And stolen. As of last night, questions about what happens if one candidate is incapacitated. Its important to remember only three days ago, though many of us, it seems like to go, the president alleged to a National Audience and with no evidence that mailin voting to fraud and he refused to say he will accept the results of the election. We say we are bracing ourselves for what happens when the polls close november 3. It is important to say that that does not indicate the results are illegitimate. May be used to learning results hours after the polls closed but in likelihood, that will not happen this year end that is okay so how does this work . What is the law . Does the constitution say . That is what today is about. We are lucky to have four experts who will shine a light on what to expect and what to repair for polls closed november 3. We will have four briefings and then we will take questions from you. Those of you watching us live can submit your questions anytime starting even now by clicking on the q a button at the bottom of your screen. If youre comfortable doing so, please include your name, affiliation and if you desire, where you are watching us from. We will get to that later, at least some of them. Anytime, youre welcome to do so. To kick it off, we must start with the competition, how does this work in determining who is the next president a professor of law at law school, scholarship and Legal Practice focuses on American Election draw, addressing issues like Voting Rights, political parties, campaign finance, redistricting and election administration. Codirector of the Stanford Cyber policy center, democracy on the internet and social science. Thanks for being with us. Thank you for having me and i should add to that long introduction, what other product, which is the elections project which we have started with my team and you can get material as the election stop work including what we talked about today. Im going to do a quick powerpoint, as i make that transition, let me start by reflecting on the news the last couple of hours and how it has an impact on contested elections and everything we will be talking about in this session, in addition to the other questions we are now going to deal with, we have to talk about what happens if the candidate needs to be replaced, whether it President Trump or Vice President biden and their procedures in place for this in the event that there is a reason a candidate, even after the ballots have been printed needs to be replaced. The rnc and dnc have procedures in place to do that such that when the election happens, the boat will go to the replacement candidate. In addition, if the replacement happens after the vote, the constitutional machinery goes into operation and we have to deal with the question of how the state legislatures might direct the president ial electors for each state. Thats what people have been thinking about already in respect to selection. Different states are more or less wellpositioned to do that because some of the states have laws that require electors to vote for a particular candidate that was on the ballot. Lets start with the calendar and how we should think about each phase of the dispute resolution process. So we will have an election day on november 3 at as you know the ballots, voting has already begun. Millions have artie been cast and so we should expect roughly half of the votes to be cast before election day. But between Election Night and two weeks later there are various deadlines for the receipt of outlets and the expiration of a cure. Mac for disputed, for example, in different states have very different rules on this pick some states will not allow voters to cure defects in the ballot for example, in the signature doesnt match with whats on file, or if there are other technical problems with it. Other states did you several days to cure those defects but all of that will happen in the first two weeks after the election followed by a time where we have canvassing of the ballots and certification. They canvassing begins even earlier than november 17 but deadlines to complete the actual count of the ballots go into the beginning of december. The reason where to get it done by approximately that date, i do want to put an asterisk on december 3 because theres some possible wiggle in the joints here is that under the electoral count act which is the statue that governs president ial elections passed by congress theres a safe harbor deadline which was quite important in bush v. Gore. It does it mean if the votes are not completely counted by that date that the state will not have its electors count, but the law says if they do have them, counted by that date, that is the presumptive slate of electors that will go to the Electoral College which meets on december 14. In the time between december 14 and january 6, we have a presumptive list of electors from every state. Maybe one less come maybe more than one depend on the controversies, and then that the certificates are opened on the house of representatives on january 6. At each stage of this process there is the potential for litigation. Let me just emphasize though and i will make these lights publicly available on my twitter feed, that the nature of litigation in this election, postelection litigation will be determined by several factors. As was true in a 2000 election, the margin of victory at any given stage is the most important question. Although it is possible we will be going into overtime in this election and we have to prepare for that possibility, its not guaranteed and it is possible we will know very soon after the election who won and who lost. We again should prepare ourselves and prepare the public for a long counting period when it is possible we will know who want and who lost soon after Election Night. Depending on the nature of the dispute the litigation will take different forms. Whether it is a dispute over absentee ballots or provisional ballots or recounts like we saw in florida election, depending on the nature of the dispute, different sort of triggers will be pulled. Then there are the nontraditional things we have to refer to, things like what happens if theres violence in polling places, is there some unprecedented use of federal authority, if there are real Serious Problems with the post