The Biden Administration

[Martin Y]

You've completely invented the idea that she would be personally liable for authorizing government spending that is required by law, from whole cloth.

Government does not work that way, and never has.

I didn't introduce the phrase "legally responsible" to this, I just asked for an explanation. Not personally liable then. Another kind of legally responsible.

[EACLucifer]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released,

There is. It's her. That's why people are annoyed. It's because that is her job, and she didn't do it.

and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

America has a lengthy transition process, it's part of how its civil service is run. One reason for this is that their electoral process takes time - a legacy to some extent of running a very large country with poor transportation - and another reason is because a bunch of staff get changed and need to come up to speed. That's why they employ someone to ascertain the apparent winner. It's her job to do that. It's to cover for a process where the result is easily apparent - it was - but not quite formalised yet. The system works when people remotely understand the responsibilities of office, like most systems. That is why what she did is so outrageous.

[dyqik]

You've completely invented the idea that she would be personally liable for authorizing government spending that is required by law, from whole cloth.

Government does not work that way, and never has.

I didn't introduce the phrase "legally responsible" to this, I just asked for an explanation. Not personally liable then. Another kind of legally responsible.

The law doesn't define "apparent", so she's not at risk for a determination that ultimately turns out to be wrong, unless there was actual misconduct that led to that determination.

[dyqik]

You've completely invented the idea that she would be personally liable for authorizing government spending that is required by law, from whole cloth.

Government does not work that way, and never has.

I didn't introduce the phrase "legally responsible" to this, I just asked for an explanation. Not personally liable then. Another kind of legally responsible.

Your responses of

Wait a minute. Is she in a position equivalent to a solicitor settling an estate? If my job made me legally responsible for the disbursement of ten million dollars, I'm not going to just give it away to whoever TV news reckon is going to win it.

Followed by:

Does it offer her a $10M indemnity that it isn't wrong?

Make it pretty clear that you were talking about personal liability.

[EACLucifer]

Also, to be clear, decision desks are only doing a little bit of predicting. Mostly they are summing up unoffical tallies released by states and looking at how much there is left to count. Unofficial tallies don't vary from the final certified ones by much, usually small fractions of a percent.

[Bird on a Fire]

You've completely invented the idea that she would be personally liable for authorizing government spending that is required by law, from whole cloth.

Government does not work that way, and never has.

I didn't introduce the phrase "legally responsible" to this, I just asked for an explanation. Not personally liable then. Another kind of legally responsible.

Your responses of

Wait a minute. Is she in a position equivalent to a solicitor settling an estate? If my job made me legally responsible for the disbursement of ten million dollars, I'm not going to just give it away to whoever TV news reckon is going to win it.

Followed by:

Does it offer her a $10M indemnity that it isn't wrong?

Make it pretty clear that you were talking about personal liability.

I think this is the quote that introduced the phrase 'legal responsibility':

She also said, quite reasonably, that it's absurd that the GSA Adminstrator is the person legally responsible for determining when to release transition funds. And that she received death threats. I actually have a certain amount of sympathy for her.

Like Martin Y I'm a bit unclear as to what the official role of the GSA Administrator is in this respect: are they supposed to decide for themselves who's won the election, and therefore disburse funds, or is there supposed to be some official mechanism that hasn't worked this time round?

The coverage I've seen focuses on their role in releasing funds, but hasn't been clear that they're also responsible for calling the election.

[Martin Y]

Your responses of

Wait a minute. Is she in a position equivalent to a solicitor settling an estate? If my job made me legally responsible for the disbursement of ten million dollars, I'm not going to just give it away to whoever TV news reckon is going to win it.

Followed by:

Does it offer her a $10M indemnity that it isn't wrong?

Make it pretty clear that you were talking about personal liability.

Yes. Correct. That was what the phrase "legally responsible" made me think (and please note that I was quoting Bolo who was quoting or paraphrasing her own words). You'll also note the question marks, which I hoped would make it clear that I did not know the answer and was asking for clarification.

[dyqik]

Like Martin Y I'm a bit unclear as to what the official role of the GSA Administrator is in this respect: are they supposed to decide for themselves who's won the election, and therefore disburse funds, or is there supposed to be some official mechanism that hasn't worked this time round?

The coverage I've seen focuses on their role in releasing funds, but hasn't been clear that they're also responsible for calling the election.

They are not responsible for calling an election. Calling an election has no legal meaning or weight.

They are responsible for authorizing the disbursing of transition funds to, and authorizing government employees and agencies to talk to the apparent winner, and to give access to their transition team. They are required to do this as soon as they can reasonably say that a winner is apparent. The aim to is to short circuit the lengthy electoral college process, and to allow the new administration to start to get up to speed as soon as possible. They are responsible for their decision to say whether or not a winner is apparent at any particular time.

If the determination is wrong, the risks are only that a tiny amount of money has been wasted (I've possibly wasted as much, and I've not even been paid a tenth of that in total), and maybe some people get to see the inner workings of government that they aren't actually going to take over. If the determination is not made as early as possible, the risks are that the new administration is inadequately prepared, and something like 9/11 happens due to those problems (this has been raised as a real issue).

