"Honey Badger" On Trump Coup Gravy Boat, Of Course

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by: Colorado Pols

Former Secretary of State Scott Gessler, a.k.a. the “Honey Badger.”

Below the fold in yesterday’s Unaffiliated newsletter from the Colorado Sun’s political crew, a fascinating underreported tidbit beneath the headlines about Colorado’s much higher-profile agent in the ongoing alt-facts drama over Donald Trump’s inability to admit he lost the 2020 election, Colorado Christian University’s Jenna Ellis.

Of any Republican in Colorado, who is the one prior to Ellis coming on the scene you’d most likely guess is working to undo small-d democracy and award Trump another four year term in court by judicial fiat? If you guessed former GOP Secretary of State Scott “Honey Badger” Gessler, you win a prize!

Disclaimer: there’s no prize.

Gessler, a Republican, reviewed statements from six unnamed people, including poll workers, who raised questions about how Nevada conducted its mail-ballot election. In his report, he concluded: “It is my opinion that Nevada did not implement a reliable universal mail ballot system that provides any confidence that Nevada’s voters awarded the state’s six electoral votes to Joe Biden.”

Got that? Scott Gessler talked to six people whose name we don’t get to know, and based on whatever they told him and Gessler’s supposed expertise in how elections work (more on that in a moment), he’s ready to conclude that the state of Nevada’s election for President should be done over or blown off or whatever the overall objective of the Trump legal campaign is since at this point it’s clearly not winning cases.

And since this is Scott Gessler we’re talking about, you bet the bottom dollar in your discretionary account he’s not carrying the Trump campaign’s water pro bono:

It’s not quite what Jenna Ellis is rumored to be pulling down per billable hour, but it’s a nice rate if you can get it! And we can certainly see how this could be a boon for Gessler looking to raise his profile ahead of a bid to lead the Colorado Republican Party. But of course, the Sun dutifully pointed us to the inevitable story from KLAS-TV Las Vegas last Friday, the case Gessler rendered his “expert opinion” met the same fate as most of the other forty some-odd Trump election challenge cases:

A Nevada judge has dismissed President Donald Trump’s campaign’s request to declare the president the winner in Nevada and nullify the election results. In his ruling, Judge James Russell also ordered lawyers for the campaign to pay the defendants’ legal fees…

“Contestants did not prove under any standard of proof that any illegal votes were cast and counted, or legal votes were not counted at all, for any other improper or illegal reason, nor in an amount equal to or greater than 33,596, or otherwise in an amount sufficient to raise reasonable doubt as to the outcome of the election,” Russell wrote in his order.

Ouch. Then again, anyone who knows Scott Gessler’s record of baselessly alleging massive voter fraud, a crusade he carried on for years as Secretary of State and thatt pitifully sputtered out after his claims of “tens of thousands” of “illegal voters” dwindled to thousands, then to hundreds, then dozens, and finally less than a half-dozen isolated cases, could have predicted this outcome for any argument based on his so-called “expertise.”

Gessler’s proven fictional claims about vote fraud made a running joke of Republicans obsessed with issue in the eyes of Colorado voters, and then landmark election reforms in 2013 including mail ballots and same-day registration proved that reforms Gessler darkly warned would end in disaster actually work extremely well and have led to historic rates of voter participation in Colorado elections.

What we’re saying, and we believe it’s very defensible based on his record, is that there may be no one in America less credible to allege another state’s election was carried out unfairly than Scott Gessler. Along with the backfiring caricature that Rudy Giuliani has become and Jenna Ellis’ ridiculously overstated “constitutional law” experience, Gessler’s role as an “expert witness” to assist Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 elections perhaps could not be more perfectly ridiculous.

