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Latest Featured Reports | Friday, February 14, 2025
Global Health Menace Becomes U.S. Health Chief; Also: DOJ's Thursday Afternoon Massacre: 'BradCast' 2/13/25
Repubs confirm RFK, Jr. to HHS; Six DoJ officials resign in defiance of Trump order...
'Green News Report' 2/13/25
  w/ Brad & Desi
Climate change reshaping U.S. real estate markets; Admin failing to hire seasonal firefighters; PLUS: Trump rolls back money-saving efficiency standards...again...
Previous GNRs: 2/11/25 - 2/6/25 - Archives...
2024's Last Unsettled Race: 'BradCast' 2/12/25
Guest: Debra Dicks Maxwell of the NC NAACP; Also: Trump 'violates First Amendment' by shutting AP out of Oval Office, attacks free speech by firing another IG...
'Very Dire': Ethics Expert on Trump's Golden Age of Corruption: 'BradCast' 2/11/25
Guest: Craig Holman of Public Citizen; Also: Bannon pleads guilty; Blago wins full pardon; DoJ drops charges against Adams in NYC...
'Green News Report' 2/11/25
  w/ Brad & Desi
Hottest January on record. Again.; Trump Admin halts funding for national EV charging network, cancels paper straws; PLUS: Super Bowl ads take a break from electric cars...
Previous GNRs: 2/6/25 - 2/3/25 - Archives...
'Insane': Former FEC Chair on Trump's Firing of Current FEC Chair: 'BradCast' 2/10/25
Guest: Former FEC Commish Ann Ravel; Also: Admin attempts to 'delete' agency that polices Big Bank fraud; Will Trump follow court orders?...
Sunday 'Bye American' Toons
THIS WEEK: Enemy Within ... Distractions of the Day ... Never Surrender ... And much more in our latest collection of the week's best toons!...
Some Trump/Musk 'Shutdowns', 'Pauses' and 'Freezes' You Haven't Heard as Much About: 'BradCast' 2/6/25
Guest: David Dayen on CFPB, NLRB shutdowns; Also: Bird flu news; Racist DOGE Bro resigns...
'Green News Report' 2/6/25
  w/ Brad & Desi
Musk's DOGE Bros descend on NOAA, Trump taps disgraced 'SharpieGate' guy to run it; Monarch butterfly hits new low in Western U.S.; PLUS: Study finds rats love global warming...
Previous GNRs: 2/3/25 - 1/30/25 - Archives...
'Two-State Solution -- State of Confusion and State of Chaos': 'BradCast' 2/5/25
Guests: Heather Digby Parton, 'Driftglass' on the disastrous, illegal, authoritarian state of play in Trump/Musk World, and its rising Opposition...
The Opposition Takes Shape:
'BradCast' 2/4/25
Agency insiders, elected Dems, civil suits, public actions coalesce to take on the radical rightwing extremism of Trump, Musk and the DOGE Bros...
'Green News Report' 2/3/25
Tariff threats spike energy prices; Admin deletes 'climate change' across government; Micro-plastics found damaging human brains; PLUS: Trump wasted billions of gallons of water in CA...
'You're Not Overwhelmed. You're Under Attack.': 'BradCast' 2/3/25
Trump's unlawful firings at DOJ, FBI; CDC databases gone; USAID taken over, shut down; Musk takes over payment system for entire U.S...
Sunday 'DEI (Divisive Erroneous Idiocracy)' Toons
THIS WEEK: Blame Gaming ... MAGA Me Too-ing ... Buyer's Remorsing ... And more! In our latest collection of the week's most idiotic toons...
'Green News Report' 1/30/25
New data on cause of Altadena fire; Senate confirms Trump EPA pick; Powerful cyclone slams Ireland; PLUS: Global warming changing Pacific migration patterns...
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GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal 2012...
VA GOP VOTER REG FRAUDSTER OFF HOOK
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...

Criminal GOP Voter Registration Fraud Probe Expanding in VA
State investigators widening criminal probe of man arrested destroying registration forms, said now looking at violations of law by Nathan Sproul's RNC-hired firm...

DOJ PROBE SOUGHT AFTER VA ARREST
Arrest of RNC/Sproul man caught destroying registration forms brings official calls for wider criminal probe from compromised VA AG Cuccinelli and U.S. AG Holder...

Arrest in VA: GOP Voter Reg Scandal Widens
'RNC official' charged on 13 counts, for allegely trashing voter registration forms in a dumpster, worked for Romney consultant, 'fired' GOP operative Nathan Sproul...

ALL TOGETHER: ROVE, SPROUL, KOCHS, RNC
His Super-PAC, his voter registration (fraud) firm & their 'Americans for Prosperity' are all based out of same top RNC legal office in Virginia...

LATimes: RNC's 'Fired' Sproul Working for Repubs in 'as Many as 30 States'
So much for the RNC's 'zero tolerance' policy, as discredited Republican registration fraud operative still hiring for dozens of GOP 'Get Out The Vote' campaigns...

'Fired' Sproul Group 'Cloned', Still Working for Republicans in At Least 10 States
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...

FINALLY: FOX ON GOP REG FRAUD SCANDAL
The belated and begrudging coverage by Fox' Eric Shawn includes two different video reports featuring an interview with The BRAD BLOG's Brad Friedman...

COLORADO FOLLOWS FLORIDA WITH GOP CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION
Repub Sec. of State Gessler ignores expanding GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, rants about evidence-free 'Dem Voter Fraud' at Tea Party event...

CRIMINAL PROBE LAUNCHED INTO GOP VOTER REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL IN FL
FL Dept. of Law Enforcement confirms 'enough evidence to warrant full-blown investigation'; Election officials told fraudulent forms 'may become evidence in court'...

Brad Breaks PA Photo ID & GOP Registration Fraud Scandal News on Hartmann TV
Another visit on Thom Hartmann's Big Picture with new news on several developing Election Integrity stories...

CAUGHT ON TAPE: COORDINATED NATIONWIDE GOP VOTER REG SCAM
The GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal reveals insidious nationwide registration scheme to keep Obama supporters from even registering to vote...

CRIMINAL ELECTION FRAUD COMPLAINT FILED AGAINST GOP 'FRAUD' FIRM
Scandal spreads to 11 FL counties, other states; RNC, Romney try to contain damage, split from GOP operative...

RICK SCOTT GETS ROLLED IN GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL
Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) sends blistering letter to Gov. Rick Scott (R) demanding bi-partisan reg fraud probe in FL; Slams 'shocking and hypocritical' silence, lack of action...