[Bird on a Fire]

deleted - cross-posted with dyqik

[Bird on a Fire]

Like Martin Y I'm a bit unclear as to what the official role of the GSA Administrator is in this respect: are they supposed to decide for themselves who's won the election, and therefore disburse funds, or is there supposed to be some official mechanism that hasn't worked this time round?

The coverage I've seen focuses on their role in releasing funds, but hasn't been clear that they're also responsible for calling the election.

They are not responsible for calling an election. Calling an election has no legal meaning or weight.

They are responsible for authorizing the disbursing of transition funds to, and authorizing government employees and agencies to talk to the apparent winner, and to give access to their transition team. They are required to do this as soon as they can reasonably say that a winner is apparent. The aim to is to short circuit the lengthy electoral college process, and to allow the new administration to start to get up to speed as soon as possible. They are responsible for their decision to say whether or not a winner is apparent at any particular time.

If the determination is wrong, the risks are only that a tiny amount of money has been wasted (I've possibly wasted as much, and I've not even been paid a tenth of that in total), and maybe some people get to see the inner workings of government that they aren't actually going to take over. If the determination is not made as early as possible, the risks are that the new administration is inadequately prepared, and something like 9/11 happens due to those problems (this has been raised as a real issue).

Ok, thanks for the clarification.

So it does sound like they're pretty much expected to apply their own standards to when 'a winner is apparent'. Now, I and you and pretty much everyone else can agree that Biden has pretty clearly won, and I'm not sure it's reasonable for the GSA Administrator to be dragging their heels like this. Nevertheless, it does seem like quite a fraught and contentious decision for a bean-counter to have to make without anything official to point to for backup.

[dyqik]

The point is that there's very little downside to them giving the decision too early, even if it turns out to be wrong, and very big downsides to them holding off on the decision.

Trump's transition team got the letter authorizing transition sometime between 11:30pm on Election day and 01:30 that night, at least 12 hours before Clinton conceded, and well before the result was as clear as this one was ten days ago.

[monkey]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released, and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

Nancy Pelosi was talking about doing just that before the election, because of the worries that Trump would steal it. There's lots of holes in the rules.

[bolo]

If you want some history of the transition process, with statutory references to pursue for those so inclined, try this report:

https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R46602

There is a section on "Ascertaining the 'Apparent Successful Candidates'".

[Millennie Al]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released, and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

The single process is the counting of the votes of the Electoral College by Congress which will happen on 6th january. The problem is that the transition is performed before the result is official, and that is what should be fixed - not trying to improve the prediction of who will win. Of course things would be greatly helped by the USA adopting some 19th century technology and having the results communicated by telephone to Congress as soom as they are certified, which would allow Congress to determine the result much more quickly.

But if the period from 6th to 20th is not sufficient for transitioning, either it should be increased of transitioning should be simplified.

[Squeak]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released, and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

The single process is the counting of the votes of the Electoral College by Congress which will happen on 6th january. The problem is that the transition is performed before the result is official, and that is what should be fixed - not trying to improve the prediction of who will win. Of course things would be greatly helped by the USA adopting some 19th century technology and having the results communicated by telephone to Congress as soom as they are certified, which would allow Congress to determine the result much more quickly.

But if the period from 6th to 20th is not sufficient for transitioning, either it should be increased of transitioning should be simplified.

That might involve the rather more revolutionary idea of a non-political civil service, with only the ministers changing from one government to the next, rather than the 4000+ senior managers of all government agencies swapping over at once. It's really hard for non-Americans to grasp the scale of the transitions. What gains they've got in vote counting speed from technology have been more than made up for by the size and complexity of all the changes that have to happen and all the information that needs to be handed over. But the alternative is proving to the American electorate that 4000 top jobs in the public service shouldn't be subject to their votes, and that's a tall order.

Besides, almost all constitutional arrangements come down to some kind fudgework when you poke at them too hard. (For example, who, in Australia, has the authority to sack the government? Is it Queenie? Or her representative in Australia, the Governor General? The questions in this space get very murky, very fast.

In the US, as soon as they know who will probably become the next president (a statement that is deliberately worded vaguely to account for variations in circumstance) enough money should flow that the transition team can have email addresses and desks, and they should be allowed to talk to departmental staff. If a transition team is erroneously given those immense privileges, the cost is unbelievably small, so the assumption is that it's better to erroneously give intelligence briefings to Gore's transition team (which is what happened) than to hamstring the next government by waiting for the formal process to play out. It all works until some prick decides to pretend that the rules don't apply to him and his staff are too frightened to upset him by saying that the voting results in the five closest states are leaning very strongly towards a clear winner, so the email addresses should be handed over.

[dyqik]

It's worth noting that transition starts well before election day, with all plausible winners getting briefings and access to certain aspects of government. The GSA Administrator's decision on an apparent winner isn't the first step, but is a fairly big step somewhere in the middle of the process.