office that make it come make them unable to deliver the mail, deliver the ballots. Depending on the nature of the forum, the different deadlines may be shifted. By forum i meet are we talking about a dispute the result in state court or federal court . To the administrative process you may remember in the florida recount there was a lot of administrative work, remember secretary of state harris was in charge of that. But obviously theres a lot of work thats happening at the local canvassing boards and as it proceeds to the state system, and Different Actors become more or less important at different stages in this. Let me just run through quickly, and you know theres a lot of text, unlike us that i will make these available to people who request them. We need to understand theres a lot of it litigation already. There are over over 300 cases have been of an file in this election already, and they are going to set the tone for what comes afterwards. I had paid particularly attention to this pennsylvania case that is the potential on its way to the Supreme Court and how that might lay the groundwork for later litigation. If youre interested we have a a litigation tractor helptheelections. Org which shows all the cases and how theyre progressing through the courts. On election day will have lawsuits for that matter even all the voting is occurring in the few days before. In the weeks before. We should not be surprised if it litigation over polling places dysfunction or potentially violent seems to with respect to poll watchers and the like. But then in the aftermath as this that it depends on who is head and by how much of what the nature of the dispute is. I want to emphasize that although well have a flood of absentee ballots in this election, states have rules to adjudicate and evaluate these ballots and we just need to let the state processes work themselves out. Most of the action will start in the state and local canvassing boards and then potentially end up in state court and the like. It is possible though of course because the penny on the nature of dispute you can a federal court action to protect the rights of vote, allegations the election has been marred by fraud and the like. In that week or two after the election we will see the processing of the set of the mail in ballots. Some of these issues regarding the curing of absent ballots could be litigated. And as a saw and bush v. Gore itself litigation over the rules that would apply in perhaps the counting period. But then if it remains closed and that is of course a big if, and as we approach the safe harbor deadline becomes extremely important that the recount of the actual count be completed so that then the electors can be in the Electoral College. We assume because we went through bush v. Gore not that long ago although for my students many of them were not even born yet, that it would fall on a bush v. Gore, that the u. S. Supreme court would get involved, that it would be very judicial lysed process. That is possible that we will have litigation the end up in the Supreme Court be actively involved of course with the death of Justice Ginsburg it becomes more complicated depending on if you have split. There are also other paths which then take advantage of other aspects of the constitution machinery such as the state legislators stepping into a point electors. There is a considerable dispute i would say over whether state legislatures cant ignore the will of the voters if the voters express their preferences on election day and it is clear who they voted for but under a scenario in which as the kennedy to argue about fraud and they tried to say theres a cloud over the results, it is possible you could see different slate of electors coming from the state legislature and the governor that would have to be resolved before the house of representatives. I want to emphasize though if the state legislature set out subverted the wheel of the voters, that would raise all kinds of other constitutional problems with respect to violating the right to vote, but weve never really been in that situation, and with the possibility of kennedy replaced that you could easily see some of state legislatures exercising that right. I will end with what then happens in the succeeding period. By january 6 theres counting on the floor of the house of representatives, and then january 20 is when the new president is sworn in, and if no president has been chosen by that point, then the succession act kicks into place as the 20th amendment and the speaker the house of representatives becomes president. I will end it there and turn over to my other colleagues. Nate, thank you so much. First of all to everybody we have received question saying can you share the presentation. We realize it mightve been hard to read. We will show the slides at aspen and also email it to you suggest, the answer is yes. Sure theres a lot of questions for nate. We will get to those but we felt it was important to start with what does the constitution say, what is known and unknown, so thank you for that, nate. We are now going to turn it over to talking about how how the news media works in these instances as a reminder the news media does not call the election. They project election even though sometimes the wording in some News Organizations they play a little fast and loose. It is really just the norm and something we are used to knowing because the results have been so clear. Its possible that will not be the case this year which is why it was so important to start with nate but lets turn it over to the news media because thats gender how we find it was happening in the world, which is a good thing. Here to tell us how it works is sally buzbee, senior vp and executive editor of the Associated Press. She oversees global news operations, news content from journalists based 250 locations around the world. She led aps coverage of the 2016 president or campaign and election including polling and coverage of the white house, congress and the pentagon. Sally, over to you. Thank you for joining us. Thanks so much and welcome everyone. What am going to do is talk about how News Organizations it into that structure, the constitutional structure that nate just laid out. Including our key role in protecting elections and counting the vote on Election Night. Its