- Thanks to Deep Sentinel for keeping LegalEagle safe and sound. Texas files an insane lawsuit that goes straight to the Supreme Court, that doesn't seek a recount, it doesn't seek to add
votes that were discarded, but it seeks to invalidate
the entire election for almost every swing state. - Our request is we want to be heard. The only place we can go
is the US Supreme Court. And so we're pleading
with the US Supreme Court. (microphone feedback) (bright music) - Hey, it's Devin from the future again. So funny story, about
an hour after I finished recording this video for the first time, the Supreme Court issued a summary dismissal of the Texas lawsuit. So this lawsuit is now dead. But there's so much that's interesting about the Texas lawsuit
that even though we now know the actual result, which
is that this case is dead, it's still worth going over what was trying to be accomplished in this particular lawsuit. So stick around until
the end of this video, where Devin from the further future will come back and actually explain the court's dismissal of this lawsuit. A lot of people are calling
this a seven to two dismissal. It's actually not, for
reasons that I will explain. But let's actually dig into the analysis of this particular lawsuit
with Devin from the past. And I'll come back in the future to talk about the dismissal
that happened about an hour ago. Yeah, it all makes sense in a timey wimey Jeremy Bearimy sort of way. (eagle cries)
- Hey, LegalEagles, it's time to think like a politician, because you don't need
to think like a lawyer to understand that the
Texas lawsuit is nonsense, and it's a political stunt
rather than a legal strategy. Texas filed a lawsuit
in the Supreme Court, asking the Court to overturn
the presidential results in Georgia, Michigan,
Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. The lawsuit seeks an injunction preventing the electoral college from voting on December 14th. The Texas case was filed
by its attorney general, Ken Paxton, who has some
legal woes of his own that we'll come back to later on. Why yes, that is a mugshot of
the Texas attorney general. 17 other states filed an amicus
brief in support of Texas. This doesn't technically mean that they've joined the lawsuit. Think of it as an aggrieved Trump state just yelling, "Me, too." It's a friend of the court brief. You're adding your authority and your approval for the lawsuit, but it actually doesn't mean that you have joined the lawsuit. And it will have no impact on the outcome of this particular lawsuit. Now, Trump won the popular vote in Texas and the other 17 states that
have joined in this lawsuit. The four states they are attacking gave the popular vote to Joe Biden. More specifically, urban
voters in those four states selected Biden at a much higher rate than now President Trump. And tellingly, the lawsuit
doesn't ask the court to overturn any of the other
races on these ballots, many of which went for Republicans. It's laser-focused on stopping Joe Biden from becoming president
by disenfranchising voters in urban areas and their suburbs. 22 states and Washington DC have now filed their own amicus briefs in
opposition to the Texas suit. Now, before I delve into these claims, here's a quick reminder about
how American elections work, because it's crazy system,
but it's our system, and it's important to
understand this lawsuit. The Constitution's election clause, article one, section four,
empowers states to determine the time, places, and manner
of congressional elections. Subject, of course, to
Congress's authority to make or alter state regulations. State and local governments
have the authority to pass election laws, including rules about voter registration, voter protection, fraud prevention, vote counting, and determination
of election results. Now, America does not
have national elections, as we are very cognizant of. The 50 states run their
individual elections as they see fit. And as long as those rules
don't violate the Constitution, the states can do what they want. And generally, Republicans
have been in favor of this patchwork approach because it allows them the flexibility in certain states, generally the red ones, to put in generally more
restrictive voting laws, often claiming it's necessary
to prevent voter fraud. And conservatives once
applauded this design as an example of federalism
and states' rights, because it gives states the
right to run their own affairs. Remember when Republicans used
to care about states' rights? The Texas lawsuit wants the Supreme Court to turn against federalism and nationalize the rules for voting effectively. You can argue that this
would be a good thing and that our system doesn't make sense. I would probably agree with you. But changing it isn't something the Supreme Court can generally do, especially after the election
has already occurred. And you'd have to change the Constitution to require uniformity in voting laws. It would require a
constitutional amendment. Of course, both Congress
and state governments are constrained by the Constitution
as it currently exists. But with that out of the way, let's turn to the Texas lawsuit, and start at the beginning and ask, does this case satisfy
