Suppose the Democrats cook up another Russia Russia Russia hoax. Now, this victory is so overwhelming that they're not going to do that, but humor me. Or if they say that the Republicans cheated.
Does Kamala Harris have the right to:
- declare herself the winner outright?
- declare in favor of a second slate of electors that the Democrats send in?
- send the election to the House?
If you argue that it is the law change, does this mean that Gore had the right to crown himself president in 2000?
From the National Archives FAQ:
Under Federal law, an objection to a state’s electoral votes may be made to the President of the Senate during the Congress’s counting of electoral votes in January. The objection must be made in writing and signed by at least one-fifth of the Senators and one-fifth of the members of the House of Representatives. Only two grounds for objection are acceptable: that the electors of the State were not lawfully certified under a certificate of ascertainment, or that the vote of one or more electors has not been regularly given. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives debate the objection separately. After the debate, both the Senate and the House of Representatives rejoin and both must agree to reject the votes.
Under a previous version of the statute (which required only that one member of each chamber sign the objection), Congress broke to consider objections from the 2004 and 2020 Presidential elections. In January 2005, Ohio’s 20 Electoral votes were challenged. After debate, the Senate and the House failed to agree to reject the votes. Ohio’s 20 Electoral votes for President Bush and Vice President Cheney were counted. In January 2021, despite objections to the Electoral votes in numerous States, no objection was sustained and all votes were counted.
The more likely hinkey maneuver are faithless electors. Those are the electors you voted for, not voting the candidate they pledged to.
Faithless electors are not allowed. I don't think they've been allowed to exist for quite some time at this point.
IIRC, messy and state-by-state. Most have laws that prohibit and/or punish faithless electors but some of those punish them and still count the votes. The constitutionality of said laws was challenged in 2016 (go figure) and SCOTUS unanimously said it's constitutional to make them do their damn jobs.
Some states have rules against them, the majority do not. Those only been a relative few in history and they've never affected an outcome.