important to remember that u. S. Election system is very decentralized. There is no federal agency that oversees voting. The state speech control how their elections are run and in practice have led to a wide variety of practices in Different Levels of skill on the election. On night states report to the public their Election Results as those coming. But my organization, the ap and other organizations, i believe those results come gather them from each of the 50 states and put them together cleanly so that the public can see the whole picture on Election Night. The Electoral College does not meet for a long time, and been based on that as the vote comes in, we say who is going to win the election. We realize were not the official word, as vivian said come in the country. But what we do is we do a very strong mathematical calculation based on the account and went a trailing candidate as no path to catch up or to win mathematically, we tell the public that that person has one that race or that state or Something Like that. The networks also all do this to each of us does it independently. For the record our methodology for doing that is laid out in full transparency on our website at ap. Org. Back to how the system works. As nate laid out, the Electoral College, the race to 270 Electoral College vote is have is how the president is decided. This in fact, is when News Organizations focus on battleground state. Some states under this system that the Founding Fathers set up are, in fact, more critical and others are less critical. Some peoples votes to have more impact in the margin than others. Thats just witticism set up whether we like it or not. If a candidate beat another candidate can of when it votes in florida, they get all of floridas electoral votes. That is one of the most critical things to keep in mind when you were looking at News Coverage on Election Night. Thirdly and the portly, absentee, early and mailin voting has been growing strongly in the transfer years, a full 42 of americans vote in 2016 and the president ial race did so by either voting early voting by mail. They did not show up at the polls on election day and that was before the pandemic. The vast majority of that as we know happened without any fraud. This year because of the pandemic more people want to vote by mail, or early. States are having to wrap up quickly to prepare for that some are ready, others are still trying to get ready. I will say that as a News Organization we found states get better at handling mailin ballots as a primary went on the spring, summer and fall. Theres evidence theyre getting on top of it. As nate said theres already a lot of court fights, legislative make a lastminute changes over the rules come things like how long after election election da mailin ballot be counted. Much of that is a subject of intense political battles. One thing thats important to keep in mind is that in general most states not all but most into account mailin ballots last. Sometimes that can be days after election day. This has happened routinely over the last few years. Is that something new. Why am i i going through this . The reason to point that out is the lack of speed on Election Night in News Organizations calling races does that mean something bad is happening. It is not evoke corruption or problems necessarily. It might just mean estate is been careful to count all its mailin ballots and maybe its struggling with more than they had in the past but that doesnt mean they wont eventually accurately count all of those and report them. We and a lot of other News Organizations have done fact checked about what the president has set a mailin balloting because it does not track with the reality and the accuracy of what we see that its happen. From a race called perspective as i said but with a News Organizations doing Election Night, we cannot project winners, call races into an overture salmon has actually mathematically one or they know they have no path to victory. Some states have automatic recount so even if some is ahead if an automatic recount is triggered at a certain level we are not recall that race because we know theres automatic recount is going to happen. States are going slower than normal at counting ballots because theyre trying to grapple with this new world. That will, in fact, likely impact how fast race called by the networks and by the Associated Press goes on Election Night. We intend to be transparent on Election Night. Thats one of the things that is most important. If we said estate, weve not called arrays are projected to a state, we will go on air, go to the people who we get all reporting to to our customers come to the public and explain why that is so. We will tell the public what is going on in real time. If there is in this vacuum where a race when it is not clear. Thats one big chunk of the situation this year that is in some ways the most important thing but if at the same time e doing other things. This story is sort of changing every day. We know through empirical facts a lot of people have requested ballots. If they get nervous about sending them in and then decide to show up at the polls anyway, theres an indication in the last few days some people are doing that. Of course it might be a lot bigger crowds at the polls and we thought of. Theres just a lot of uncertainty about not two people will vote for but the actual physical ways they will vote than there has been in the past. All of that of course is one element there were also ramped up on Election Night from whatever else on this call is going to talk about, possible intimidation of voters are other types of conflict or unrest on Election Night. We will have to be able to cover that in real time to show the world and the public whats going on. We are completely ramped up for either real realtime or next l battles. We assume many of those will emanate from the states and that they will be hardfought in most cases. Thats a very quick overview of the role of the press on Election Night, and also i think some of the things that most News Organizations are trying to prepare themselves for in case there is a contested election. We have a lot of experience from 2000 of something going to the Supreme Court. We have thankfully reporters in every state you can follow all of these local lawsuits as they play out. I think the most important thing we think we need to do [inaudible] i think we might have lost your audio for a second but youre just wrapping up so we will keep it there. Everybody can hear me. I said so we will tell me if you cant. So sally, thank you so much for that really terrific context. I want to remind everybody come if you have questions, click on the q a button. Dont put in the chip. Please click on the q a button, add your name, affiliation and location if youre comfortable doing so and vendor question in as succinct a as possible. We are now in terms of our next speaker, just days ago we learned President Trumps 2016 campaign was accused of actively trying to deter 3. 