New York Personal Injury Law Blog » Donald Trump, Elections

 

November 11th, 2020

Blaming the Lawyers – Election Edition

It comes as news to no objective person that Joe Biden won a sweeping victory in the election — both in the popular vote and most likely in the electoral college when the counting is done — and that Donald Trump has lost.

But Trump, being Trump. won’t accept that people have done the rare thing of voting an incumbent out of office. They usually win.

So he’s going to court screaming fraud, or something, and trying to do this in multiple states. Some places he wanted them to keep counting votes and others to stop counting. None of this is in the least bit surprising, because Trump.

But a deeply troubling thing has happened. The Lincoln Project, a group of #NeverTrump conservatives who knew that Trump was neither Republican nor conservative but only out for himself, has decided to attack the lawyers bringing the suits:

The Lincoln Project is set to launch a multiplatform campaign hammering Jones Day and other firms for their role in facilitating Trump’s efforts, I’m told. It includes TV and digital ads and social media highlighting the damage that enabling Trump threatens to our democracy and to the success of the presidential transition.

This is a very bad move.

If lawyers come into court with frivolous suits, then courts can do two things: The first is to dump the suits.

The second is, potentially, to sanction the lawyers if the suits were without basis in law and fact. Courts, after all, have an inherent power to control the conduct of those that come before them and sanction those who use it for an improper purpose. (Chambers. v. Nasco)

So let the lawyers make their arguments. If they go too far in representing their client and overstep their legal and ethical bounds, the courts can take care of that issue

And these would be good things. Let the Trumpers see that the claims of fraud were meritless, and to the extent they existed, they were isolated circumstances where the votes could be counted on fingers and toes. And from both sides.

Sunlight, Justice Brandeis once wrote, is the best disinfectant. Let the world see a lack of merit. Let the world see Trump lose. Over and over and over again.

The one thing we should not want is for anyone to say that he was denied his fair access to the courts and a fair count. Trying to intimidate lawyers away from representation could do that.

Let the courts prove the election and count were fair. Let the courts shove the fairness down Trump’s throat.

Attacking the lawyers for having a reprehensible client is the wrong move. For even sociopaths have a right to due process, and have a right to have their claims heard. And rejected.

Indeed, having the courts reject bad claims is the best possible outcome at this point.

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