By November 5, it had become clear that President Donald Trump was not going to win a second term. Trump’s lead in Pennsylvania was slipping, and with it went any real chance of electoral victory. Trump had spent months baselessly claiming that the election would be corrupted by the Democrats, so it wasn’t particularly surprising when Republicans immediately filed legal challenges to stop certain votes from being counted. Somewhat more unexpectedly, pro-Trump media figures began calling for the much more drastic measure of throwing out election results altogether.
Fox News host Mark Levin tweeted in all caps that Republican state legislatures “have the final say over the choosing of electors” and called on them to “get ready to do your constitutional duty.”
Levin’s suggestion closely mirrored a set of concerns published in The Atlantic in late September. The article’s writer, Barton Gellman, was scoffed at by some for promoting “political panic porn.” In hindsight, however, the very scenario he warned about has become the Trump campaign’s electoral strategy.
“Trump’s state and national legal teams are already laying the groundwork for postelection maneuvers that would circumvent the results of the vote count in battleground states,” wrote Gellman. “Ambiguities in the Constitution and logic bombs in the Electoral Count Act make it possible to extend the dispute all the way to Inauguration Day, which would bring the nation to a precipice.”
In the weeks that followed, Levin’s call for an extreme last-ditch strategy to keep Trump in power was discussed on Fox News in unsettlingly casual terms.
Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume alluded to this approach during the network’s election night coverage. “It’s worth keeping in mind as we follow these lawsuits, that what they’re really mostly about is what state law -- that is to say, the law passed by state legislators -- says are the rules and regulations of an election,” said Hume. “And some state legislatures adjusted their rules and regulations to accommodate COVID-19. Some states did not. But the Constitution grants the authority to set election rules to state legislatures, not state courts, not state election boards, but state legislatures.”
This was one of Fox's first attempts to push the “Independent State Legislature Doctrine,” at the time a little known legal theory that postulated -- contrary to constitutional history and precedent -- that state legislative bodies could override not only the other state branches of government, but also the popular vote, when it came to setting election procedures and choosing presidential electors.
Sean Hannity stopped just short of echoing Levin’s message during the November 5 edition of his eponymous Fox News show. Hannity claimed that “nobody can testify to the legitimacy of what [Pennsylvania’s] counting was,” and so the only reasonable remedy would be to hold a “do-over” election in that state. During his radio show, however, Hannity promoted Levin’s basic point.
During the November 6 edition of Fox Business’ Lou Dobbs Tonight, Tom Fitton, president of the right-wing group Judicial Watch, argued that Republican-led legislatures in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona should “make a stand on behalf of the rule of law.”
“Are they going to endorse what went on this week or are they going to appoint a clean slate of electors that supports President Trump?” Fitton asked before urging viewers to pressure members of Congress. “If I were in Congress, I'd be telling these states, ‘You better keep up on -- you better be honest here, because we're not going to accept your votes if your -- if your -- if your election is a sham.’”
On Sunday, November 8, former special counsel Ken Starr was interviewed on Life, Liberty & Levin, where he provided a few choice antidemocratic quotes. “To count every vote may be a crime ... under federal law. It's definitely a crime under state law.” Starr called it “shameful” that Biden supporters had adopted “count every vote” as a sort of unofficial motto, calling it “an invitation for absolute lawlessness.”
“If the legislature of a state -- let’s just say Pennsylvania -- believes that the election cannot be trusted, it can step in and determine how the electors are chosen from the commonwealth,” Starr said to Levin, who obviously agreed.
During a November 11 appearance on Bill Hemmer Reports, Fox News White House correspondent John Roberts said, “The anger out there in these red states is so deep and so palpable that GOP legislators may have a difficult time seating Biden electors,” without noting that this would be a massive blow to democracy.
On Fox’s website, Fox media commentator Brian Flood accused other media outlets of hypocrisy for voicing opposition to Trump’s end-run around the electorate. Flood cited right-wing Twitter personality Stephen L. Miller’s rebuttal to CNN political correspondent Abby Phillip after she said that Trump’s actions were “out of bounds.” Miller’s point was to highlight a handful of people who urged delegates to the Electoral College to go rogue back in 2016. Neither Flood nor Miller noted the obvious difference between the two situations: In 2016, the calls were from people not associated with Hillary Clinton’s campaign, whereas the current situation is being pursued by the candidate himself.
More recently, Fox & Friends Weekend co-host Will Cain this week pointed to the Trump campaign's strategy and said that “there may not be enough evidence for a court system [to overturn the election], but there should be enough evidence for state legislators to change their electors.”
Fox has also provided a platform for Trump’s campaign to make the case for this wild strategy.
On November 12, White House press secretary-cum-Trump campaign spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany joined Fox & Friends and defended the proposal as constitutionally “accurate.”
Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis appeared on the November 17 episode of Fox News @ Night with Shannon Bream. Ostensibly one of Fox’s “news-side” hosts, Bream allowed Ellis to make a direct call for the Michigan state legislature to “get involved.” Rather than pushing back on the undemocratic idea, Bream simply said, “All right. We want transparency -- across the board.”
On November 19, one-time Trump lawyer and all-time conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell made an appearance on Fox Business’ Lou Dobbs Tonight. “The entire election, frankly, in all the swing states should be overturned and the legislatures should make sure that the electors are selected for Trump.”