VIDEO: Brad Breaks GOP Reg Fraud Scandal on Hartmann TV
Breaking coverage as the RNC fires their Romney-tied voter registration firm, Strategic Allied Consulting...

RNC FIRES NATIONAL VOTER REGISTRATION FIRM FOR FRAUD
After FL & NC GOP fire Romney-tied group, RNC does same; Dead people found reg'd as new voters; RNC paid firm over $3m over 2 months in 5 battleground states...

EXCLUSIVE: Intvw w/ FL Official Who First Discovered GOP Reg Fraud
After fraudulent registration forms from Romney-tied GOP firm found in Palm Beach, Election Supe says state's 'fraud'-obsessed top election official failed to return call...

GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD FOUND IN FL
State GOP fires Romney-tied registration firm after fraudulent forms found in Palm Beach; Firm hired 'at request of RNC' in FL, NC, VA, NV & CO...
The Secret Koch Brothers Tapes...


Guest: Physicist, author and former Asst. Energy Sec. Joe Romm on Trump, Perry, Tillerson, the DoE and 'the fate of the next thousand years'
Also: Jill Stein's 'recount' lessons and her ongoing fight for citizen oversight of elections...
By Brad Friedman on 12/13/2016 6:22pm PT  

On today's BradCast, Green Party candidate Jill Stein speaks to lessons learned during her wildly obstructed attempt at citizen oversight of election results in three states, and a former U.S. Dept. of Energy official joins us with warnings about Donald Trump's disturbing choices to head the State Department, the EPA and the DoE, where a chilling Transition Team memo was recently sent in apparent hopes of ferreting out climate scientists in a witch-hunt reminiscent of the McCarthy era. [Audio link to show posted at bottom of article.]

First up, Stein held a press conference call today to wrap up her attempted "recount" of Presidential election results in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Despite her willingness to pay millions of dollars, only one of those states, WI, allowed a statewide count at all. And, even there, it was done mostly by computer, so the results remain unverified by actual human beings. Still, she and her attorney on the call vowed to press on with a lawsuit in Pennsylvania and other actions meant to try and amend the horrific election practices, processes and laws exposed, once again, during the wildly obstructed and unprecedented attempt at counts and forensic analyses in all three states.

Then, my guest today is Dr. Joe Romm, physicist and former Deputy Asst. Secretary of Energy at the U.S. Dept. of Energy. He is now a Climate Progress blogger and author and he joins me to discuss, among other things, Donald Trump's nominations of former TX Gov. Rick Perry to head up the DoE (which, when he could remember its name while a Presidential candidate, he vowed to shut down entirely); Climate science denier and Oklahoma A.G. Scott Pruitt as DPA chief; and ExxonMobil's enormously interest-conflicted CEO Rex Tillerson as Sec. of State.

As Romm notes, "the Department of Energy is a very poorly understood agency" which most Americans, including Trump and Perry, likely know little about. It's a sprawling federal agency that carries out nuclear energy research as well as oversight and disaster clean-up. "So you have the weapons labs, you have all the national labs, which do energy and all sorts of work, including the nation's physics labs," he explains. "The Department of Energy has the highest ratio of PhDs per employee of any of the agencies, because it's doing all of this physics and energy research, and weapons research. So it's a good thing that Rick Perry got those glasses that make him smart."

On Trump's nomination of Tillerson to head up the State Department, Romm describes the conflicts of interest with the ExxonMobile CEO's pending $500 billion deal with Russia, observing: "If we didn't live in this topsy-turvy world where Donald Trump is President and naming people to run agencies who are anti-everything the agencies stand for, it would be ridiculous. Secretary of State is one of the most important, maybe the most important cabinet positions there is. Historically, it goes to someone who really understands diplomacy and many aspects of international policy." But Tillerson, he argues, has "literally no qualifications other than the fact that he has negotiated oil deals around the world."

As disturbing as Trump's nominations may be, however, even more chilling may be the story told by the McCarthy-esque survey recently sent by someone at the Trump Transition team to the Dept. of Energy, asking them to identify scientists and other career civil service employees who have worked on climate change and renewable energy issues at the federal agency, or even those who may have simply attended a U.N. climate conference. Romm speaks to all of the above, which he describes as "unprecedented" and details why there are newly disturbing reasons to be concerned about, "literally, the fate of the next thousand years."

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report, with more on the above and, believe it or not, some arguably good news she was able to find from the U.S. Congress, of all places!...

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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Guest: Marcy Wheeler on U.S. intel agencies' 'secret' allegations about foreign interference in the Presidential race, as 'recount' ends in WI, is denied by courts again in MI, PA...
By Brad Friedman on 12/12/2016 6:18pm PT  

On today's BradCast, what we know and don't about newly reported charges that the CIA is said to believe Russian state-actors interfered in the U.S. election on behalf of Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton, even as attempts to verify the actual Presidential election results, and concerns that they were hacked or otherwise in error, are blocked by Republicans in Michigan and Pennsylvania and come to an official close in Wisconsin. [Audio link to show posted below.]

Over the weekend, Washington Post and New York Times each reported on unnamed sources alleging a "secret" "consensus" of U.S. intelligence agencies charging Russia tried to interfere with the Presidential election in order to help Donald Trump defeat Hillary Clinton. National security journalist and author Marcy Wheeler of EmptyWheel.net offers a measure of skepticism about the explosive reports on those allegations, which she suggests could echo what proved to be blatantly misrepresented and cherry-picked intel by the George W. Bush Administration in their run-up to the Iraq War.

We discuss what we know and don't know concerning the newly reported charges, which parties have an interested in forwarding them and why they are arising in this form now, and how those concerns can possibly square with seemingly contradictory resistance --- by both Republicans and Democrats alike --- to human verification of the stunning and poll-defying 2016 Presidential election results reported in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and elsewhere.

Speaking of which, late on Friday, a 3-2 split vote at the MI state Supreme Court denied a hearing of Green Party candidate Jill Stein's appeal of a 3-Republican judge decision that aborted the state's disastrous paper ballot hand-count last week. And today, a federal court in PA denied [PDF] Stein's lawsuit seeking a statewide hand-count of paper ballots and a forensic analysis of the 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting and computer tabulation systems used across most of the state. Also today, the state of Wisconsin completed its partial statewide hand-count and certified Donald Trump as the winner of that state's electoral vote. (Final tallies are not yet available from the Wisconsin Election Commission, but as of earlier today Reuters reported "Trump with a increase of 628 votes, Clinton with an increase of 653 votes and Stein with an increase of 68 votes". Those are net increases, without reflecting the total number of originally-mistallied votes, nor explaining that most of the state's largest counties simply ran the hand-marked paper ballots back through the optical-scan computers again to derive their "recount" totals.)

