded Wednesday were bizarre.

Large-scale protests are not an uncommon thing in the nation’s
capital, and around the Capitol complex in particular. Law
enforcement officials understand perfectly well how to lock down an
area, should they wish to do so.

But for unclear reasons — perhaps due to poor planning and an
utter underestimation of the threat — Capitol police allowed large
groups of protesters to get extraordinarily close to the building,
and as a result, they eventually forced their way in.

This was preventable with better planning and security, and
there will surely be recriminations for law enforcement officials
about why they dropped the ball here. The answer is not yet clear,
though the Washington Post’s Carol Leonnig, Aaron Davis, Dan
Lamothe, and David Fahrenthold have begun digging into that
question. Already, lawmakers have called for investigations into
the Capitol Police’s actions.

The flip side is, despite this gigantic security failure,
officials got quite lucky that there wasn’t far more violence. If
it eventually proved so easy to get into the Capitol, after all,
why couldn’t people get in with deadlier weaponry? Even if most did
not intend to harm anyone, it only takes a few to create a
bloodbath.

And some people apparently wanted violence. DC’s metropolitan
police chief, Robert Contee, said law enforcement discovered pipe
bombs near the Democratic and Republican National Committee
buildings, and a cooler of Molotov cocktails near the Capitol
building, according to WUSA9.

It’s an ominous reminder that things could have been much worse
— and that they could still get worse in the days ahead.

There’s new talk of impeachment and invoking the 25th
Amendment — but it probably won’t happen unless Trump goes even
further
The behavior of the president of the United States throughout all
this was alarming.

In addition to inciting his supporters to go to the Capitol in
the first place, once they did break into the building, he refused
requests to convene the National Guard to help restore security,
according to the New York Times’s Maggie Haberman and other
outlets. (Haberman also reported that, per a senior adviser, Trump
has “lost it.”)

Leading Republicans were not happy about what transpired. “We
will not be kept out of this chamber by thugs, mobs, or threats,”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said after the Senate
reconvened Wednesday evening. “We will not bow to lawlessness or
intimidation. We are back at our posts. We will discharge our duty
under the Constitution and for our nation.” Some White House
officials resigned, apparently in protest, including the chief of
staff to the first lady.

A few Republican senators who had planned to object to Biden’s
win, including just-defeated Sen. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia and
Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, dropped their planned
objections to state results because of the day’s events — helping
ensure an overwhelming Senate rejection of any challenges.

And yet 121 out of 204 House Republicans present still did go on
record voting to throw out the results in Arizona, which Biden won.
Clearly, it will take more than a measly storming of the Capitol to
shake Republicans’ loyalty to Trump; the party is apparently not
yet prepared to totally break with him.

But Trump’s behavior throughout the day did revive concerns
about whether he should really be left in power for another 14
days. Democrats openly called either for his impeachment and
removal or for the stripping of his presidential powers under
Section 4 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. That latter
method has never been used, but both CBS and Axios reported
Wednesday that Republican officials were discussing it. (It would
require Vice President Pence and a majority of the Cabinet to agree
that President Trump was “unable” to discharge the duties and
powers of his office.)

Neither appears particularly likely at the moment, but the
question of what happens next is really up to Trump himself. If
such an extreme response as a second impeachment or the 25th
Amendment is used, it would require strong Republican backing — and
that would likely only materialize if Trump truly crosses the
Rubicon.

Culled from Vox

*After a chaotic day, the election result stood.

Despite the chaotic, violent storming of the United States
Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump, a joint session of
the United States Congress formally recognized Joe Biden’s victory
in the 2020 presidential election early Thursday morning.

Congress had gathered Wednesday to fulfill its constitutionally
prescribed role of counting the electoral votes that were submitted
by the states last month, and they conducted their count properly:
Biden won 306 electoral votes, and Trump won 232.

Initially, most expected the day’s main drama would lie in an
effort from Trump’s congressional allies to object to the results
from certain states. It was always evident that those objections
would fail, but Trump stoked his supporters’ hopes that the day
would somehow turn in his favor — for instance, through some
dramatic intervention of Vice President Mike Pence, who presided
over the proceedings.

But Pence understood that he had no such power to interfere with
the count, and he finally deigned to make that clear publicly just
as Congress was about to begin its session at 1 pm Eastern. A crowd
of thousands soon gathered outside the Capitol, in part because
Trump had encouraged attendees at a rally to head over there.

The count had barely gotten underway — Congress was in the midst
of dealing with Trump allies’ objection to Arizona’s results — when
a mob shoved past security and forcibly entered the US Capitol. So
the count was halted for what turned out to be six hours, as law
enforcement tried to ensure Congress members’ security and clear
the building.

No members of Congress were hurt, but four people died during
the storming of the building, according to DC police — a Trump
supporter who was shot by a Capitol Police officer, and three
others who died of medical complications. Trump was slow to
discourage the chaos (reports suggest he welcomed it) and only told
protesters to go home after they’d been in the building for two
hours. Twitter soon locked Trump’s account because of this.

Finally, Congress reconvened shortly after 8 pm Eastern. Members
concluded their debate and voted on the objection to Arizona’s
results. The Senate voted it down 93-6, and the House voted it down
303-121. The events of the day did spur some GOP senators to drop
their plans to object to Georgia’s results, speeding up the
process. But Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) stood by his plans to object
to Pennsylvania’s results, forcing another failed vote.

In the end, Biden got all the electoral votes to which he was
entitled. But that won’t really be what the day is remembered for.
Rather, the spectacle of thousands of the president’s supporters
disrupting the United States’ peaceful transition of power —
however briefly — could haunt the country for some time.

