Two men have re-engineered the US electoral system in favor of Republicans

[erronis]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/oct/04/electoral-college-map-gerrymandering
If the right strews constitutional chaos over the certification of this presidential election, two people will have cleared the path

Two men recognized and exploited the anti-democratic loopholes within America’s rickety democracy in order to deliver Republicans victories that they could never win at the ballot box.

Now their willfully minoritarian creations threaten the very essence of a representative democracy: if Donald Trump, rightwing courts, gerrymandered state legislatures and an extreme Republican caucus in the US House of Representatives create constitutional chaos over the certification of this presidential election, two men cleared the path.

The single-minded determination of Leonard Leo built a conservative supermajority on the US supreme court and stacked lower and state courts with Republican ideologues that have pushed the nation to the right via the least accountable branch of government.

Chris Jankowski masterminded the partisan gerrymanders that tilted state legislatures and congressional delegations across the south and the purple midwest toward extreme Republicans, ended Barack Obama’s second term before it started, and rendered elections in Wisconsin and North Carolina all but meaningless over the last decade and a half.

Leo and Jankowski understood, separately, that the courts and state legislatures were undervalued and often undefended targets for a deliberate strategy aimed at capturing important levers of power that sometimes float under the radar. They could be Moneyball-ed, to borrow the term Michael Lewis used in his book about how the Oakland A’s made an end-run around large-market teams by understanding value that their opponents overlooked.

What Leo and Jankowski built separately would soon reinforce the other’s creation (with, of course, crucial assists from chief justice John Roberts), tightening the knots around meaningful elections, pushing policy to the extreme right and making it nearly impossible for voters to do anything about it.

[UpInArms]

1. Leonard Leo is evil

Everything he touches rots. I cannot despise him more.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. These 2 clowns are why M$M marches to their tune

Pushing their fascist Christo-lunacy on the public. Their heads live in 1845.

[moniss]

3. If we could get past the dark money barriers

to disclosure about their funding we would find a good deal of it from foreign sources and the usual suspect countries. Also the impact of contributions of laundered money from human trafficking, drugs and illegal arms trade. But you have a MAGA majority on the SC who will protect that funding at all costs.

[Botany]

4. Leonard Leo got the help he needed from McConnell in his packing of the courts

The mother fucker was laughing as he blocked Merrick Garland from the SCOTUS, rammed through
Amy Coney Island as the voting was already underway, and allowed the shame hearings to cover
up Brett Kavanaugh’s multiple drunken assaults on women.

Leo knows that the demographics should doom the Republicans to the dustbin of history
with fair elections so he has gone all in packing the courts.

Thomas is 76
Roberts turns 70 in a month or two
Alito is 74
Kavanaugh should be removed for all of his sexual assaults

We need to keep the White House, win back the House, and keep the Senate.

[rubbersole]

8. Roberts morphed 'a well regulated militia'...

...into 'a well funded militia'. He was Ws permanent stain on America. Amongst others.

[Botany]

12. Roberts does have some kind of organic brain/nervous disease or problem and will turn 70 shortly.

Roberts was groomed for the SCOTUS for years by people like Leo and the Judicial Crisis Network
including having a ready made family. He is totally compromised.

Btw McConnell was told of Russian interference in 2016 to help Trump and the republicans and
he worked to hide those facts from the American People.

[Clouds Passing]

5. Add Kris Kobach to that list

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/uncovering-kris-kobachs-anti-voting-history

“Notably, Kobach has drafted and promoted several draconian laws, including Arizona’s controversial 2010 “show me your papers” law (which requires police to determine the immigration status of someone arrested or detained when there is “reasonable suspicion” a person is not in the U.S. with lawful authorization), requirements for documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote (all of which have been tied up in court and administrative battles for years), and strict photo ID requirements to vote. He has also been one of the most vocal proponents of the notion that American elections are plagued by voter fraud.“

[erronis]

13. No argument from me. Kobach is extremely conniving and evil.

[Timeflyer]

6. "A republic, if you can keep it," out of the hands of corrupt self-interested plotters like these two.

[BlueTsunami2018]

7. Yep, John Oliver did a show about this last week.

It’s very depressing and bleak. This all happened and no one did a damn thing about it.

[jaxexpat]

10. But, to be fair, progressives were pretty busy rearranging the ACA's purview to mollify the right.

Also, there was the question of proving Obama's birthplace. So much to do/so little time.

Not entirely . It's just that the truth sometimes sound that way.

[NoMoreRepugs]

9. Conservatism, for lack of a better one word descriptor, is a disease that needs to be ELIMINATED from

our society. Leo, Jankowski, Roberts and others are enemies of the state.

[hay rick]

11. Enemies of a humane society. nt

[oldmanlynn]

14. I cant understand how Dems didnt see this coming.

Did we just fall asleep while they did all this?

Seems to be a big miss by dems back in the 2010-2020 time frame

[ReRe]

15. It takes The Guardian

to inform us of our domestic enemies, doesn't it? I've probably learned more about our country from the Guardian
than any news org here.

So, who in this country is appointed to search out our domestic enemies? DOJ via the FBI?

What is the "Mission Statement" of the Federalist Society anyway? It's org seems to thwart the Will of the People.

I see Leo & Jankowski as domestic enemies.