5 million black americans in battleground states from voting. They did so but with targeting them with negative Hillary Clinton ads specifically towards those individuals on facebook. This is sadly not the sole instance of attempt to suppress citizens of color from voting, to talk about that and more we are really pleased to have sherrilyn ipo, the president and director counsel of the naacp Legal Defense and Education Fund combinations but a civil rights Law Organization fighting for Racial Justice and equality, a position she is held since 2013. Previously she she was with the aclu was litigated Voting Rights cases and that civil procedure and constitutional law at university of Maryland School of law for almost 20 years. She is, so thrilled to have yet another wonderful expert on these topics and i turn it over to you. Terrific, thank you vivienne and thank you all for joining this important convening. So we heard earlier at the wouldbe litigation about this litigation election and i can assure you will be. Let me give a lens into the way were looking at this in terms of Africanamerican Community and i think that might be of interest to you. We had a number of concerns, two of them are really top of mind at this moment. The first one is around intimidation itself, the issue of potential violence, the issue of individuals and groups intimidating black voters at the polls. I think a lot of what we have heard over the last two weeks suggest this is not an irrational concern and fear for us to have. We can expect theyre going to be a number of concerns about whether there have been Voter Suppression that happens in real time at the polls and, frankly, as we all restored to see early voting is a place for this as well. This may mean to our real concern on the back end of whether all voters in particular polling places were able to participate equally in the political process. The aegis of malicious and so forth will be taken up by one of our subsequent speakers but they all fall into this bailiwick of intimidation. Whenever intimidation not just the independent militia groups. We also have concerns about state actors. You heard the president talk about bringing out sheriffs and so forth. We are also on the lookout for that. Theres numbered civil rights statutes that will help us on the backend, 42 usc 1985 that prevents against conspiracies to interfere with the right to vote, but those are back in litigations that would be available to us and might form the basis for being able to challenge the Election Results that come into particular polling places. Its critical to be aware of that. The second big bailiwick is one absentee voting. Thats because during the covid19 pandemic many civil rights organizations have pushed to try to expand absentee voting opportunities for black voters. The black community has been very hardhit the black and Latino Community by the covid19 pandemic. A number of us including the Legal Defense fund had really honed in on some of the owners absentee voter requirements in some states. We just recently one hour litigation in louisiana. Three days ago we received a favorable decision in alabama which relaxes absentee voter restrictions. What this means is well see something we generally dont see. Africanamerican voters are less likely traditionally to vote absentee. Africanamerican voters often have mistrusted the absentee process, want to vote in person. It is part of a an acknowledgment of history and so traditionally we have not wanted to vote absentee. Its also true that the votes of africanamericans who cast absentee votes are more often not counted then those of white voters because of errors in the absentee vote was returned to the polls. This year were going to see something quite different because we had been encouraging particularly elderly africanamericans who are more likely to come up to the polls traditionally to vote absentee to protect against covid19 pandemic. What that means it is theres also the obligation on the back and to count all of us absentee votes. So Election Night is one issue but a week after the elections is going to be critical to count those votes particularly and places where africanamerican turnout is equally important to the president ial election, Senate Election and other down ballot races do we expect and fear frankly there may be intimidation of vote counters. Many of us old enough to remember the Brooks Brothers riot in 2000 during the bush v. Gore election. Our fear this year is is that rather than wearing khakis they will be strapped with ar15s. So its critical to engage with attorney generals, governors to prepare to protect the election counters the week after the election so that we can ensure all absentee votes are counted. To the extent there are problems on election day, and there always are, and this would expect to be an incredible turnout on election day, that would be more provisional ballots cast than usual. These of the ballots that are cast when you come up to the table and you know this is your polling place but somehow your name is not on the books. Your place on an inactive list or there are other issues associated with your bow. He may be committed to vote provisionally. The provisional ballots are not counted on Election Night. The following week you have to come back into the board of elections to true the provisional ballots, to explain why he should been allowed to e at that polling place. Many years is is not a big deal because the elections are not that close by in a number of states and jurisdictions with elections may be close, even the provisional ballots would be critically important. Once again to