{"id":12428,"date":"2018-01-04T18:03:37","date_gmt":"2018-01-05T02:03:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=12428"},"modified":"2018-02-09T19:58:31","modified_gmt":"2018-02-10T03:58:31","slug":"control-of-va-house-decided-by-lot-for-now-trump-voter-fraud-commission-disbanded-bradcast-142018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=12428","title":{"rendered":"Control of VA House Decided by Lot (For Now); Trump &#8216;Voter Fraud&#8217; Commission Disbanded: &#8216;BradCast&#8217; 1\/4\/2018"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/Images\/BradCast_VirginiaHD94SimondsYanceyDrawingSlips_010418.jpg\" hspace=\"6\" vspace=\"3\" border=\"0\" align=\"right\">On today&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/BradCast\"><i>BradCast<\/i><\/a>: The wheels seem to be coming off everywhere. That&#8217;s both good and bad news. [<i>Audio link to show follows below.<\/i>]\n<p>We start here: After a two month <a href=\"https:\/\/pilotonline.com\/news\/government\/politics\/virginia\/article_cdda6053-f653-5ce1-9ad0-5123990c5374.amp.html?__twitter_impression=true\">back and forth<\/a> since the November 2017 off-year elections in Virginia, it appears that Republicans will retain &#8212; if just barely &#8212; their majority control of the Virginia House of Delegates (for now) following a <a href=\"https:\/\/pilotonline.com\/news\/government\/politics\/virginia\/article_cdda6053-f653-5ce1-9ad0-5123990c5374.amp.html?__twitter_impression=true\">random drawing<\/a> out of a bowl in Richmond today resulted in Republican David Yancey being named the winner over Democrat Shelly Simonds.<\/p>\n<p>That, despite a &#8220;recount&#8221; in the 94th District race finding the Democrat <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/story\/2017\/12\/19\/democrats-tie-virginia-house-of-delegates-244598\">had won<\/a>, until a Republican observer <a href=\"https:\/\/pilotonline.com\/news\/government\/politics\/virginia\/republican-awarded-more-vote-causing-a-tie-in-house-race\/article_ecdf9e8a-1f10-5dc7-a955-9873e3f60ebe.html\">changed his mind<\/a> and a Republican Circuit Court panel of judges agreed with him. That was followed by a rejected court challenge by the Democrat, today&#8217;s random drawing to determine the winner of that court-declared tie, a likely second &#8220;recount&#8221; to come in the same race, a court challenge to a separate very close race in the 28th district decided by 73 votes with at least 147 voters receiving the <a href=\"https:\/\/wtop.com\/virginia\/2018\/01\/exclusive-va-knew-voting-wrong-house-districts-issues-2017-election\/\">wrong ballot entirely<\/a>, and Democrats across the obscenely gerrymandered state having out-voted Republicans by a <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/LarrySabato\/status\/948947832039526401\">&#8220;landslide&#8221;<\/a> 10% margin in the November 7, 2017 elections.<\/p>\n<p>We detail all of that today &#8212; including my brief, if telling, email conversation with the election official in the city of Newport News who supposedly oversaw the race in the 94th district. And, for the record, <a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/Images\/VAHouseOfDelegates_BallotInQuestion_SimondsYancey.jpg\">here is a JPG<\/a> of the one single ballot in question which led to the current tie.<\/p>\n<p>Then, in other election related news, we move on to Donald Trump&#8217;s monumentally <a href=\"http:\/\/thehill.com\/opinion\/white-house\/367496-trumps-failed-fraud-commission-flawed-from-the-start-dissolved-in\">failed<\/a> &#8220;voter fraud&#8221; Commission, disastrously helmed by <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=8202\">longtime<\/a> GOP &#8220;voter fraud&#8221; fraudster and Kansas Sec. of State Kris Kobach. The Commission, created after Trump&#8217;s evidence-free assertions that millions of unlawful votes were cast against him in 2016, has been besieged with <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=12215\">lawsuits<\/a> against it, including by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pressherald.com\/2017\/12\/22\/judge-backs-maine-secretary-of-state-in-lawsuit-against-trump-voter-fraud-panel\/\">one of its own Commissioners<\/a>. But there may be another reason that Trump suddenly, and without notice to anyone, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/01\/03\/us\/politics\/trump-voter-fraud-commission.html\">disbanded it entirely<\/a> by Executive Order on Wednesday evening: <a href=\"http:\/\/politi.co\/2CAywNz\">he got mad<\/a> at Steve Bannon. Democrats and voting rights advocates are rejoicing after the news, but will the dissolution of the Commission result in even <a href=\"http:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/politics\/2018\/01\/donald-trump-shut-down-his-election-fraud-commission-but-he-hasnt-given-up-on-voter-suppression\/\">more concerns<\/a> for advocates of free and fair elections?