The disturbing events even started a new round of discussion
about whether Trump should be involuntarily removed from office or
deprived of his powers before his term expires at noon on January
20. And the answer may depend on how Trump chooses to act in his
final two weeks.

Republicans indulged Trump’s lies about a stolen
election for two months. This was the result.
The storming of the Capitol was the culmination of months’ worth of
lies and conspiracy theories about a supposedly stolen election
spread by President Trump — lies that were often indulged or left
unchallenged by top Republicans.

To the GOP’s (very limited) credit, their swing state governors,
state officials, and state legislative leaders refused to use their
institutional powers to actually help Trump steal the election.
Republican-appointed judges also largely spurned Trump’s flurry of
frivolous lawsuits.

But before January 6, relatively few in the party had the
courage to openly debunk or challenge Trump’s false claims. Some
happily embraced them (whether out of genuine belief or cynical
political expedience); others rolled their eyes and avoided
comment. (In a now-infamous quote, an anonymous senior Republican
official told the Washington Post back in early November, “What is
the downside for humoring him for this little bit of time? No one
seriously thinks the results will change.”)

The problem is that not everyone was in on the joke — as those
storming the Capitol, many of whom voiced belief in the stolen
election or in other, QAnon-related conspiracy theories, made
clear.

For the past two months, Trump’s effort to overturn Biden’s win
has focused on various legal mechanisms — state certifications, the
makeup of state elector slates, lawsuits filed in court, attempts
to reject state results in Congress, and Trump’s cockamamie idea
that Pence could unilaterally change the results. Most of these had
already failed, and the Congress-focused efforts were on track to
fail Wednesday.

Now, the means of Trump’s election-stealing effort flirted with
illegality — particularly when he tried to pressure Georgia’s
secretary of state to “find” votes for him. And there was talk,
particularly from Trump ally Michael Flynn, that the president
could go even further, for instance, by using the military to order
a new election.

But the storming of the Capitol by Trump supporters egged on by
the president himself was a wholly extralegal attempt to disrupt
the transition of power. The question is whether it’s a one-off or
the harbinger of a new phase.

This didn’t have to get this bad. It could also have been much
worse.
In addition to being menacing, the specifics of the spectacle that
unfolded Wednesday were bizarre.

Large-scale protests are not an uncommon thing in the nation’s
capital, and around the Capitol complex in particular. Law
enforcement officials understand perfectly well how to lock down an
area, should they wish to do so.

But for unclear reasons — perhaps due to poor planning and an
utter underestimation of the threat — Capitol police allowed large
groups of protesters to get extraordinarily close to the building,
and as a result, they eventually forced their way in.

This was preventable with better planning and security, and
there will surely be recriminations for law enforcement officials
about why they dropped the ball here. The answer is not yet clear,
though the Washington Post’s Carol Leonnig, Aaron Davis, Dan
Lamothe, and David Fahrenthold have begun digging into that
question. Already, lawmakers have called for investigations into
the Capitol Police’s actions.

The flip side is, despite this gigantic security failure,
officials got quite lucky that there wasn’t far more violence. If
it eventually proved so easy to get into the Capitol, after all,
why couldn’t people get in with deadlier weaponry? Even if most did
not intend to harm anyone, it only takes a few to create a
bloodbath.

And some people apparently wanted violence. DC’s metropolitan
police chief, Robert Contee, said law enforcement discovered pipe
bombs near the Democratic and Republican National Committee
buildings, and a cooler of Molotov cocktails near the Capitol
building, according to WUSA9.

It’s an ominous reminder that things could have been much worse
— and that they could still get worse in the days ahead.

There’s new talk of impeachment and invoking the 25th
Amendment — but it probably won’t happen unless Trump goes even
further
The behavior of the president of the United States throughout all
this was alarming.

In addition to inciting his supporters to go to the Capitol in
the first place, once they did break into the building, he refused
requests to convene the National Guard to help restore security,
according to the New York Times’s Maggie Haberman and other
outlets. (Haberman also reported that, per a senior adviser, Trump
has “lost it.”)

Leading Republicans were not happy about what transpired. “We
will not be kept out of this chamber by thugs, mobs, or threats,”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said after the Senate
reconvened Wednesday evening. “We will not bow to lawlessness or
intimidation. We are back at our posts. We will discharge our duty
under the Constitution and for our nation.” Some White House
officials resigned, apparently in protest, including the chief of
staff to the first lady.

A few Republican senators who had planned to object to Biden’s
win, including just-defeated Sen. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia and
Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, dropped their planned
objections to state results because of the day’s events — helping
ensure an overwhelming Senate rejection of any challenges.

And yet 121 out of 204 House Republicans present still did go on
record voting to throw out the results in Arizona, which Biden won.
Clearly, it will take more than a measly storming of the Capitol to
shake Republicans’ loyalty to Trump; the party is apparently not
yet prepared to totally break with him.

But Trump’s behavior throughout the day did revive concerns
about whether he should really be left in power for another 14
days. Democrats openly called either for his impeachment and
removal or for the stripping of his presidential powers under
Section 4 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. That latter
method has never been used, but both CBS and Axios reported
Wednesday that Republican officials were discussing it. (It would
require Vice President Pence and a majority of the Cabinet to agree
that President Trump was “unable” to discharge the duties and
powers of his office.)

Neither appears particularly likely at the moment, but the
question of what happens next is really up to Trump himself. If
such an extreme response as a second impeachment or the 25th
Amendment is used, it would require strong Republican backing — and
that would likely only materialize if Trump truly crosses the
Rubicon.

Culled from Vox