the threshold requirements for Supreme Court jurisdiction? Now, I'll warn you ahead of time. We're going to get into
the incredibly sexy topic of Supreme Court jurisdiction. So if there are any young
children watching this video, please ask them to leave the
room or avert their attention, because it's gonna get
a little out of hand. But that being said, Texas alleges that the Biden states made unconstitutional decisions about how they decided
to run the 2020 election. But before we dig into
the merits of this claim, Texas has to prove that
the Supreme Court can and should hear this particular case, because it's very difficult
to get into the Supreme Court. And as we've often talked
about on this channel, almost any time someone says
that they're going to take this all the way to the Supreme
Court, it's total nonsense, because there's a long,
long way you have to go before you can get a case
to the Supreme Court. But Texas has skipped all of that and they went straight
to the Supreme Court. And it's not as crazy as it first seems, because article three, section
two of the Constitution establishes the Supreme
Court's jurisdiction. The court has original
jurisdiction over lawsuits between two or more states. The court has appellate jurisdiction on almost any other case that involves a point of constitutional or federal law. But Texas is invoking the
Court's original jurisdiction, which means that this is a new case that can bypass all of
the other lower courts. But this doesn't mean that the
Court has to hear the case. The state has to file a motion for leave asking the Court to hear the dispute. And that's what Texas did. However, Texas went one step further by applying for emergency
injunctive relief. Texas says that the Court
should intervene quickly and stop the four defendant
states from relying on the popular vote results
and appointing electors. In other words, Texas would like the Supreme Court to
tell those four states that they need to cancel the Biden votes. And then they just simply
want the small favor that the Court will force the legislatures in those four states to appoint electors who will select Trump, ignoring what the majority of voters in that state wanted and
what state law demands, you know, no big deal. Now, when the court accepts
original jurisdiction cases with facts disputes, it usually appoints a special master to gather evidence. And this process usually
takes a long time. State disputes over water
rights, for instance, have lingered in the
Supreme Court for 20 years. But President Trump doesn't have 20 years. So the Paxton Texas brief
argues that the Supreme Court should hurry up and decide this
with no additional briefing. That's why Texas argues that the issues in this litigation are neither
fact-bound nor complex. But this does bring up
another obvious question. If the issues are obvious and non-complex, why did Texas wait until a month after the election to file the lawsuit? And why haven't any of the
other lawsuits succeeded? Now, the Supreme Court's
original jurisdiction can get complex, but generally speaking, the Supreme Court has narrowly interpreted its constitutional grant
of original jurisdiction. Whether the Supreme Court has jurisdiction is a threshold question, which means that the
Court has to be satisfied it should take this case up
before getting to the merits. And there are many threshold
problems with this lawsuit. The first of which is
the question of standing, which is a topic that
we've covered many times in relation to the election lawsuits. The first problem is that Texas may not have standing to bring the case. Standing is the ability of a party to demonstrate to the court that it has enough connections
to the alleged harm that it has the right to file a lawsuit. Generally speaking, to file a lawsuit, you have to be the party
that was actually harmed. For example, you can't go
into court and say that, well, my neighbor's house was robbed and I wanna file suit on their behalf. You don't get to do that. You have to actually
personally have been harmed. And here, the right party
to challenge election laws in other states would probably be the candidates and voters of that state. It's a little crazy for a state
to say that they were harmed by what happened in
another state's election. But President Trump and
the other candidates, and the voters have
already had the opportunity to litigate their claims in those states. But generally speaking, they've
lost all of those cases. Texas argues that it has standing because what the other states do impacts who won the presidential election. But if that's the case, then other states should
started suing Texas because they disagree with
the state's election rules. It would basically just destroy the entire concept of standing. And as Texas GOP Whip John Thune confirms, "I just don't know why a state like Texas, which never wants anybody
telling them what to do now wants to tell a bunch of other states how to run their elections." Yeah, it's kind of crazy. And ding, ding, ding,
ding, ding from the future. That's exactly how the Court came down, saying that Texas has absolutely
no standing whatsoever to be filing this lawsuit
in the first place. Got that right.