All of that amidst a repeated, coordinated, well-funded and familiar efforts by Republicans and Team Trump to block any and all verification of Presidential election results in all three states. "Cronyism, bureaucratic obstruction, and legal maneuvering have run roughshod over the democratic process," Stein said following Friday's Supreme Court decision in MI after tens of thousands of votes were deemed "unrecountable" due to the state's arcane "recount" laws while the attempted count was still underway last week. "A recount should not be this difficult or controversial. If you take out money from a bank, the teller counts it twice --- and the second time, they count it in front of your eyes. It should be well understood that something as important as a presidential election requires a basic level of quality assurance and verification."

We have all of the latest details on today's BradCast...

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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Guest: Susan Pynchon of Florida Fair Elections Coalition on high 'invalid vote' rate, a hacked election vendor, case calling for hand-counts in FL
Plus: Claims of Russian election hacking and chilling Trump transition news at DOE...
By Brad Friedman on 12/9/2016 6:51pm PT  

A federal court victory for Jill Stein in Wisconsin; a federal court hearing in Pennsylvania; the fight to restart counting in Michigan; and the case for a recount in Florida. Yes, in Florida. But that's just the tip of the iceberg on today's very busy BradCast! [Audio link to complete show follows below.]

First up, some encouraging news from the New York Attorney General concerning his intentions to hold Donald Trump's nominees to head up the Environmental Protection Agency and Dept. of Labor accountable to the rule of law. Then, a bit more good news out WI today, where a federal court dismissed a Team Trump attempt to stop the ongoing Presidential "recount" in the state.

Meanwhile, a federal court in PA heard Jill Stein's case calling for a statewide count and forensic analysis of voting systems today. And, following the the hearing, in a press conference outside the courthouse, University of MI Computer Science and voting systems expert Prof. J. Alex Halderman explained again why such a study is necessary.

"Over the past ten years, we've found every one of the [voting and tabulation systems in the U.S.] susceptible to hacking. Doesn't matter whether they're plugged into the Internet directly or not," he said. "The evidence on the paper ballots, the evidence on the software in the machines --- that's what we're asking to examine. And that's the only way we're ever going to know for sure whether our votes were counted correctly or not in the 2016 Presidential election. We think that by looking at that evidence, which seems to me like just a common-sense security precaution, we can increase voter confidence, and help everyone know their that their votes really counted." Those comments come on the same day that the Obama Administration announced plans to release a report on charges that Russian hackers attempted to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election.

Then, we're joined by long time election integrity champion, Susan Pynchon, founder of Florida Fair Elections Coalition and a central character in HBO's Emmy-nominated 2006 documentary Hacking Democracy, joins us to discuss a lawsuit [PDF] filed late last week calling for a statewide hand-count of paper ballots in FL(!)

Pynchon explains the reasons why it was filed, which include not just the surprising result in the state's Presidential race, but also reports that a Florida-based corporate vendor by the name of VR Systems --- a company contracted by about a dozen states --- was reportedly hacked earlier this year. She says they provided "voter registration and other services in 64 of Florida's 67 counties. Voter databases, management and tracking of mail-in ballots, and election reporting services on election night." (And here is that Exhibit T [PDF] from the complaint that I referenced during the show, concerning troubling voter registration problems reported on Election Day in several Sunshine State counties, including Broward and Lee.)

Also, Pynchon details the high "invalid vote rate" ("votes that weren't actually counted --- undervotes, overvotes, and invalid write-in votes"), which she says is "more than double in this election than it was in 2008 and 2012. We need to take a close look at that because it's not normal. It's not typical of past elections." She goes on to describe how one county was also found to have "ordered duplicate sets of [security] seals," asking: "So how secure is that when you're sealing a ballot box with a seal that could then just be replaced with your duplicate set of seals?"

Coincidentally, part of Halderman's remarks from outside of the federal courthouse in Philadelphia this afternoon, which we play in full on the show today, referred to how easy it is to break into those voting machine security seals. He says they are "easy to remove in just a few seconds with a hairdryer or a screwdriver."

"You know, if you'd asked me this ten years ago, I would have said, well, maybe it sounds like science fiction, someone hacking into a country's national election by tampering with the voting machines," warns Halderman. "I think it's only a matter of time before this happens, if it hasn't happened already."

Finally today, an incredibly chilling missive was confirmed to have been sent to the U.S. Dept. of Energy from the Trump transition team, seeking the names and details of scientists and other employees there and at national laboratories involved in climate change and other related studies...

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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Systemic obstacles to citizen oversight of election results continue to reveal 'outrageous', 'farcical' deficiencies in U.S. election processes...
By Brad Friedman on 12/8/2016 6:22pm PT  

On today's BradCast, our coverage of what suffices in the U.S. as a Presidential election "recount" continues, in no small part, because someone has to cover what is actually going on there. [Audio link to show posted below.]

A federal court ruling [PDF] issued late yesterday in Michigan has effectively stopped the counting of paper ballots in the state following an earlier 3-Republican judge state court ruling that Green Party candidate Jill Stein is not an "aggrieved candidate" and, thus, not entitled to any type of "recount". Moreover, U.S. District Judge Mark Goldsmith finds there is no federally recognized right to a "recount" and, in any case, Stein presented no "evidence of significant fraud or mistake" while asking for one. But, of course, how could she, without being allowed to examine the evidence in question? State Republicans described the suspension of ballot counting as "a victory for the taxpayers and voters of Michigan."

That, even as scores of precincts across the state --- hundreds in Detroit alone --- were deemed "unrecountable" by election officials under MI's horrible statutes disallowing the hand-count of votes when human error or computer vote tabulator failure leaves Election Night ballot totals off by as little as a single ballot, as compared to the number of names signed in to pollbooks. Even in just three days of counting before it's suspension today, many such precincts were found to be "unrecountable", despite totally unreconciled vote tallies.

"It is an outrage that the voters of Michigan are being denied their right to have their votes properly counted," rails longtime election integrity advocate and attorney John Bonifaz, one of those who initially argued to both Hillary Clinton and Stein that a post-election count was necessary. "Because of a partisan state appeals court decision, Americans will never know the truth about what happened in this election."