the extent we have seen massive Voter Suppression target of africanamerican committee, polling place changes target at the Africanamerican Community and other oppression activities we should expect a disproportionate number of people who will be casting provisional ballots will be black voters. So once again we will be pressing to make sure that africanamerican voters who voted provisionally whenever an opportunity to cure those ballots on the backend. We have issue of intimidation, where the issue of absentee votes, with the issue of provisional votes. I should also mention that the issue of the polling place itself on election day and the need to extend polling place ours is a subject of litigation will have very long lines, specialty extent we have problems that exist with machines and we seen this in 2018 and 2016, machines that mysteriously switched the vote from one party to another. They have to bring out that a technician to calibrate the machines. In Gwinnett County george you may recall the polling places open four hours late because her some reason the power cords were not in the polling place. We typically go into court been on election day to seek an extension of hours. This is in the primary election this year, the lasso and the primer in the battle just this summer was cast at 1 a. M. Theres going to be litigation that day to try to extend the hours of the polling place and that may be the cause of some of the delay in being able to call elections but also some of the confusion that may happen at the polls, and with your intimidation that may have at the polls particularly if the president frankly uses social media to suggest that people [inaudible] regular illegal or evidence of fraud. I want to add one thing on the count that hasnt been discussed and it may not be discussed today, and this is about what habits on january 6 you will recall that during bush v. Gore on january 6 when the electors were all now to be accepted by the cartridge, it was members of the black caucus who stood and opposed the acceptance of the 25 electors in florida. They were acting in accordance with three usc section 15 in which they were raising an objection. Under that statute, that objection cannot be received if it is also signed by at least one member of the senate. No member of the senate was willing in january 2001 the sign that objection raised by members of the Congressional Black Caucus. But this year given all that weve talked about and the very many legitimate reasons why people may have concerns about the votes that were cast and Voter Suppression and the number of states, we need to keep in mind that the new senate is seeded on january 3, and that this meeting doesnt happen until january 6 there may be a senator who is willing to sign on with objections raised by members of outcome members of the Congressional Black Caucus is deeply racial Voter Suppression happens inside of the casting or counting of ballots. This is one of the reasons why the senate races are so important. As we think about calling the election and whats going to happen in the count, we should remember alabama which normally is written off in the president ial election as a red state. We should think about georgia, think about south carolina. These are places in which there are Close Senate Races and arizona and colorado more traditionally looked at as potential battleground states. Ldf works penciled in the south. We are focused on those states. We are not partisan organization but we believe it is critical that every vote is counted. I would just draw your attention to the fact that we really have to take this all the way to january 6 and the potential statutory challenge that may be received quite differently in 2021 than it was received in 2001. I will stop there, and happy to take questions later. Sherrilyn, thank you so much. They are just so many variables and its a grateful to all of the panelists for shedding light on all of them. In the debates the other day you may recall the president told the White Supremacist Group proud boys to quote, stand back and standby. While there are different interpretations as to what he met there is evidence that far right neofascist groups are preparing to act. They have been signs of intimidation at polling places early voting polling places. In the event of demonstrations by supporters of Vice President , in the event of intimidation at the polling places what does the constitution say about armed militia and demonstrators . To shed light on that topic we are pleased to have mary mccord, legal director at the institute for constitutional advocacy and protection and is a professor of law at Georgetown University law center, previously mary was acting assistant attorney general for National Security department of justice, Principal Deputy assistant attorney general for the National Security division, and was with the u. S. Attorneys office for the district of columbia. Mary, thanks for joining us, d over to you. Thank you so much for having me, aspen, and to my fellow panelists. I know our focus here is on the day after, but in light of comments and a light of what we all heard on tuesday night during the president ial debate, i think its worth talking also a little bit about the prospect of armed groups intimidating voters at the polls. The president of the other night was unwilling to denounce the possibility of civil unrest following the election. He was urging his supporters to go to the polls to poll watch, and he was of course region out to the proud boys to standby. This is really a dog whistle for far right armed groups in the country who operate wholly outside of Governmental Authority and is shown themselves historically and particularly in this last year, particularly since the pandemic started and george floyd was killed, have really shown themselves to be coming out in public much more frequently, and certainly in response to things the president says. And that is both in opposition to government such as what we saw earlier this spring when groups of armed individuals stormed statehouses and governors mansions in lansing, michigan, and in louisville, kentucky, and elsewhere in opposition to Public Health safety orders, shutdown orders and stayathome orders. And more recently in response to antimasking, or mask orders that theyre opposed