(eagle cries) But that takes us to the
second problem, estoppel. The second problem is
that these same claims have already been
adjudicated in other courts. There's a legal doctrine called estoppel that prevents the parties from litigating the same cause of action or issues once they've already been
decided by other courts. It's sort of like double
jeopardy, but for civil cases. Now, Republicans have tried
to get the Supreme Court to hear the cases that the
lower courts have dismissed. But so far, the Court has declined. And here, Texas is simply
trying to do an end run around those other cases,
which they already lost. Which brings us to the third problem, which is the doctrine of laches, which means a party is barred if it unreasonably takes too long before bringing a legal claim. And here, Texas complains
about changes to election laws in other states that happened
months before the elections. The alleged issues Texas complains about were also obvious while the
voters were still being counted. And under federal law, election disputes are supposed to be resolved by six days before the electoral college meets, a deadline known as the safe
harbor, which was December 8th. The Texas lawsuit wasn't
filed until December 7th, a day before. Why didn't Texas do it sooner? And why didn't Texas
file before the election, if it already knew what the problems were in the other states? And as one of the briefs make clear, it's because they didn't know who was going to win the election, which is the epitome of writing
the quiet part out loud. I mean, writing the
quiet part in the brief. It's just crass and unbelievable. Which takes us to the fourth problem, which is known as the
political question doctrine. And to be the kind of matter
that the Court can adjudicate, the dispute needs to be a
legal one, not a political one. And when the Court
decides whether the issue is a political one or a legal one, it looks to whether the problem is within the purview of
another branch of government. In this case, the Constitution provides that the Congress is the ultimate judge of the electoral college results. Republicans are well aware of this, because they are already
plotting a floor fight when Congress meets to
certify the results. So that kind of seems
like a political question. Which takes us to the fifth problem, which is the case is arguably moot. A dispute can become
moot when the controversy initially existed at the
time the lawsuit was filed, and it's no longer live
due to a change in the law or status of the parties involved. And 49 of 50 states have already certified their election results
by the safe harbor day. And the president and his
team of Kraken wranglers have already been litigating these issues since election day. And they've lost basically
every single one of these cases. They've lost over 60 times. And arguably, there's nothing left for the Supreme Court to decide. But you know what issue isn't moot is hitting the notification bell. I was checking my stats
and only 10% of people have enabled notifications. It'd mean the world to me if you would subscribe and
hit that notification bell, so you'll know when a video comes out. Which takes us to the sixth problem, which is that the remedy that Texas wants to disenfranchise millions of voters after they've already voted is probably grossly unconstitutional. Texas wants the Supreme Court to extend the electoral college deadline. The Supreme Court has never granted such an extreme remedy in a voting case. It didn't even do this
in Bush versus Gore. That case involved 537 votes in one state. - While I strongly disagree
with the Court's decision, I accept it. - And this is radically different considering what's at stake here. But Texas thinks that the
Republican legislators in the four defendant
states should be allowed to cancel all the votes
and just pick Trump. In our system, the people have a right to cast votes for the president. The states in question don't
like who the voters selected. So they want the Republican
legislatures to pick instead. That's extraordinary and also incredibly dangerous to democracy itself. But all right, let me get
down from my soap box, and let's play along with the lawsuit. Let's say that the Supreme Court believes this suit satisfies all of
these threshold questions, and then it turns to the merits. Well, we get into a lot
of the same questions that we've already talked about in terms of election lawsuits. Texas alleges that the
four defendant states violated their own laws by changing their election
procedures in 2020. The theory is that this violated
the equal protection clause by allowing different sets of voters to be treated differently
within their states. Even if this were a valid
equal protection claim, it would not overturn the
electoral college results, because the votes have already been cast. The remedy would not be to
disallow millions of ballots that were cast by voters
who did nothing wrong. All these voters did was follow the rules. Now, Texas and 17 other states
want those votes canceled. But how would that be
equitable or constitutional? And we already talked about how bogus these equal protection claims are in the context of the Kelly