Bonifaz was joined by many longtime computer science and voting systems experts, such as Douglas Jones of the University Iowa, who warns today: "In a healthy democracy, elections are run with sufficient transparency that partisans of the losing candidate can convince themselves that they lost fair and square. Recounts in close elections are a necessary part of this transparency, particularly when the margin of victory is exceeded by an unusual number of ballots that were cast without reporting any vote in the election." Jones is referring to the 75,000 ballots in MI said to have no vote for President at all, nearly twice as many undervotes as reported in 2012, despite a 10,000 vote margin between Trump and Clinton in MI, where some 5 million votes were cast. That case is headed to MI's Supreme Court, where Stein is demanding two state Justices recuse themselves after being named by Donald Trump as potentially U.S. Supreme Court nominees.

In Pennsylvania, a similar, if even worse case of lacking "evidence" of fraud has served to block forensic analyses of the otherwise 100% unverifiable touch-screen voting and tabulation systems used across most of the state. Late Wednesday, Stein filed a new court challenge in Allegheny County (Pittsburgh), seeking the type of examination that computer science and voting systems experts have been desperately calling for. A similar challenge was rejected yesterday in Philadelphia for...you guessed it...lack of evidence of fraud.

And in Wisconsin, observers of the ongoing counts and retallies are calling for a federal suit --- which, I'm told, could be filed on Friday --- seeking a statewide hand-count of paper ballots, after a state court previously found a new law passed by Republicans last year allowed most of the largest (and Democratic-leaning) counties to "recount" by the same computer scanners that initially tallied votes (either correctly or incorrectly). The computer tallies, and a number of other concerns revealed to date, have led some of those observers to describe the current process as a "farce", and declare: "The most urgent issue in America right now is to be able to confirm that every vote was counted fairly, accurately, and honestly, and if not, for patriotic Americans to raise bloody hell about it."

And so, we do. Even as the corporate media continue to misreport or ignore altogether what is actually going on in all three longtime "blue" states where just 3 votes per precinct recorded for Clinton instead of Trump would have meant that she, not he, would be considered the President Elect right now. Citizen oversight of election results matter. As simple as that should be, the struggle to achieve any such post-election oversight or verification, in the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles, is astounding and an outrage.

Also today, speaking of outrages and science ignored by corporate media and elected officials alike: Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report on Trump's shocking choice to head the EPA, on another oil pipeline rupture --- this time not far from the contested Dakota Access Pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota --- and temperatures in the Arctic are now from 35 to 55 degrees Fahrenheit warmer today than they normally are this time of year...

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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Guest: Election Integrity advocate Paul Lehto says this proves again 'the only option is to get it right on Election Night'
Plus: Trump taps climate science denier, fossil fuel industry tool for EPA chief...
By Brad Friedman on 12/7/2016 6:00pm PT  

On today's BradCast, state and federal court rulings, shameful 'recount' laws and other outrageous obstacles preventing citizen oversight of Presidential election results in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and elsewhere. And, as if that's all not disturbing enough, wait until you hear who Trump is reportedly tapping to head up the Environmental Protection Agency! [Audio link posted below]

Our "Recount" 2016 coverage continues today, on the heels of "dueling" federal and state court rulings on Tuesday night in Green Party candidate Jill Stein's fight to continue hand-counts in Michigan, hundreds of precincts across the state (including tens of thousands of ballots) are being declared "unrecountable" by state officials --- for often absurd reasons. We explain those rulings as we await what is likely to be a federal court order ending all counting in the state by tomorrow, despite Trump's razor thin 10,000 vote statewide margin of just one-tenth of one-percent over Hillary Clinton.

Another court ruling comes down today against Stein's suit for a forensic analyses of 100% unverifiable touch-screen voting systems used in Philadelphia, prompting plans to seek same in state court. And the counting (and computer re-scanning) continues in Wisconsin, despite efforts by Team Trump to stop counting and oversight immediately in all three states.

We're joined today by author, former attorney and longtime election integrity advocate Paul Lehto to discuss all of the above and much more, including how failed tabulation systems, woeful election law, and extraordinary legal challenges in at least six courts in three states to block all oversight is little more than an invitation for future fraud.

On MI's "outrageous" law resulting in hundreds of "unrecountable" precincts in Detroit alone, Lehto charges: "All you need to do is add an extra ballot without adjusting the poll books, which makes it easier to do fraud or easier create an error. And that error or fraud is insulated from ever affecting the results. If somebody did want to do fraud, it's like a dream for them."

"But here's the thing: it doesn't really matter, from the perspective of democracy, whether it's an error or whether it's a fraud. Because we're only interested in the true vote count," he tells me. "But in this case, Michigan law itself is protecting and creating 'safe harbor' for both errors and fraud."

"Don't count on anything happening after Election Night," Lehto has long warned. "Why? Number one: everybody wants to avoid embarrassment. Nobody wants to be the next Florida. So everybody in the state government and the elections bureau is working really, really hard not to be embarrassed, and that's a non-partisan interest that really goes against transparency. The other thing is that 100 percent of all election law is made by election winners, who absolutely do not want their victories to be questioned. So that's another factor why you can never really count on getting good election laws for post-election remedies, because everybody that's voting on it is a winner and they don't want losers --- or what they would call 'sore losers' --- questioning their great victory. So basically that leaves democracy defenseless."

As he describes the evolution of the Election Integrity movement over the past decade, Lehto concludes our system amounts to "basically: certify first, ask questions later." He says post-election audits or "recounts" are ultimately "not sufficient, no matter who you are. The only option is to get it right on election night."

Also on today's show, in case you still don't believe elections and democracy matter: Trump will reportedly nominate Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt --- a climate change denier, opponent of environmental regulations, and long-time fossil-fuel industry tool --- to head up the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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Plus: Team Trump ups efforts to shut down 'recounts'; New VT law undermines democracy; Paper v. Computer counts; More...
By Brad Friedman on 12/6/2016 6:09pm PT  

On today's BradCast, the latest breaking news on how broken optical-scan tabulation computers may have undermined the ability to count tens of thousands of ballots in Michigan --- specifically in or near Detroit --- and much more "recount" 2016 related news, even from Vermont! [Audio link to show is posted below.]

With a reported margin of just over 10,000 votes for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in MI --- out of some 5 million votes tallied in the state --- the ability to hand-count tens of thousands of votes in Green Party candidate Jill Stein's federal court-ordered [PDF] "recount" may be at risk of "chaos" under state law, thanks to the failure of computerized paper-ballot optical-scanners which may have mistallied ballots in some fashion on Election Day.

Hopefully, hand-counts can reconcile mismatches between poll book signatures and computer printouts from "610 of 1,680" precincts in Wayne County, which includes heavily Democratic-leaning Detroit, where "392 of 662" or 59% of precincts may now be uncountable. That's a major concern, obviously, not just due to the state's razor thin margin, but also, as Stein points out today, since some 75,000 ballots --- until now, completely unexamined by human beings --- were reported by the computers to have no vote at all for President. That's a 70% increase from 2012 in the number of ballots reported to have Presidential undervotes, a number that is more than seven-fold the margin of votes that could flip the state from Trump to Clinton.