14 thoughts on ““Honey Badger” On Trump Coup Gravy Boat, Of Course”

harrydoby says:

December 9, 2020 at 2:49 pm

I wonder if Trump's team will ask Gessler for a refund, since as the judge noted:

A Nevada district court judge on Friday dismissed the lawsuit, and in the ruling, he wrote that Gessler’s methodology for reviewing the election results was “unsound”

Even more telling — the Nevada AG challenged them to basically, "Put up or shut up". So far, crickets…

Because I take fraud claims seriously, I have personally requested that President Trump’s team, including former Attorney General Adam Laxalt, file an official complaint and supporting evidence with my office. They have yet to send in a complaint that details and provides evidence for the allegations they have publicly been making. Absent such a complaint and supporting evidence, these claims of widespread voter fraud remain baseless and, moreover, are insulting to the countless of elections workers who have diligently overseen our elections.

AARON D. FORD, NEVADA ATTORNEY GENERAL

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1. kickshot says:
  
  December 9, 2020 at 3:53 pm
  
  A refund for failing to get a refund?
  
  Or is Gessler claiming that he won?
  
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2. MichaelBowman says:
  
  December 10, 2020 at 12:30 pm
  
  Tim Miller FTW:
  
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  1. kwtree says:
    
    December 10, 2020 at 1:07 pm
    
    😆
    
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  2. kickshot says:
    
    December 10, 2020 at 1:15 pm
    
    Steve Schmidt (Tim's buddy) at his best
    
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itlduso says:

December 9, 2020 at 9:10 pm

If they truly believe that the election was stolen from Trump, then they should stop paying income taxes. After all, wouldn’t a stolen election be the very definition of Taxation without Representation? Income taxes are the lifeblood of government. Patriots with actual courage would cut that lifeblood off and not file their tax returns.

Oh, and write-in Trump for the GA Senate races. #WriteInTrumpGA

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kwtree says:

December 9, 2020 at 9:55 pm

Gessler was happy to take credit for how well Colorado's elections ran once all mail ballot elections were implemented in 2013. The Secretary of State's office has gotten numerous awards for its election and business practices, and Colorado has been in the top 5 states for voter turnout since 2010.

However, he (and his minion Suzanne Staiert) fought all of the reforms that made our high voter turnout possible: all mail ballot elections, automatic registration , same day registration, alternative ID acceptable to vote (Gessler wanted only photo ID and proof of citizenship).

So, shockingly, Gessler and Staiert continue this tradition of hypocrisy. "Watch what they do, not what they say".

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1. unnamed says:
  
  December 10, 2020 at 8:53 am
  
  Thankfully, when you're talking about Gessler and Staiert, you are talking about a has-been and a never will be.
  
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unnamed says:

December 10, 2020 at 8:54 am

delete

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Genghis says:

December 10, 2020 at 10:19 am

My rate for this matter is $450 per hour.

The Colorado legal services market has evolved past the point where that figure shocks the conscience, but for the services of Scott Fucking Gessler, ffs? Come on.

Gessler shall henceforth and forevermore be known as the Money Badger.

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1. kickshot says:
  
  December 10, 2020 at 10:25 am
  
  Who paid it?
  
  Was there a personal connection?
  
  His name was not picked out of the Yellow Pages.
  
  Qualifications probably involved some amount of koolaid and having read the playbook.
  
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  1. spaceman65 says:
    
    December 10, 2020 at 10:50 am
    
    $450/hour for his experience level is significantly lower than comparable attorneys are larger local firms and the national firms. $500-$700/hour is fairly ordinary for them. Which is ridiculous. But you gotta pay that outrageous overhead, you know
    
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  2. kwtree says:
    
    December 10, 2020 at 12:45 pm
    
    Gessler has been the go-to attorney for the Neville clan’s “Recall Polis” grift.
    
    Before that it was recalling state legislators who supported red flag gun laws, the national popular vote bill, SB181 to regulate extraction industries, band whatever other rightie cause du jour they thought they could raise money from their gullible donors.
    
    This “Trump won” BS is just their latest monetizing grievances scheme.
    
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JohnInDenver says:

December 10, 2020 at 10:45 am

Apparently the AG of Utah also jetted off to support the Nevada case. Outgoing Gov. AND incoming Gov. Were not amused.

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