versus Pennsylvania suit in a prior election video. But disenfranchising one set of voters would present its own
equal protection problems, especially since the president is obsessed with what happened in urban areas, which voted overwhelmingly
for future President Biden. Texas is arguing that
those votes don't matter. And AG Paxton is already
on very thin ice here, because he's already raised all of these fake election fraud claims
in the lower courts, which have already been dismissed. Texas claims that there are quote, voting irregularities
that would be consistent with the unconstitutional
relaxation of ballot integrity protections in
those states' election laws. And there's a long list of complaints that we've already heard about. And generally, which has already been adjudicated in other places. Allegedly missing USB drives, ballots being delivered in food trucks, alleged statistical disparities, poll workers doing something nefarious when other poll watchers weren't looking. These are allegations that
have already been addressed in many different jurisdictions. Almost always, the court finds them to be completely bogus and made up. And even if all of those
allegations were true, which time and time again, it's been proved that they aren't, why would Texas have any
kind of standing whatsoever to make a claim about those allegations? It doesn't make any sense. And that brings us to the electors clause. Texas also claims that
it's unconstitutional for a state legislature
to delegate their power to make election laws to state courts or even to the governor. Texas claims that by quote, taking or allowing non-legislative actions to change the election results that would govern the appointment
of presidential electors, the defendant states have
violated the electors clause, the equal protection clause,
and the due process clause. And ironically, it turns
out that Texas is guilty of doing the very thing
that it complains about. Texas Governor Greg Abbott
extended the early voting period. Is Texas suing itself? Spoiler alert, it is not. But Texas is supported in
these claims by 17 states who filed the friend of the
court brief, an amicus brief. These states argue that
it was unconstitutional for Pennsylvania judges to let
absentee ballots be counted if they were postmarked by election day, but arrived afterward. Like Texas, these states are utterly blind to their own hypocrisy. Kansas and Mississippi
also count mail-in ballots if they arrive late. So are they calling out their own laws as unconstitutional as well? It doesn't really seem like it. But again, the fact that
states have different laws about voting doesn't violate
the elections clause. The Constitution was set up that way. The elections clause give states the right to decide the way votes
are cast and counted. It doesn't give Texas or any
other state a right to veto. Okay, but enough about
the merits or lack thereof of this particular lawsuit. Let's talk about some of
the procedural high jinks. First, there is President
Trump's motion to intervene. President Trump filed a motion
to intervene in this lawsuit. Remember, this was brought by
the Texas attorney general. Here, the president, for some reason, is being represented by John Eastman, a lawyer who is most famous
for writing an article suggesting that as an
American-born child of immigrants, Kamala Harris wasn't
really an American citizen. It sort of goes downhill from there. But what is President
Trump actually arguing? Well, quote, despite the
chaos of the election night and the days which followed, the media has consistently proclaimed that no widespread voter
fraud has been proven. But this observation misses the point. The constitutional issue is not whether voters committed fraud, but whether state
officials violated the law by systematically loosening the measure for ballot integrity so that fraud becomes undetectable. They're arguing that the fraud is so good that it can't be detected,
therefore, President Trump wins. I don't need to tell you
that this is pure nonsense that contradicts what the Trump lawyers have been saying for over a month, that poll watcher saw
the stuff that was fraud, and that the Dominion voting
machines created fraud, and that the Democrats injected fake ballots into the final counts. Every lawsuit filed by the Kraken says that she figured out the entire scheme. But now Eastman argues that quote, it is not necessary for the plaintiffs in interventions to prove
that fraud occurred. It's only necessary to
demonstrate that the elections in the defendant states
materially deviated from the manner of choosing electors established by their
respective state legislatures. Now, I will point out parenthetically that perhaps the biggest irony
of this motion to intervene, where the president
says that he would like to be a party in this lawsuit actually may prevent the court from
actually addressing the lawsuit. Because remember, we talked
about original jurisdiction. And the fact that Trump is arguing he has standing to be in this lawsuit, sort of cast doubt on the
idea that this is a lawsuit between one state and the other states. It shows that this case can