All of that as Team Trump ups their efforts in both state and federal court to stop the counting in MI entirely and as Stein pushes back in both court cases, including a move to force the recusal of two state Supreme Court judges named by Trump as potential U.S. Supreme Court nominees.

Also, while a recent change to state law by Republicans in WI has resulted in many of the largest counties simply running paper ballots through the same computer scanners that tallied them (either correctly or incorrectly, who knows?) the first time in that state's "recount", it's not just Republicans who prefer unverified computer tallies over hand-counts. In Vermont, the will of the voters may never been known in two exceedingly close state legislative races, thanks to a 2014 state law supported Democrats, requiring that computers, not people, tally ballots during ongoing "recounts" there. Two incumbent Democratic lawmakers who supported the new law may now be undone by it, as one is set to lose a "recounted" race by just six votes, and the other is facing a tie, depending on whether two questionably marked paper ballots were tallied by the scanner or not. (I wonder how they could figure out if they were?)

All of that may be good news to the Washington Post, however, which published an op-ed yesterday explaining why the authors believe, in contravention of computer scientists and voting systems experts, that "computers are better than humans at counting ballots." Of course, to know that for certain, the authors suggest...um...counting ballots by hand.

Also on today's BradCast: Al Gore meets with Donald Trump to discuss Climate Change and Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report on the weekend's victory for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe against the Dakota Access Pipeline in North Dakota, on Trump reportedly eying Native American lands for energy development and Exxon Mobile's CEO for Sec. of State, and a bit of good renewable energy news out of Texas (of all places)...

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Guest: David Cobb, Green Presidential campaign manager, 2004 nominee
Also: U.S. Army halts construction of Dakota Access Pipeline (for now)...
By Brad Friedman on 12/5/2016 6:14pm PT  

On today's BradCast, we cover an enormous amount of news, breaking and otherwise, on both the Presidential "recount" story in three different states, as well as the fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline in North Dakota. And we speak to Green Party candidate Jill Stein's campaign manager, David Cobb, about the ongoing and "escalating" legal battles and fights for citizen oversight of election results in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. [Audio link to show posted at bottom of article.]

First today, the latest on the breaking news over the weekend in the story of the denial of a permit for the controversial pipeline in ND, where thousands of native Americans have been protesting for months against its construction near tribal lands. On Sunday, in a huge victory, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers denied an easement to Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners that would have allowed them to complete the pipeline by building on disputed land near and beneath Lake Oahe, the Standing Rock Sioux's source of drinking water. The victory, while monumental --- even as the protests and violent attempts by law enforcement to stop them have been almost entirely ignored by mainstream corporate media --- may be short-lived, depending on legal actions and decisions made by the next President. Desi Doyen joins us for the latest.

At the same time, over the weekend, the corporate media was busy misreporting and misleading the legal maneuvers of Green Party Presidential candidate Jill Stein, who has dropped just one of the statewide voter-initiated suits demanding a PA "recount", in favor of a federal filing [PDF] today, on Constitutional grounds, seeking federal intervention for a statewide count and forensic analysis of 100% unverifiable voting systems used there. Stein and her attorneys held a press conference and rally today outside of Trump Tower in Manhattan, to explain the efforts.

Also, a federal judge this morning ordered [PDF] the state of Michigan to being counting ballots today, after successful maneuvers by Team Trump delayed the start of that effort late last week and had hoped to further delay or deny citizen oversight of results entirely. MI's Attorney General (a Trump supporter) falsely argued in his filing and during an unusual emergency hearing in federal court on Sunday, that the count might endanger the state's Electoral College votes. U.S. District Judge Mark Goldsmith ordered the counting to begin at noon today, however, finding that any further delay "would likely violate [plaintiffs'] right to vote under the First and Fourteenth Amendments" and that "there is a credible threat to the voters' right to have a determination made that Michigan's vote for president was properly tabulated." The MI GOP has vowed to appeal both the federal and state cases against counting ballots.

My guest today, Stein's campaign manager David Cobb, the Party's 2004 Presidential nominee --- who, himself, called for the partial statewide count that happened after that year's Presidential contest in Ohio --- joins us to discuss the latest developments in the ongoing counts and court cases in all three states, and to explain why Stein and the Green Party "are demanding integrity in the election system."

In PA, he explains (as we long have as well), that "there is no way to properly verify the DRE --- direct recording electronic --- equipment, otherwise correctly known as 'black box voting'. It's terrible to begin with and they should never be used. ... The real gain here is forensic experts getting an opportunity to get their hands on these machines --- and that is exactly what we are seeking in all three states --- but, in Pennsylvania, in federal court specifically, because of the completely outrageous system of recount provisions in the state." (To get an idea how horrific they are, check out my interview with VotePA's Marybeth Kuznik from last week, or read today's filing [PDF] in federal court.)

"I really want to underscore," he tells me, "we are escalating the fight into federal court in Pennsylvania precisely because the Pennsylvania laws are so horrible."

"These black box voting machines are hackable," he continues. "If any nefarious individual can get their hands on them, there are ways to manipulate them. That's the reason it's so important to have these forensic studies done. So that we can literally verify the vote. What is Donald Trump afraid of?"

We also discuss the efforts of the Green Party going back to Cobb's own attempted "recount" in Ohio, when two top election officials in the state's largest county, Cuyahoga (Cleveland), were found guilty and sentenced to the maximum sentence in prison for having rigged the 2004 Presidential "recount".

"We are demanding that every vote counts, so count every vote! It's just that simple. At the end of the day, if we do not have confidence in the election system, we cannot have confidence in our government itself," he argues.

Finally, speaking of counting votes (or not), North Carolina's abhorrent Republican Gov. Pat McCory has announced he is giving up his own battle for a statewide recount (which we supported) and has conceded the race to the state's Democratic candidate Attorney General Roy Cooper, becoming the first Governor to lose a re-election bid in state history...

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Jill Stein: 'Why is Donald Trump afraid of these recounts?'...
By Brad Friedman on 12/2/2016 5:57pm PT  

On today's BradCast, Team Trump takes a page from the George W. Bush 2000 playbook by attempting to stop the "recounts" in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, just as his margin over Hillary Clinton plummets in PA. [Audio link to show follows below.]