to get weve also seen arms groups deploying and was bored of purported to be an augmentation of Governmental Authority, tht is usually in response to Racial Justice protests where they ostensibly deployed to downtown streets during demonstrations and peaceful marches in order to protect property, often in response to false rumors of violent anarchists come into those communities. This has that tragic results as weve seen in kenosha, albuquerque, and of the places with people being shot and wounded and, of course, killed in kenosha, two people kill kill. These are the groups have a history of responding to the president s statements, not just recently but over the last several years. So several groups responded to the southwest border after the president complained about the Migrant Caravan threatening the u. S. They of course have no authority. It were not called into action by any Governmental Authority, but they came to the southwest border and took migrants into custody and held them for customs and border patrol. We saw them deploy to approach of rallies, ostensibly to protect rally goers. And we have seen them call out over social media a willingness to, to the president aid back during the impeachment proceedings, in the event that the president should event impeached and removed from office. Now of course with a daily dose of disinformation about mailin balloting being susceptible to fraud and about any delay in the calculations being the result of a rigged election. So based on the past we can expect that really will be a call for some of these armed organizations to self deploy to the polls to protect the vote, protect against fraud, and then post election to protect the counting of the votes. If the results dont go the way there is already talk on social media about civil unrest. What i want to make sure it is phoebe takes only three things away from what ive said today, its first, that armed groups of individuals have no authority under federal or state law, that is constitutional or statutory law, to call themselves into service as a militia. Secondly, the Second Amendment, the individual right to bear arms does not protect paramilitary activity or militia activity by unauthorized armed individuals. It does not prevent states from prohibiting it. Third, all 50 states prohibit it. Let me unpack that for you. Groups will often referred refe use of the terms militia in the u. S. Constitution and in state constitutions to say, thats us, we have authority under the constitution to exist, to muster him and itself to point when we think that if necessary. But militia historically refers to all ablebodied residence between certain ages who are available for the government to call forth into active service in defense of the state. There is no authority in federal or state law for armed groups of individuals to self activate or call themselves forth. In fact, every state has a very comprehensive scheme i which the governor in times of need can call forth ablebodied individuals. Once he does so, and this would be to augment the National Guards which already exist in all 50 states, if he does so they then become subordinate to and must report up to the civilian government. In fact, 48 states have baked into the constitutions the requirement that in all cases the military be subordinate to the civilian government. Second, for all the areas of the gray in the Second Amendment, this is not one of them. The Supreme Court in 1886 upheld, postcivil war reconstruction, upheld a law that still exist to this day in 29 states that prohibits bodies of men from associating together as military units or parading or drilling in public with firearms. The Supreme Court upheld the statute against constitutional challenge in 1886 saying it was without question that states had to have the ability to prevent such private era military organizations in to protect peace and good order. In 2008 the Supreme Court in district of columbia versus heller, when holding for the first time in that case that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms for when an individual self protection pointedly contrasted that with its statements in 1886 and reaffirm that the Second Amendment is not prevent states from banning private paramilitary organizations. And, of course, the third is all 50 states do, whether its through the constitutional i mention, whether it is to the antimalicious statutes which are criminal statutes in 29 states, or whether or whether its through antiparamilitary activity statutes which exist in 25 states which bar training, instructing, chemistry or practicing the use of firearms or techniques capable of causing injury or death during civil disorder, whether its through statutes upon the false assumption of the duties and functions of law enforcement. There is no state that authorizes this type of private armed activity. Theres no state that doesnt prohibit it explicitly in its loss. So its incumbent about come i dont think we into this election, pre, during and post we necessarily rely on the federal government to protect voters into Public Safety. This is going to fall on state and local officials to know these laws, to make public statements right now about the importance of voters being able to feel safe at the polls. Support for Public Safety after the election both while we are tied to the votes and after a winner is declared, and the fact that the loss to government this type of selfhelp, this vigilante activity by private armed organizations. They can be investigating now. They can be issuing civil orders. They could be doing even criminal prosecutions where necessary. It really should stretch across the ideological political divide. I commend the republican commissioner of elections in philadelphia yesterday for coming out strong against voter intimidation. Thats the kind of thing that we need to see. Support the validity of the election. Theres no reason to believe that there is going to be any type of massive fraud. No recently that disinformation that that is circulating on social media, and urge peace, calm, and the peaceful transition of power should that be the result of the election. Mary, thank you so much, so much about this point unappreciative last comment. All of our panelists have been so clear that while we all must remain vigilant, we do want to