WTF Community

Day 665

General Discussion
#1

Updated 11/15/2018 1:20 PM PST

1/ A federal judge ruled that Florida voters have until Saturday to correct their rejected mail-in and provisional ballots, saying the state's law requiring signatures on ballots to match those on file is being applied unconstitutionally. More than 4,000 ballots across 45 counties in Florida were not counted because of inconsistent signatures. In 22 other counties, the number is unknown. In the Senate race, Gov. Rick Scott (R) leads Sen. Bill Nelson (D) by fewer than 13,000 votes. In the gubernatorial race, Rep. Ron DeSantis (R) leads Andrew Gillum (D) by nearly 34,000 votes. (Washington Post / ABC News / BuzzFeed News)

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/2018/11/15/day-665/
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#2

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/florida-recount-signatures-judge-ballot-machine-count-deadline/2018/11/15/21275a22-e87c-11e8-bbdb-72fdbf9d4fed_story.html?utm_term=.5cd5e26bf537

The five-day sprint to run ballots in Florida through counting machines for a second time ended Thursday, with the state ordering a manual recount of results in the U.S. Senate race, where about 12,600 votes separated Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson from Republican Rick Scott, the state’s governor. No such measure was ordered in the governor’s race, where former congressman Ron DeSantis ® held an edge over Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum (D).

Palm Beach County’s election supervisor said less than an hour before the 3 p.m. deadline that they would not finish the machine recount in any of three statewide races still in question and would move on to the manual recount at 4 p.m. The county’s results from election night will be added to the recount results from other counties.

The manual recount expected in the Senate race would begin at 7 a.m. Friday.

There will be 100 tables set up with two election workers, two campaign representatives and two party representatives at each, according to instructions distributed by election officials. Only the election workers are allowed to handle ballots, while wearing gloves.

The recount is scheduled for 11-hour days Friday and Saturday, with two 30-minute breaks each day. The deadline is noon Sunday.

Where’s the fire? I assume the Sunday deadline is to comply with a state law, but, really, we’ve got to change these laws. I can see no persuasive reason to rush a recount – the Senate doesn’t even convene until January 3.

It’s totally outrageous that Palm Beach county did not complete its machine recount in any of the three races it was ordered to process. This is a travesty.

The article also covers important legal disputes that could be crucial to the outcome of the vote count, but I didn’t include them because they’re difficult to sum up in a few words – if you’re following this recount closely, you’ll want to check out the full article.

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#3

Gulen is also the guy General Flynn was planning to kidnap.

4/ Robert Mueller is investigating Michael Flynn’s role in a plan to extradite a Muslim cleric in the US and deliver him to Turkey in return for $15 million. Investigators are looking into the role Flynn and his son may have played in the alleged proposal to deliver Fethullah Gülen to the Turkish government. Erdoğan views Fethullah Gülen as a political enemy and has repeatedly pressed the US to extradite him. Flynn is facing military, congressional, and criminal investigations for concealing his financial ties to Turkey and Russia, and whether the ties played a role in his decisions as Trump’s national security adviser. Any deal where a government official is bribed to act on behalf of a foreign government would involve multiple federal crimes. (NBC News / Wall Street Journal)

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#4

This is kind a big deal, the US is preparing to prosecute Assange.

The Justice Department is preparing to prosecute WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and is increasingly optimistic it will be able to get him into a U.S. courtroom, according to people in Washington familiar with the matter.

Over the past year, U.S. prosecutors have discussed several types of charges they could potentially bring against Mr. Assange, the people said. Mr. Assange has lived in the Ecuadorean embassy in London since receiving political asylum from the South American country in 2012.

The people familiar with the case wouldn’t describe whether discussions were under way with the U.K. or Ecuador about Mr. Assange, but said they were encouraged by recent developments.

Prosecutors have considered publicly indicting Mr. Assange to try to trigger his removal from the embassy, the people said, because a detailed explanation of the evidence against Mr. Assange could give Ecuadorean authorities a reason to turn him over.

The exact charges Justice Department might pursue remain unclear, but they may involve the Espionage Act, which criminalizes the disclosure of national defense-related information.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-is-optimistic-it-will-prosecute-assange-1542323142

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#5

Does anyone know if the rejection of Broward County’s recount is a moot point (since there will be a hand recount in the Senate race) or does it have consequences?