<\/p>\n<p>Speaking of which, heads up! Trump&#8217;s Dept. of Justice appears to have a new idea for how to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/trump-justice-department-pushes-for-citizenship-question-on-census-alarming-experts\">game the 2020 Census<\/a> (which is also an election-related issue).<\/p>\n<p>Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for a bone-chilling first <a href=\"http:\/\/greenNews.BradBlog.com\"><i>Green News Report<\/i><\/a> of the new year, as a dangerous blast from the melting Arctic slams much of the country, the Trump Administration guts even more environmental and safety regulations over the holiday weekend when few were noticing, before <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/97e57e5f0f7045909757e87b452fd2a5\/Trump-moves-to-vastly-expand-offshore-drilling-off-US-coasts\">announcing<\/a> a new disturbing scheme today to open up 90 percent of nation&#8217;s off-shore oil reserves to new commercial drilling.<\/p>\n<p>The wheels seem to be coming off both the world <i>and<\/i> the Trump Administration. We&#8217;ll hope for the latter in time to prevent the former&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\".\/Images\/Speaker_Icon_24.png\" style=\"width: 24px; float: none; vertical-align: middle;\"><span style=\"font-size: 18px; line-height: 18px;\"> <b><i><a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/audio\/BradCast_BradFriedman_VirginiaHD94Dispute_TrumpKobachCommDisbanded_RecordColdRegsGutted_010418.mp3\">CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!&#8230;<\/a><\/i><\/b><br \/>\n[audio:http:\/\/bradblog.com\/audio\/BradCast_BradFriedman_VirginiaHD94Dispute_TrumpKobachCommDisbanded_RecordColdRegsGutted_010418.mp3]<\/blockquote>\n<p><center><b>* * *<\/b><\/center><i>While we post <a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/BradCast\"><\/i>The BradCast<i><\/a> here every day, and you can hear it across all of our great affiliate stations and websites, to automagically get new episodes as soon as they&#8217;re available sent right to your computer or personal device, subscribe for free at <a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/the-bradcast-w-brad-friedman\/id803467610\">iTunes<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/stitcher.com\/s\/player.php?fid=25838&#038;src=psl\">Stitcher<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/tunein.com\/radio\/The-BradCast-with-Brad-Friedman-p477565\/\">TuneIn<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/podcastgen\/bradcast\/feed.xml\">our native RSS feed<\/a>!<\/i><\/p>\n<p><!--BB-DONATEPITCH-START--><\/p>\n<div style=\"background:#f5f0e0; border:2px solid #6b5a2e; border-radius:6px; padding:10px 14px; text-align:center; font-family:Georgia,serif;\"><span style=\"display:block; margin:0 0 8px 0; color:#3a2e0e; font-size:0.95em; line-height:1.5;\"><strong>The BRAD BLOG<\/strong>, <em>The BradCast<\/em> and <em>Green News Report<\/em> are all 100% independent and 100% listener and reader supported!<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/Donate\" style=\"display:inline-block; background:#6b5a2e; color:#ffffff; padding:6px 18px; border-radius:4px; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:none; font-family:Georgia,serif; font-size:0.9em;\">Please CLICK HERE to help support our work today!<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!--BB-DONATEPITCH-END--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On today&#8217;s BradCast: The wheels seem to be coming off everywhere. That&#8217;s both good and bad news. [Audio link to show follows below.] We start here: After a two month back and forth since the November 2017 off-year elections in Virginia, it appears that Republicans will retain &#8212; if just barely &#8212; their majority control [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,675,543,499,869,223,479,594,954,106,6,28,200,1110,477,654,540,172,868,105],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-12428","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media-appearance","category-bradcast","category-climate-change","category-coal","category-dept-of-interior","category-dept-of-justice","category-donald-trump","category-election-2016","category-election-2017","category-election-fraud","category-election-irregularities","category-election-reform","category-environment","category-gerrymandering","category-kpfk","category-kris-kobach","category-oil","category-photo-id-laws","category-steve-bannon","category-virginia"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12428\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12428"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=12428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}