Clinton electors lobbying for EC protest votes? *UPDATE* 29 electors want intel briefing

[Nym90]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector

Trump could become the first winning candidate to have a faithless elector since Nixon in 1972. Faithless electors since then have all defected from losing candidates (Ford in 1976, Dukakis in 1988, Gore in 2000, and Kerry in 2004).

The last time that there was more than one faithless elector in an election was technically 1912, but that was a unique circumstance since the Republican Vice Presidential candidate died before the election and after it was too late to remove him from the ballot....so the fact that Taft's electors didn't vote for him shouldn't really count IMO.

So you'd have to go back to 1896 to find the last instance of more than one faithless elector in an election in which the candidate to whom they were pledged was still alive....there were four that year, but all for Vice President only, none for President.

The last time that there were multiple faithless electors for President in one election was in 1872, though again that was a unique situation since Greeley died after the election but before the EC could convene.

You have to go back to 1832 to find the last time there were multiple faithless electors for a Presidential candidate who was alive (there were two that year).

The last time there were more than two was in 1808, when there were six.

And so if Clinton ends up having seven (or more), it would be the most since 1796 when the electors cast two votes for President instead of separate votes for President and Vice President.

[Nym90]

The 1960 Alabama electors who voted for Byrd were also unpledged. The Democratic ticket that year included 6 unpledged electors and 5 Kennedy electors. So the only faithless elector that year was the one in Oklahoma.

[Nym90]

I wonder what would happen in a very theoretical scenario in which Trump dies before the electors meet. On one hand you can't cast a valid vote for a dead candidate (like with Greeley). On the other hand, in some states, electors wouldn't be allowed to vote for someone else.

I suppose RNC would have to designate a replacement candidate to receive Trump's evs (likely Pence).

Almost certainly they would vote for Pence.

The constitutionality of state laws requiring a vote for the candidate to whom the electors are pledged is very shaky. The Supreme Court has never been asked to rule on it. This could be the year that will change.

[Nym90]

It makes sense that the 538 people who choose the President of the United States should know before casting that vote the extent of the involvement of one of the candidates in any efforts to hack the Election Day vote.

[Nym90]

All Russian hacking talk is strictly non-election rigging stuff right? As in they selectively hacked and leaked info, but didn't engage in actual vote manipulation to directly affect the outcome.

So far as we know to this point, that is correct.

[Nym90]

All Russian hacking talk is strictly non-election rigging stuff right? As in they selectively hacked and leaked info, but didn't engage in actual vote manipulation to directly affect the outcome.

This is a key point.  Actual vote-count affecting hacking is worthy of thorough investigations.  Luckily we've seen no evidence of that so far.

Russians throwing their voice into the cacophonous noise of an election...meh, so what?  Is there something inherently threatening about Russian fake news than say, John Harwood's fake news?

But all of this talk has a sub-text of elitism that is so typical of the left.  "Voters are too stupid and easily swayed by Russian propaganda...therefore we must discredit or possibly overturn the election, because we're smart and the sheeple are dumb."  Well, remember the videos circulating of the Obama voters who thought dumb things (he's gonna pay my rent...from his 'stash')?  Did even one Republican suggest we need to get information to the electoral college about how so many Obama voters got misinformed in '08?

This whole line of thinking is poisonous.  Democrat projection ("Republicans won't accept legitimate election results!  Horrors!") all over again.

We don't know the full extent of Russian involvement as of yet.

Now that it's known that hacking was accomplished, the next question is how, and from whom they had coordination/assistance.

Any Americans who were complicit in their hacking are pretty clearly guilty of treason.

It may well bring back the old Nixon era question of what did the President know, and when did he know it.