Florida will not use results from Broward County’s machine recount because the office submitted its results two minutes past the 3 p.m. deadline Thursday.

“We uploaded to the state two minutes late so the state has chosen not to use our machine recount results. They are going to use our first unofficial results as our second unofficial results,” Joe D’Alessandro, an electing official, said, according to the Sun-Sentinel.

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#6

Yes, where Flynn failed, Trump may succeed. Hence, this headline:

What a sad state of affairs.

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#7

@Keaton_James
It’s just so bizarre. I’m at a loss as to why anyone would think this would be in America’s best interest in Turkey.

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#8

As @anon95374541 posted, there was some buzz earlier today in the WSJ that the Justice Department was preparing to charge Assange and now the WaPo is reporting that it’s already happened.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been charged under seal, prosecutors inadvertently revealed in a recently unsealed court filing — a development that could significantly advance the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election and have major implications for those who publish government secrets.

We’re one step closer to finding out what really happened in the 2016 election. :mag_right:

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#9

Ok…yes Acosta will get his WH Press Pass. Judge grants it back.

CNN 1 WH 0

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#10

Ok…official word from George C Conway III about what he most detests about T’s administration - everything.

“I don’t feel comfortable being a Republican anymore,” Conway said in an exclusive interview for the Yahoo News podcast “Skullduggery” about his decision to drop his party registration earlier this year. ” “I think the Republican Party has become something of a personality cult.”

Asked if he thinks the president is fully stable, Conway responded: “No comment.”

The idea that the president would be commenting on legal indictments in such crass political terms stunned Conway. “I was appalled,” he said. “It was appalling. We’re talking about someone who has sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution and laws of the United States, and to criticize the attorney general for permitting justice to be done without regard to political party is very disturbing.”

Conway’s emergence over the past year as a persistent Trump critic on Twitter and in newspaper op-eds has become a subject of public fascination, given his wife’s role as a senior White House official and the president’s most aggressive defender on cable television.

Asked how his wife has reacted to his public attacks on her boss, Conway replied: “I don’t think she likes it. But I’ve told her, I don’t like the administration, so it’s even.”

https://www.yahoo.com/news/george-conway-republican-party-become-personality-cult-trump-130234835.html?soc_src=newsroom&soc_trk=com.apple.UIKit.activity.PostToTwitter&.tsrc=newsroom

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#11

I wonder if this means that Butina will become a cooperating witness. If so, I’ll wager there are some NRA officials really sweating it right now. :fearful:

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#12

Mueller is, indeed, turning over every stone. Go Mueller! :mag_right: :muscle:

Dick Cheney’s former top national-security aide has come under scrutiny from special counsel Robert Mueller, two people with knowledge of the probe tell The Daily Beast. It’s the latest sign that Mueller’s probe has expanded beyond the narrow bounds of Russian interference in American politics.

Mueller’s team has been looking into the communications and political dealings of John Hannah, the former Cheney adviser who later worked on Trump’s State Department transition team. This includes interactions with Lebanese-American businessman and fixer George Nader, who brokered meetings between foreign dignitaries and Team Trump, and Joel Zamel, a self-proclaimed social-media guru with deep ties to Israeli intelligence.

Mueller’s interest in Hannah’s communications and interactions with the two suggest the special counsel’s probe is broader than previously understood.

“Mueller might be opening another front here,” said John McLaughlin, the former acting director of the CIA.

…the special counsel has looked at the January 2017 Seychelles meeting between Nader, former Blackwater head Erik Prince, and Kirill Dmitriev, the head of a Russian sovereign wealth fund. And it has asked witnesses about the offer by Zamel to employ social-media manipulation to help Trump defeat Republican primary opponents and Hillary Clinton, according to two individuals who worked with the group.

Mueller’s probe of Hannah’s interactions and communications with Nader, Zamel, and other Trump officials sheds new light on what appears to be a lesser-known side of the special counsel’s investigation—one that deals with Israeli, Emirati, and Saudi influence in the 2016 presidential elections.

Hannah is one of the individuals who sits at the center of that nexus.

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#13

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