Over the past 24 hours, Donald Trump or his surrogates have filed multiple legal complaints in three different states in an effort to stop the "recounts" (hand-counts, machine counts and/or forensic analyses of computerized voting and tabulation systems) as lawfully sought by Green Party Presidential nominee Dr. Jill Stein. As the Stein camp noted today, the sudden interest by Team Trump comes as Trump's margin over Hillary Clinton has dropped from about almost 70,000 votes to about 46,000 votes (out of some 6 million tallied) as PA counties finally complete their initial tallies. The Stein camp notes today: "With his margin of victory in the state nearly halved as of last night, and now within 0.2% of triggering an automatic statewide recount, Donald Trump is desperately fighting to stop the recount in Pennsylvania." His attorneys filed a suit [PDF] late Thursday to dismiss her filings in the Keystone State.

He is also attempting, somewhat successfully, to stop hand-counting from moving forward in MI, where he reportedly leads Clinton by just over 10,000 votes out of about 5 million tallied, including more than 75,000 ballots with no vote reported for President at all, many of those cast in or near Detroit. That figure, Stein charges, "is double the number [of undervotes] from 2012." After Trump filed an objection to the "recount" request in MI last night --- claiming that a count would "risk having the Electoral College door knocked off its hinges" and delaying the start of counting for as many as five days --- the state Attorney General Bill Schuette, a Trump supporter, filed a separate complaint [PDF] today on behalf of the state in federal court, seeking to prevent votes from being counted as well. His claim supports Trump's objection filed yesterday and argues that counting ballots is "frivilous" and is meant by Stein to delay final certification of the results. She describes his action as "nothing more than party politics that needlessly delays what should be a routine verification of the democratic process."

In Wisconsin, pro-Trump outfits calling themselves the Great America PAC and the Stop Hillary PAC filed a complaint [PDF] in federal court to immediately stop the counting of ballots, which is now in its second day in the Badger State. That complaint, citing Bush v. Gore from 2000, argues that counting ballots violates the Equal Protection and Due Process clauses of the U.S. Constitution and "may cast an unjustified pall over the election of President-Elect Trump, undermining public confidence in the integrity of the electoral process." Sounds familiar, ironic and, yes, hypocritical.

Just before airtime today, a federal Judge in Wisconsin denied the plaintiffs' motion in that case seeking an immediate restraining order to halt the ongoing counts, but has set a hearing on the matter for December 9th. For her part, Stein, pushing back, has announced a press conference for Monday, December 3, across from Trump Tower in Manhattan.

So, why are Trump and the GOP against verifying election results? We discuss that, the ongoing and not-ironic-at-all fight of the GOP Governor in North Carolina to verify his own election results(!) and much more, including Desi Doyen and her latest Green News Report, on today's BradCast!...

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Computer scientists and voting systems expert plead for hand-counts; Fees increased; Callers ring in with questions...
By Brad Friedman on 11/30/2016 5:52pm PT  

On today's BradCast: The Green Party's Jill Stein has filed for a 'recount' in the third of three states, and continues to fight against barriers erected to prevent citizen oversight of the 2016 Presidential Election results. [Audio link to show is posted below.]

Late today, Stein filed for a "recount" in the state of Michigan, after computer security and voting systems experts continue their pleas for hand-counts of paper ballots that have, to date, only been tallied by computers. MI is the third state, following Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, where counts of the 2016 Presidential election race are being sought. The campaign included a check for nearly $1 million dollars with their filing.

In Wisconsin, where the GOP state legislature recently changed the law to jack up the fees for "recounts" and to allow such tallies to be done by computers instead of by hand, a state judge, citing that new statute, denied a suit by Stein (and joined by the Hillary Clinton campaign) seeking statewide hand-counts, despite the judge's own belief they should be carried out that way. The Green Party candidate, however, vows to press on, despite the cost of the counts --- partial, hand-counted or machine-counted --- now rising to some $9.5 million. That, apparently, is now the obscene price that citizens have to pay to even have a fighting chance of knowing who actually won or lost a Presidential Election in just three states.

We have much more today on all of the above today, and callers ring in with questions and thoughts on the "recounts".

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report and an update on the climate-fueled wildfires in Tennessee, where the death toll has now tragically been increased yet again...

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Guest: VotePA's Marybeth Kuznik on insane 'recount' laws and 100% unverifiable voting systems in Pennsylvania
Also: What good are paper ballots if nobody can afford to actually count them?...
By Brad Friedman on 11/29/2016 5:52pm PT  

On today's BradCast: The newly insane cost for a "recount" in Wisconsin and the even more jaw-droppingly insane voting system and "recount" laws in Pennsylvania. [Audio link to today's show is posted below.]

Barriers against citizen oversight of 2016 Presidential election results continue, even as the campaign of the Green Party's Jill Stein works with tens of thousands of citizens to try and overcome them in three different states where she is seeking "recounts". (For the record, if you're wondering, The BRAD BLOG generally uses quotes around the word "recount" to denote post-election hand-counts of ballots which have never actually been counted by human beings, but rather, only tabulated by computers during the official tally. It's impossible to know whether those computers actually tallied votes accurately unless paper ballots are examined by hand.)

The WI Election Commission informed the Stein campaign (and independent candidate Rocky De La Fuente, who has also filed for a "recount" there) yesterday that she will have to pay $3.5 million to even begin counting paper ballots in the state. I've confirmed with her campaign that she intends to do so, even after state election officials had originally estimated the fees to be $1 million for a statewide recount. That, even as state law has recently changed to allow counties to use computers to "recount" ballots, rather than public hand-counts. As we've long reported, similar barriers are often erected to block citizen oversight of elections, begging the question again: What good are hand-marked paper ballots if nobody is actually allowed to count them?

But the situation is far worse in Pennsylvania, where voters in most of the state are forced to vote on 100% unverifiable touch-screen systems and the state's arcane "recount" statutes require tens of thousands of voters to file affidavits (3 in each precinct) asking for such counts.

Longtime election integrity champion and VotePA.us founder Marybeth Kuznik joins us with details on what is now going on in the Keystone state towards that end, and to help explain the insanity of the state's unverifiable voting systems and the near-incomprehensibility of its "recount" laws.

"Pennsylvania election law is so convoluted," she tells me, while explaining the requirements for three voters in each of the state's 9,163 precincts (that's 27,489 voters!) to file a complaint in order to have a statewide voter-initiated count. She also explains the second route towards such a count, which requires 100 voters to file in the Commonwealth Court.

In either case, since much of the state uses unverifiable touch-screens, there is often nothing at all to count, even if a count is allowed! "They'll print out the Election Night tapes. They'll bring out some sort of a printout from the central tabulator. Usually they just bring out results. They look at the precinct tape, they look at the precinct printout, they go 'Hmm, that looks the same to me!', and everything's good. That's the recount!," Kuznik explains. "The thing is, of course it's going to be 'good'. The same software that counted on Election Night and printed out that tape is what's counting and printing out this result paper that they compare. It's nuts. It's just crazy."