and should have been litigated in the various states where
the harm allegedly occurred and doesn't need original jurisdiction before the Supreme Court. It's the ultimate irony that by blustering his way into the suit, he may actually be making it
jurisdictionally impossible for the Supreme Court to
actually adjudicate it. Now, you might be saying, Devin, are these states really suing because they don't like the outcome? Well, yes, it seems that's
exactly what they're saying. This lawsuit is very possibly
nothing but bad faith. Now, keep in mind that Pennsylvania has been fighting the same issues since before the election, and the courts keep ruling
in the state's favor, even when the judges are Trump appointees. But in this particular case, and I usually don't engage
in this kind of speculation, it's possible that the
attorney general for Texas might have brought the suit for reasons unrelated
to the election itself, but actually to try and curry
favor with the president to get a presidential pardon. As ridiculous as that sounds, that seems to be the most likely reason for filing this suit. Texas attorney general Paxton
has been under indictment since 2015 on securities fraud charges relating to activities that
happened before he was elected. These generally are state charges. And just for the hell of it, here's Ken Paxton stealing $1,000 pen from the same courthouse
where he was indicted. - [Narrator] This is Ken Paxton, the indicted Texas attorney general, rummaging through the metal detector trays and stealing that $1,000 pen. And this is Ken Paxton, the
indicted Texas attorney general, walking away with a stolen pen. - But then, earlier this year, he was accused of committing
crimes while in office. This time, the call came
from inside the House. His own aides contacted federal
law enforcement authorities and asked them to investigate allegations of improper influence, abuse of office, bribery, and other potential crimes. Several lawyers resigned, another personnel say that
they're being retaliated against for reporting Paxton's criminality. The Texas solicitor general who would normally join a filing like this in the Texas versus Pennsylvania lawsuit did not sign any of these pleadings, which indicates that he doesn't want to be associated with this lawsuit. And he'd probably like
to avoid being swept up in Paxton's issues himself. Now, why is all of this relevant? Well, Ken Paxton could actually
use a presidential pardon. He hasn't been charged
with a federal crime yet, but just this week, the
FBI subpoenaed his office, indicating that an
investigation is ongoing. Paxton chatted on the
phone with President Trump, and then he filed this lawsuit. But don't take my word for it. Even Republican Senator Ben Sasse sees this as a pardon grab. Now in passing, I'll mention
a couple of the other amicus briefs that were filed. These are not binding, they're
not parties to the suit, but it's interesting that they
filed these with the court. They want their opinions to be known. And Montana Governor Steve Bullock filed his own amicus brief to make it clear that
neither Texas nor Trump sought to throw out the selection
of presidential electors in states that made the same
legal changes to voting rules as the defendant states, stating quote, Texas chose not to include
the state of Montana where President Trump
and other Republicans were successful in a mail ballot election conducted to reduce the impact of COVID. Underscoring, of course, that this action is less about election
integrity than it is about attempting to overturn
the will of the electorate. But if Texas is successful in its suit, it would destabilize the
results of elections in Montana and any other state that
took valid state law actions to minimize the impact
of the virus on voting, including states that delivered victories to Republican candidates
using mail ballots. And then of course, there
were the insane ramblings of the amicus brief on behalf of the state of New
California and New Nevada. I was born and raised in old California. So I was actually quite
surprised to learn of the 51st and 52nd state of New
California and New Nevada. Not surprisingly, this legal brief is sovereign citizen level,
absolute garbage nonsense. We're all dumber for having Reddit, and may God have mercy on their soul for actually filing this
nonsense amicus brief. - May God have mercy on your soul. - Hey, it's Devin from the future again. And as I promised at the
beginning of this video, we now have the known conclusion
to this particular lawsuit, which is that the Supreme Court has summarily dismissed the suit. And it did so in two
very terse paragraphs. The first stating that
the state of Texas's motion for leave to
file a bill of complaint is denied for lack of standing under article three of the Constitution. Article three of the
Constitution is the one that just says what jurisdiction
the courts actually have. It creates the federal
courts in the United States. And then it says, Texas
is not demonstrated to judicially cognizable
interest in the manner in which another state
conducts it elections. All of their pending motions