[Bird on a Fire]

Waiting until January to make the election result official does seem a bit stupid though, to be honest. (On top of the additional, but separate, stupidity of having a partisan civil service)

[El Pollo Diablo]

Waiting until January to make the election result official does seem a bit stupid though, to be honest. (On top of the additional, but separate, stupidity of having a partisan civil service)

I think the reason for that is because there have been elections past where (shock, I know) there weren't just two proper candidates, and no one got an overall majority of the EVs, and they didn't know wtf to do, so needed all the time they had.

[dyqik]

Waiting until January to make the election result official does seem a bit stupid though, to be honest. (On top of the additional, but separate, stupidity of having a partisan civil service)

I think the reason for that is because there have been elections past where (shock, I know) there weren't just two proper candidates, and no one got an overall majority of the EVs, and they didn't know wtf to do, so needed all the time they had.

Look up the accounts of Thomas Jefferson's election...

36 votes in the House over 6 days to try to break the deadlock.

The US Constitution was designed for this kind of election, and was supposed to have been fixed to deal with the changing reality. It was partially, but not enough.

[El Pollo Diablo]

I mean, I suppose it's possible (just highly, highly unlikely) that US politics will become a bit more sensible and represent a wider spread of opinion, maybe by a couple of centuries' time, so maybe it's a good thing?

[sTeamTraen]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released, and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

Nancy Pelosi was talking about doing just that before the election, because of the worries that Trump would steal it. There's lots of holes in the rules.

But surely the sitting president could subvert this, too, by firing the people in charge of the process and installing a lackey? The whole thing is predicated on people playing by the rules at some level; it isn't designed to resist infinitely recursive subversion. Trump probably hasn't had enough time to appoint enough lackeys as judges, but you can imagine what would happen if he wanted a third term and decided to pack every court and electoral board in swing states (that currently have Republican state legislatures or governors) with his own people.

[bolo]

It's more complicated than "the President can just fire people". He can fire most people he appointed, but he can't easily fire career civil servants (Fauci, for example). There are some appointees that he can't fire, e.g. FEC commissioners, although that particular example wouldn't help as the FEC isn't currently quorate . He can't fire state officials, and state governors supporting him can't fire state officials who are directly elected (like secretaries of state). He can't fire anyone in the legislative branch (e.g. the comptroller general, who makes rulings in certain types of contract dispute and IMHO would be just as plausible a person for this job as the head of GSA - probably more so).

[sTeamTraen]

It's more complicated than "the President can just fire people". He can fire most people he appointed, but he can't easily fire career civil servants (Fauci, for example). There are some appointees that he can't fire, e.g. FEC commissioners, although that particular example wouldn't help as the FEC isn't currently quorate . He can't fire state officials, and state governors supporting him can't fire state officials who are directly elected (like secretaries of state). He can't fire anyone in the legislative branch (e.g. the comptroller general, who makes rulings in certain types of contract dispute and IMHO would be just as plausible a person for this job as the head of GSA - probably more so).

Perhaps not, but given a compliant Senate who are prepared to, for example, allow him to appoint Barr as AG, he can do a lot of damage, as we have seen.

[Bird on a Fire]

I mean, I suppose it's possible (just highly, highly unlikely) that US politics will become a bit more sensible and represent a wider spread of opinion, maybe by a couple of centuries' time, so maybe it's a good thing?

I think it's very clearly the case that FPTP and two-party systems are terrible. The hard thing is getting past both parties under FPTP to change it. Populist c.nts seem to be cracking the code, though, so hopefully Good People can learn from their tactics as part of a more benevolent strategy.

I do enjoy watching people earnestly trying to defend the US's antiquated, dysfunctional systems. It's like when a hipster tries to tell you that a penny farthing is actually the best type of bike for a commute through suburban Norwich, but with a major democracy instead of a barista with a degree's bicycle.

[monkey]

Surely the secretaries of state are a higher authority than the TV channels? Why isn't it their job to say "ay yo release these funds already"?

It seems that there ought to be a single internal government process for determining who's going to be the next president, which should be triggered in time for transition funds to be released, and that's either happened or it hasn't. Requiring a bunch of random civil servants to call the election themselves is a bit daft, for exactly the reason we're seeing now.

Nancy Pelosi was talking about doing just that before the election, because of the worries that Trump would steal it. There's lots of holes in the rules.

But surely the sitting president could subvert this, too, by firing the people in charge of the process and installing a lackey? The whole thing is predicated on people playing by the rules at some level; it isn't designed to resist infinitely recursive subversion. Trump probably hasn't had enough time to appoint enough lackeys as judges, but you can imagine what would happen if he wanted a third term and decided to pack every court and electoral board in swing states (that currently have Republican state legislatures or governors) with his own people.

Yeah, rules are only as good as how far people are willing to follow them and whoever it is who enforces them. I have no idea what Pelosi's exact plans were, only that she was talking about it.

As far as 3rd terms go, the 22nd amendment is pretty explicit. Even a Trumpist judge would find it hard to find an exception to it. He (or somebody else) might be able to sneak in a third term by becoming VP and having the P resign, but the bit about being elected president is very clear.