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Joseph Stalin once famously said: "It's not who votes that counts, it's who counts the votes." Was Stalin thinking about the six counties in Pennsylvania where election officials refused to certify the 2020 election results? Probably not, but if he knew about them he might be thinking kind thoughts about them from his grave.
In multiple swing states, there are election officials who believe Donald Trump's "Big Lie" and are determined to make sure he wins in 2024, no matter what the people want. If one or two on a county election board refuse to certify a win for Kamala Harris, they can be outvoted, but if it is a majority somewhere, they could seriously gum up the works.
Reuters examined the election boards in the five largest counties in the seven swing states. It found that on 16 of the 35 boards, at least one member was an outspoken Trumper who has expressed doubt about the integrity of voting machines, absentee ballots, or some other aspect of the 2020 election. In all, they discovered 37 election skeptics on the 35 boards. Of these, 20 have a history of refusing to certify election results. The only state with no election deniers on the boards of the five biggest counties was Wisconsin. All the others had at least one, often multiple ones. Smaller counties also have election skeptics on their boards, but Reuters didn't track them.
In most cases, the election deniers won't be able to reverse the results, but they could try to delay the process until after the deadline for certification, which is Dec. 11, 2024, per federal law. The results have to be in by then because the Electoral College meets for its first and only class on Dec. 17, 2024. If one or more counties refuse to certify the results, that could conceivably lead to the state being unable to certify the entire election on time. In that case, the state legislature might step in and appoint its own slate of electors.
Of course, counties don't have the ultimate authority on elections. The secretary of state can give orders to the county boards. If they fail to obey them, in some cases, the secretary can take over the certification process. It is also possible to get the courts involved. And in the end, it is the governor who must sign the certificate of ascertainment that is sent to Congress and the National Archives.
Some states are anticipating problems and dealing with them preemptively. Michigan, for example, has passed a law stating that the authority of the local boards is to add up the votes cast and report the totals. They explicitly do not have the authority to hold up certification because they suspect fraud. That is the job of the courts later on. The secretary of state has the power to enforce this by bypassing the local board if need be. Michigan's secretary of state, Jocelyn Benson, has made it clear she understands the situation and what she might be up against. For example, she may be up against Kellie Deming, a member of Huron County's election board. Deming asserts that Trump won in 2020 and is still president. She is not sure she can certify this year's results (at least until she sees them). But the law and power are with Benson this time and everyone knows that. Similar situations may play out in other states, where the law is not always so clear as in Michigan.
Also, the process for members of Congress objecting to electoral votes has been revised by the Electoral Count Reform Act of 2022. To challenge the electoral votes of a state, one-fifth of the newly installed House and one-fifth of the newly installed Senate must object. There might be 87 crazies in the House to do that, but getting 20 senators to object will be much harder. (V)