are dismissed as moot. So there you have it. Texas doesn't have any cognizable injury. It doesn't have standing to argue that what other states do is bad and that it can reverse the
results from different states. If it has an issue with the way that things were run in its own state, or if there are people who
were injured in those states, then they can file suit and they can sue those particular states. But the state of Texas has no interest in being able to file a lawsuit, no interest in the legal sense. Obviously, we have an AG here who wants to overturn the
results, but in a legal sense, they don't have an interest
to be able to file a lawsuit. It's like trying to make a lawsuit over something that
happened to your neighbor when it didn't affect you
in any way, shape, or form. And then, so a lot of people get the second paragraph
of this dismissal wrong, which there are two justices that say that they would have heard the case, specifically statement of Justice Alito, with whom Justice Thomas joins. "In my view, we do not have discretion to deny the filing of a bill of complaint in a case that falls within
our original jurisdiction. See Arizona vs California citation. I would therefore grant the motion to file the bill of complaint, but
would not grant other relief. And I express no view on any other issue." Really all that saying is
that there are two justices on the Supreme Court that
say that if a claimant, one of the states has a claim
under original jurisdiction, the Court has to hear it. And there are differing opinions on that. Some, most of the justices
on the Supreme Court say that it's discretionary whether the Supreme Court
will take up the case. All these two people are saying, Justice Alito and Justice
Thomas are saying is that, if there is a case that sounds in the Court's original jurisdiction, the Supreme Court of the
United States must hear it, no exceptions whatsoever. But almost certainly, they wouldn't have granted the lawsuit. They wouldn't have granted the relief. They still would've kicked out the case. They're just saying that they
would have heard the case, not summarily dismissed it. And here's the thing about
this particular lawsuit. It was always going to fail. It was nonsense, whether the Supreme Court
actually heard it or not under original jurisdiction or just bounced it like they did, it was always going to fail. And I'm torn on this. Because you're allowed to file lawsuits, even meritless ones, though there are mechanisms
for punishing people that file meritless lawsuits. But that doesn't necessarily
mean that we shouldn't judge the people that filed the lawsuits that strike at the very
heart of our democracy if it had been successful. So to Ken Paxton and the 17 other states that joined in this case and
the over 100 GOP senators that supported this lawsuit,
it's their right to do so, but that doesn't mean we can't judge them and judge them harshly for it. But here's the thing, Texas
attorney general Ken Paxton is still on the loose and
he's coming for your votes and he's coming for your $1,000 pens. So you'd better get a great
security system to stop him. And Deep Sentinel is just that. I used to live in a house with
a traditional security system with one of those stupid keypad where the alarm would go off if you didn't enter your code in time, and actually got fined hundreds of dollars when the police were called out on false alarm after false alarm. But Deep Sentinel is different. Deep Sentinel is the only security system that actually monitors
your property in real time and will intervene before
something bad happens. When the camera detects a visitor, the guards log into your
system, assess the situation. And then the loud two-way
speaker lets a guard intervene and stop crime before it happens. They can ask the visitor questions or tell them that the
police are on the way. It's absolute genius. And of course, I can
check on all of the status as it's happening with my cellphone. And because it's real humans, there are virtually no false alarms, because they're actually looking at what it's happening on the scene. And of course, Deep Sentinel
is Wi-Fi and app-enabled, so I can pull out my phone
and check on my front porch or backyard with one click
anywhere in the world. And I can turn on the two-way radio myself and talk to a delivery person or the guests when they arrive. And the system automatically tells me when I get packages delivered. So if you'd like to try Deep Sentinel, LegalEagles will get a special 20% off if you go to DeepSentinel.com/LegalEagle or use the promo code
LegalEagle20 at checkout. But this is a special deal. It's the best deal they have ever offered. And it will expire in a few days. So be sure to get 20% off by going to DeepSentinel.com/LegalEagle, or using the link in the description. Plus, clicking on that link
really helps out this channel. So do you agree with my analysis? Will this be the last election
lawsuit I have to cover? Probably not. Which is why you should
check out this playlist with all of my other real law reviews talking about the election issues and everything that's going on with the presidential transition. So click on this playlist
and I'll see you in court.