undermine confidence in systems that are in place and that work there where going to jump right into come in a remaining minutes will jump right into the questions. Nate, this first one is for you and accounts from adam in new york. For states like pennsylvania which is a swing state, with a republicancontrolled legislature, under what circumstances can that legislator decide on his electors rather than the electors that were voted in by majority . What other are the standards fs happening . Under pennsylvania law, and let me emphasize that this varies statebystate. So what i will say about pennsylvania does not necessarily apply everywhere. Under pennsylvania law it has to be the choice of electors have to be part of a normal lawmaking process which involves the governor. There are several levels in which his questions being asked the first question is, suppose there is a clear winner in the popular vote in pennsylvania, and then the state legislature wants to essentially overturn that election. Can it do that . The short answer is not under pennsylvania law but did you get into an interesting debate under the u. S. Constitution because article ii of the u. S. Constitution says each state shall determine in the manner determined by the legislature thereof a number of electors. You do have the possibility that state legislatures could make the argument that have independent authority to choose elect her what emphasize thats not the end of the story even there because we have a robust jurisprudence now on Voting Rights with the overturn a popular election, that the courts want something to say about it. I do want to emphasize one thing just because i may have spoken in error in my presentation. Im glad sherrilyn mentioned this, which is the adjudication of the final certificates for the Electoral College is done by congress. It would be both the senate and the house that we do. Its, the certificates of the other house of representatives but the dispute is done by both houses of congress. Thanks, nate. The next question, sally, were going to direct this to you and accounts from david in pennsylvania who of course is a legendary editor and journalist. The question is, sally, hazarding any discussions among the major news players, ap, other wire services, the new york times, the Washington Post and the networks about working together on ground rules for winter projections this year given the unique circumstances . I assume you mean around race calling and other things. Thats a great question. That sort of a doubleedged sword. I think that there has been some, i mean i thought of that question things like that. I think the media is very worried about, like if i went to other News Organizations et cetera hey, heres how were going to do Election Night. I think we could be open to some people in this country perhaps saying that the media was colluding or Something Like that. There has been i think some no. I mean, we all have our ethical standard or other News Organizations that are factbased and credible and have high standards, we consult with regularly to make sure that like a wee doing things the right way, as her son better way we can do something, or Something Like that. There hasnt been actually, but we may participate, i would answer the question in another way. Weve been participating in the repair like this we can ever find so we can throw out what we do in the most transparently as possible. Like i said how we call races is on a website. We are doing that so the public and other News Organizations have the right to contact us say hey, we dont agree with this. We criticize this, i would have it level of transparency is were trying to have this year, i would say, is incredibly high than any past year. I know a fair amount. Everyone race calls independently. Everyone projects races to use independently. Its a small world of all know what each other standards are. I fundamentally think that group of people including the group of people at fox, there was a super interesting ben smith called the other day about the race calling operation at fox, which is a very good operation by the way, and very independent from sort of talking head people. I think everyone is trying to do the right thing. David, we talked about some of that but i do think im a little leery of the idea that all the News Organizations in america are getting together and decide what to do. What were trying to do is stick to our standards, be transparent about our standards, and then in real realtime be transparent about our standards, which is the kind of thing for us to do that we didnt always do historically in the past. Any panel like this that is talking to the public about what the media is doing, i wanted to show up at and we willing to let everything out there before election day. Anything that anyone has any ideas about ways to open up the books of the news media, we are open to that idea. Thanks, thanks, sally come s. The next question comes from catherine. She writes hello from Washington State. Something ive heard our secretive state say, but with the secretary of state is kim wyman, republican in Washington StateWashington State has had decades of experience with mailin voting. Hunting effort our secretary of state say is that a job of an election administrator is to convince a loser that they did, in fact, lose. I would be interested to any or all of the panelists talk on this issue. Sherrilyn, would you like to take that one . First of all, im not sure thats the job of an election administrator. I especially think that many candidates will be impervious to that this year. People have whole teams that theyre using to advise them on the count. And as i suggested, i think these exogenous factors we often talk about very much would influence for the candidates are willing to accept the count. So yes, on when you think the Election Administrators want to be able to do the job and discipline the reason why i think the potential intimidation of counters after the election is so harmful. Obviously it would be a terrible thing, but it also will increase likely that candidates will not accept the result if they feel pressure has been brought to bear on those counting the ballots, and it will undermine confidence in what election administrator site is the outcome. Its very important that the county, that