Was it shocking that Ginni Thomas sent emails to Arizona election officials asking them to set aside the will of the voters and submit a slate of fake electors?

Submit a slate of fake electors who would support Donald Trump, even after he demonstrably lost the 2020 presidential election?

Was it really surprising or was it business as usual? Just another crazy ball-busting Republican matron who happens to be married to sitting Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas? Or a conniving harpy doing her husband’s bidding?

What Ginni was emailing was a prefabbed piece of legal advocacy that urged Arizona state officials to ‘Please stand strong in the face of political and media pressure. Please reflect on the awesome authority granted to you by our constitution. And then please take action to ensure that a clean slate of electors is chosen for our state.’

Subverting democracy

Gina’s clumsy, badly-worded legal proposition aimed to subvert an entire presidential election. It’s also a proposition her husband has endorsed as a matter of constitutional law.

It didn’t work in 2020 because the legal and political structures to support it weren’t in place then. But those pieces are being put into place as we read this.

One of the lawmakers in Arizona, Shawnna Bolick, is married to a state Supreme Court justice and mother to Clarence Thomas’ godchild.

In 2020, Shawnna urged Congress to throw out the presidential election results from Arizona and give the state’s electoral college votes to Trump. In 2021, Shawnna introduced legislation that ‘would enable a majority of the legislature to override the popular vote ... and dictate the state’s electoral college votes itself.’

What Shawnna couldn’t lawfully do in 2020 is what she hopes to legally do. Oh, and Shawnna is now running for secretary of state, the office that oversees state elections.

Democracy is withering before our eyes

At least 357 sitting Republican legislators in swing states have used the power of their office to discredit or try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. That’s forty-four percent of the Republican legislators in the nine states where the presidential race was most narrowly decided.

More importantly, election deniers around the country are running for secretary of state and vying for attorney general as swing states’ top election officer and top cop.

If successful, they can use this power to witch hunt bogus claims of voter fraud, attempt to nullify Democratic ballots, refuse to certify true results, and even try to approve an alternative slate of electors for any losing Republicans.

This is what Ginni was pushing two years ago, and what her husband has already deemed constitutionally permissible.

Minority rule

The symmetry between Ginni and Clarence Thomas’ work has never been more obvious.

While Clarence fought to give state legislatures the constitutional authority to reject election results, Ginni lobbied state legislators to do exactly that.

Two hardened right-wing conservative activists working hand in hand to ensure that Republican state legislatures decide future elections regardless of who the voters choose.

If Republicans succeed in pulling off a legally sanctioned coup in 2024, we’ll have every right to be horrified.

But we’ll have no excuse to be surprised.

Reference

“Clarence and Ginni Thomas are telling us exactly how the 2024 coup will go down” Slate (2022)