As you'll hear, it's even worse than I've described it here. But, that's how it still works (or doesn't) in PA, after all of these years, and even in light of a forensic analysis by computer scientists of just one PA county voting system in 2011, after vote-flips were reported and candidates received zero votes in several elections in heavily-Republican Venango County. (See our exclusive special report and documents here.) That landmark study found, among other disturbing things, as we reported at the time: "unexplained, out-of-sequence activity log entries in the computer tabulation system, indications that the system was mounted several times with a 'USB flash drive' device, and, perhaps most troubling, evidence that the system was repeatedly accessed by an unidentified remote computer, for lengthy periods of time, on 'multiple occasions.'"

Those same systems --- and even worse ones --- are still used today across the state in 2016, as the fate of the world relies on them. Yes, as we've been warning you for more than a decade: "It's just crazy."

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Guest: Author, election fraud investigator Richard Hayes Phillips on concerns about reported voter turnout in WI and much more...
By Brad Friedman on 11/28/2016 6:06pm PT  

On today's BradCast: As we first broke last week, Green Party Presidential candidate Jill Stein has now filed for 'recounts' (attempts at first time hand-counts and forensic audits, in any event) in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and soon in Michigan. Independent candidate Rocky De La Fuente has also filed in WI. [Audio link to show is at end of article.]

Today we catch up on all that the calls for "recounts" have led to over the weekend and since the holiday break last week, including: News on the more than $6M raised by Stein to pay for the counts so far (the number that both she and the attorneys seeking the counts had told me about last Monday before any of this had become public); the Clinton Team (somewhat) joining the effort; Donald Trump demeaning it as a "scam" and offering wildly false claims of "voter fraud"; Stein's emergency effort to draft needed voter volunteers for filings in PA; the legal question (and now lawsuit) over whether WI will "recount" paper ballots by hand or by the same computers that tallied them in the first place; whether there will be sufficient time for any kind of proper public counting before the federally mandated December 13 deadline; and whether there is anything to count in PA at all, where they still shamefully force voters to use 100 percent unverifiable touch-screens across most of the state.

We are joined by long-time election fraud investigator and author Richard Hayes Phillips, to discuss all of that and his detailed report about the unusually large apparent voter turnout numbers in many rural WI municipalities and the difficulty citizens have in verifying and overseeing those numbers. As Phillips explains, there are horrible public reporting requirements for both results and for same-day voter registration provisions in the state.

"At a minimum, the problem is a lack of transparency," Phillips tells me today. "We have no way of knowing how many registered voters there are [in WI]. If you don't know how many registered voters there are, you don't know if too many ballots were cast." His report finds that, based on the latest state-reported voter registration numbers, there were "193 towns with turnout of 90% or better, 25 towns with turnout of 95% or better, and 7 towns with turnout of 100% or better." Those exceedingly high turnout numbers are likely lower in reality, due to same-day registration in WI, but the lack of reporting requirements for those numbers is "unacceptable".

"This is the period of time during which we must analyze those numbers to decide whether or not to challenge the election, and we don't have reliable numbers to use!" Philips, who personally examined tens of thousands of ballots and poll books and much more in Ohio after the disputed 2004 election there, resulting in his book Witness to a Crime: A Citizens' Audit of an American Election, says WI's turnout numbers remind him of a number of counties where he found fraud in Ohio, where there was some 80% turnout reported.

He also warns --- as I have, very loudly, for many years --- that there are almost no ballots to actually count in PA. "The five biggest cities in Pennsylvania that have no paper record of anybody's vote, except for absentee ballots, which only amount to 1 or 2% of the ballots," he says. "My God, if Wisconsin and Michigan which are very close were to actually flip and fall to Hillary Clinton's column, we will face a constitutional crisis, because this whole election will come down to Pennsylvania and the vote cannot be verified. I want America to know this."

Also hearkening back to Ohio in 2004, Phillips notes that there are tens of thousands of ballots with no vote at all for President in MI --- even near Detroit --- according to the state's unverified optical-scan tabulators. It's impossible to know how people voted, unless paper ballots are actually counted by human beings, he confirms. "Who knows who these ballots are actually marked for?"

"I'm not a shill for Hillary Clinton. I didn't even vote for her. But I want everyone's vote to count," he argues. "I want the winner to win and the loser to lose." Crazy idea, I know. Please take some time to listen to today's program...

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An exclusive interview with the Green Party Presidential candidate...
By Brad Friedman on 11/23/2016 5:56pm PT  

On today's BradCast, my exclusive interview with Dr. Jill Stein, the 2016 Green Party Presidential candidate, on her announcement earlier today that her campaign plans to file for hand-counted paper ballot "recounts" and forensic audits of the Presidential election results in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. [Audio link to show and full interview posted below.]

"We have to move really fast in order to basically verify the vote and be confident our votes were actually counted," she tells me, citing the many concerns brought to her by computer scientists and voting systems and election integrity experts, all questioning whether paper ballots were counted accurately by error-prone and easily-hacked computer tabulators in WI and MI, and whether touch-screen systems were manipulated in some fashion in PA.

Across those three states alone, as we have been reporting, just 50,000 votes flipped from Trump to Clinton --- out of more than 13 million ballots cast in those states, where a number of anomalous results have been found --- could change who becomes the next President of the United States.

There is plenty of reason to question whether the results as reported are accurate. And not only because of the surprising results. As I note again on today's show, University of Michigan computer science and voting systems expert J. Alex Halderman, one of those urging the candidates to call for a hand-count, has cracked many electronic voting systems in recent years. He offered still more reasons to examine both the reported results and the systems used in WI, MI and PA earlier today.

Stein, explaining that some $2 million must be raised to meet the deadline to file in WI by Friday (and another $4 million or so for the other two states next week), tells me that it's an "outrage we have to go to extraordinary lengths to verify the vote," adding she is doing so, due to her "interests as a citizen, as a person in America, that the vote be valid." (The campaign has set up a fund raising page for the effort right here.)

"Why would anyone in their right mind not want to have a secured and verified vote?," she asks. "It’s long been demonstrated that our system of voting, relying on these machines, has virtually no security. They’re hack-friendly [and] tamper-friendly."