the be a wide berth around the county so that people can feel confident in that subsequently that the ballots are, in fact, encounter without intimidation, without Election Administrators eating talked come without some of the of the things we fear may happen that will undermine the building of people to believe that they should of confidence and, in fact, may undermine the confidence of the count. I want to point out for the last question about whether news media have come together to which a member also social media, and facebook has announced that it will not allow posts by campaigns of the candidates calling the election until reuters and ap is called the election. So that is, in many conversations with the Facebook Team about our fears about some of the facebook will be used. One thing theyve agreed to do is that, is that they will not allow the platform to be used for candidates and their campaigns to sokol called the election, and they are relying on reuters and ap as a kind of official sources and they will not allow it until those races have been called by those two platform. Great, thanks. Thats really important addition to the next question comes from sillinger jarvis. Should be worried that the the president could order the u. S. Attorney general to and pound voting boxes in key swing states under the Voting Rights act, or if their civil unrest on election day could the president invoke the insurrection act . Mary, i dont know if you want to take that one . If not, we can give it over to make. I will take the second piece of that and i will let nate or cheryl and take the first piece of that on the empowerment of the ballot boxes. But when it comes to the insurrection act, the president does have some authority to call for state militias. By state militias that meet official militias, the national guard. Those who are reporting up through authority. He has the authority to do that in certain circumstances, including insurrection or the inability to really protect federal and state law, to enforce and protect federal and state law. The question there is come he can also ask voluntarily for states to send their militias. For example, what we saw in washington, d. C. On may 30, 31st, june 1 fight after george floyd was killed when we saw the president asking for state, National Guards to send their units to d. C. To quell the civil unrest, that was actually not the use of the insurrection act. That was a request for then to voluntarily come, and a number of states said yes, but a number of states, governors said no to that request. The insurrection act is that just a request. Its a demand and its in certain circumstances. The question there would be are the circumstances of insurrection or rebellion, the predicates in the statute actually met based on whats going on. It would be a misuse of that authority for the president to suggest, for example, that he didnt think the outcome was fair come he didnt think it was right and to protect against civil unrest, he would invoke the insurrection act. Because if it is no reason to believe that the election is unfair, that seems there would be an abuse of that authority. That said, we have an attorney general who is very much a believer in the unitary executive authority, which gives a great deal of authority to the president and so it remains to be seen what sort of legal advice or legal argument the attorney general would make. I think this is in the area of potential vacancy litigation if this authority is misused. Thanks, mary. Do you want to take the first part that question, should we be worried the president or the attorney general to a pound voting boxes in key swing states . We know the president can order the attorney general to do anything. The question is whether the attorney general of the with this attorney general, sadly, this is the random factor. Whether he could lawfully do it, i would of course say no. But, unfortunately, this attorney general has taken positions that many of us thought a quite alarming, particularly in relation to state power and state authority. This is one of the things that we have to keep top of my pics almost all the things i mentioned as potential bases for challenging elections over being concerned about what happens on election day entry the count are matters we would normally reach up to the department of justice to assist us with or the local use the attorneys to assist us with. I will say that this year, in many states, we dont feel that way. Certainly in terms of what the attorney general is likely to do there initially noconfidence in the Civil Rights Community the attorney general would be protecting the ballot for voters rather than for the president at this moment. Sherrilyn, think of it. I really am sad to say without a time because there there are so many other great questions. There are a lot of questions in particular about the specific impact on President Trumps illness and the various scenarios there. Thank you for teaching about a bit. Im sorry we couldnt get to them but think think with the. We will post a recording of this session on aspen digital twitter handle. We also, this will be broadcast on cnbc. I want to say offer speakers and a participants, and its going to be an interesting fall, clad you could all be with us. Thanks very much. Tonight on the communicators tech freedom founder of berin szoka and free press coceo Jessica Gonzalez on tech issues that may play a role in campaign 2020. What the administration is trying to do is narrow the protection for content moderation so the websites would look to be protected if they tried to remove content they thought was false or perhaps racist. I am no fan of big tech platforms and how they have abused their workers and how they have abused the privacy rights of their users. But, frankly, going after section 230 is not the right approach to the very real problems that we are seeing with online platforms. Berin szoka and Jessica Gonzalez tonight at eight eastern on the communicators on cspan2. Watch live coverage of the Senate Confirmation hearings for judge Amy Coney Barrett starting monday, october 12 with opening by Judiciary Committee members and judge. Live coverage on cspan and cspan. Org. The smut on the cspan radio app and be sure to visit cspan. Org to view a playlist of Amy Coney Barretts legal views