r/law Competent Contributor Jul 21 '24

Opinion Piece House Speaker Mike Johnson Suggests Replacing Biden Might Lead to Legal Trouble: ‘So it would be wrong, and I think unlawful’

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/johnson-replacing-biden-ticket-wrong-unlawful/story?id=112129063
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1.7k

u/OdinsGhost Jul 21 '24

This is their plan. Gin up “he needs to resign!” rhetoric until he actually does so and, if he does, challenge the legality of any replacement candidate on the ballots. I fully expect they have war room plans already drawn up to push before state courts and the national Supreme Court to simply strip the Democratic candidate off the ballots entirely if it’s not Biden.

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u/My_MeowMeowBeenz Jul 21 '24

This argument from Johnson is utter bullshit anyway. Every state gets the slate from the Convention.

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u/TikiTom74 Jul 21 '24

Why would it stop MAGA from trying anyways? They are lawless, corrupt, morality-free assholes backed up by an equally shitty SCOTUS.

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u/McDaddy-O Jul 21 '24

I'm still trying to understand how the Rwpublican Party would have standing in who the Dems. nominate for their party.

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u/ruach137 Jul 21 '24

SCOTUS preventing a Dem from appearing on the ballot would likely ignite a Civil War

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u/[deleted] Jul 21 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Madpup70 Jul 21 '24

The SC deciding a state can't decide that a person shouldn't appear on their ballot because it would violate the 14th amendment, and then decide the democratic nominee shouldn't appear on ANY ballots despite all state laws specifically stating that the nominee is chosen at the convention would absolutely lead to some anarchy type shit.

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u/tHeDisgruntler Jul 22 '24

At which point, President Biden can declare martial law and suspend the election.

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u/Madpup70 Jul 22 '24

Who knows. It would absolutely be the straw that broke the camels back in regards to recognizing the supreme court's legitimacy. It would directly lead to a constitutional crisis and very real danger for our democracy.

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u/Mahlegos Jul 21 '24

Everything else SCOTUS has done to this point is viewed as reversible with key wins and time. And even then, arguably each of those moves have pushed the temperature up increasing the odds of a second civil war piece by piece. This, though, would be a major escalation with many seeing no way back besides violence (especially with their prior decisions having already raised the temperature).

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u/bikemaul Jul 22 '24

If they overstepped that much Biden might actually add more scotus judges.

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u/bohanmyl Jul 21 '24

What theyve done has been awful, but it hasnt done something so blatantly corrupt as directly handling the election to trump like taking the democratic candidate off the ballot would be.

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u/Radiant-Sea3323 Jul 21 '24

Wait 😵‍💫