"People have felt such anguish during this election," Stein notes. "This is a joint effort, and there are many election advocates who are involved. A lot of the grassroots election integrity experts. If ever there was a time to stand up and demand an accountable and secure vote, this is the time to do it. If we don't do it now, when exactly, what would be the cause to do it?" She also details the attempt by the scientists and advocates to encourage the Clinton campaign to take up the effort as well. (I can confirm that effort happened and that the campaign was still considering doing so as of earlier today.) She says she welcomes other campaigns, such as the Libertarian Party and independent candidates with standing, to join the effort as well.

"It feels really good to be standing up right now," she tells me. "It’s time for us to take control of our democracy to start with. To give ourselves a gift on this Thanksgiving." We discuss all of that and the many concerns about the reported results, take a few calls afterward, and actually find a bit more to be thankful for on today's harrowing program --- including, believe it or not, today's Green News Report with Desi Doyen!...

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Stein scheduled to appear LIVE on tonight's 'BradCast'...
By Brad Friedman on 11/23/2016 12:26pm PT  

The Green Party's 2016 Presidential candidate Jill Stein is announcing her intention to seek a "recount of votes in the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania." The campaign's press release, posted in full below, cites "a multi-partisan effort to check the accuracy of the machine-counted vote tallies in these states in order to ensure the integrity of our elections."

The announcement follows on word that leaked out yesterday at New York magazine that top electronic voting experts and election integrity advocates have been encouraging the Hillary Clinton campaign to file for similar hand-counts and forensic analyses of electronic voting and tabulation systems in the same states. The BRAD BLOG has independently confirmed that those efforts have been under way and are still being considered at the top level of the Clinton campaign.

We discussed just some of those efforts, and a number of reasons for them, on yesterday's BradCast program. University of Michigan computer science professor Alex Halderman, who has cracked many electronic voting systems in recent years, offers additional reasons to check the results and the systems in WI, MI and PA now right here.

As millions of dollars must be raised in a very short time to pay filing fees and attorneys fees for the effort --- filing fees in WI alone, are $1 million, due this Friday --- the Stein campaign has set up a fund raising page for the effort right here.

Stein will be my guest on today's BradCast, nationally syndicated via the Pacifica Radio Network and others, at 6p ET (3p PT). You may listen live to the show at that time right here. [UPDATE: My exclusive interview with Stein is now posted here.]

The Green Party/Stein campaign press release follows in full below...

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Guest: Steven Rosenfeld of Alternet...
By Brad Friedman on 11/22/2016 6:02pm PT  

On today's BradCast: Will the 2016 Presidential election be publicly hand-counted (what some call a 'recount')? Should it be? Experts, citing anomalies in the reported results and other concerns, are beginning to say 'yes'. But action would need to be taken --- and a lot of money raised --- by one or more of the Presidential candidates quickly in order for that to happen. [Audio link to full show follows below.]

I haven't been the only one asking questions about the reliability of the reported results of the November 8, 2016 election and whether voters should have confidence in the computer-tallied results. As we've been reporting since Election Day, there are a lot of folks looking at the numbers and asking questions about what actually did --- or didn't --- happen. A number of world class computer science, voting system and election integrity experts are beginning to urge for a public count of the election in a number of key states.

With approximately 100,000 total votes (out of more than 13 million cast), reportedly separating Clinton and Trump in the states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania alone, I can confirm that a number of those experts believe it would be a worthwhile exercise to file for hand-counts to make sure the results are correct. (Remember, just 50,000 votes recorded for Clinton instead of Trump across those three states would mean she, not Trump, becomes the next President of the United States.)

Today we look at just a few of the anomalies that have been widely cited today by some of the nation's top election experts, such as more votes reportedly cast in the Presidential election than the "Total Votes Cast" in a number of Wisconsin counties --- at least according to the counties' initially reported results.

Author and long-time election integrity journalist Steven Rosenfeld of Alternet recently wrote about just some of the concerns being analyzed and noted by experts that both he and I have been speaking with in the days since the election. He joins me to discuss concerns and discrepancies in several states where hand-counted "recounts" could, potentially, flip the results of the Electoral College and the Trump/Clinton election along with it.

"The big point here is we don't really know --- still --- what the actual count is," Rosenfeld tells me. "I, like everybody else, would like to really know what happened. And I can accept the results if I know that they're true and accurate...so let's make sure that people's votes are accurately counted. "

We also discuss the challenges that would be faced by a candidate calling for such a count and the money (lots of it, about $2 million per state) that they would need to raise in a hurry in order to get such a hand-count and a forensic analysis of voting systems and tabulators in the states where experts are saying the effort may be well worth it.

NOTE: Since getting off air, where both Rosenfeld and I needed to talk around the record a bit, Gabriel Sherman at New York magazine offers some details about some of what is going on.

Also today: The effort some activists are making to urge Trump electors to change their vote before casting it in the Electoral College on December 19th.

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Guest: Media Matters' Eric Boehlert | PLUS: Still trying to oversee election results; Police attack protesters in North Dakota; Arctic is burning up...
By Brad Friedman on 11/21/2016 6:39pm PT  

On today's BradCast, Donald Trump is well on his way to becoming the most corrupt U.S. President in history. And he's not even in office yet. For that matter, he's not even the officially winner of the election yet, as ballots are still be tallied and we're keeping an eye on three key battleground states (Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania) where less than 50,000 votes total (out of more than 13 million cast) remain the difference between a President Trump or a President Clinton. We continue to call for full hand-counts in those states and others to determine who actually won them. [Audio link to full show is posted below.]

Then, after Trump agreed to pay $25 million in a massive fraud settlement concerning his 'Trump University' scam late last week, the U.S. corporate media became immediately distracted by a his tweets about Mike Pence being booed at a Broadway play over the weekend.

We discuss today how the media --- and GOP politicians --- would have reacted differently if it was Hillary Clinton who had agreed to pay tens of millions of dollars to settle multiple fraud cases after the election. At the same time, word comes in from the foreign press that Trump has been cashing in since the election, on business deals in India, the Philippines and Argentina, while unconstitutionally receiving payoffs from foreign diplomats via his new Washington D.C. hotel.

So, what explains, if anything, the U.S. media's deferential treatment of Trump? Author Eric Boehlert of Media Matters joins us to discuss the extraordinary disparities between how the media cover Republicans versus Democrats and how they utterly failed the nation in the lead-up to the election.

Also today: Police unleash water cannons and tear gas in North Dakota overnight, against Native American protesters gathered to try and stop the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline and climate scientists are freaking out (for very good reason) as the Arctic is now an "insane 36 degrees" warmer than usual for this time of year and as global sea ice area is now way lower than it has ever been in recorded history. It is, in fact, off the charts from even previous record low years.

This is all very not good...

CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!...

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