Sen. Doug Mastriano Leads Efforts for Pennsylvania Legislature to Directly Appoint Electors

Nov. 27, 2020 (EIRNS)—Appearing on Sloppy Steve Bannon’s “War Room” program Friday morning, and Newsmax Friday evening, Pennsylvania State Sen. Doug Mastriano announced that he’s moving forward with his colleagues on passing a joint resolution of the Pennsylvania Senate and House of Representatives in order to reclaim the legislature’s authority, under the U.S. Constitution, to directly appoint electors to the Electoral College.

On his Nov. 27 Newsmax appearance, Senator Mastriano reported that a Joint Resolution to award Pennsylvania’s Electors to Donald Trump had been introduced into both the state House and Senate, that additional Republican cosponsors were being organized to sign on over the weekend, and that they plan to move the resolution through both houses on Monday, Nov. 30. On the question of the election having already been certified, Mastriano said that the Joint Resolution would be the legislature re-taking its authority to decide the means of choosing the state’s electors. “We put a man on the Moon 50 years ago, but we can’t run a fair election today in Pennsylvania. Even Stevie Wonder can see that we have a problem here.”

Mastriano referred to 1994, when a Pennsylvania state Senate race included so much cheating that a federal district judge threw out the election and the Democrat, William G. Stinson, who supposedly won the election, ordering that his Republican opponent, Bruce Marks, instead be seated in the state Senate. “This is extraordinary relief,” the judge wrote. “However, it is appropriate because extraordinary conduct by the Stinson campaign and the board tainted the entirety of the absentee ballots.”

On his earlier appearance on Bannon’s show, Mastriano reflected on the immense quantity of evidence put forward at the vote fraud hearings in Gettysburg on Wednesday, Nov. 25, and blasted the media as political hacks failing to cover the shocking news. “And that [testimony] was only the tip of the iceberg.”

What’s next? “Obviously a joint resolution saying that we are going to probably grab back our constitutional authority in Pennsylvania.” After recounting the history that in 1938 the Pennsylvania legislature handed over the choice of electors to the Secretary of State, who would award them based on a popular election. “This makes sense if the election’s fair, but if it’s not fair, it’s handing the power of selecting the delegates [electors] to that same person who cheated.”

“So thank God we have the Federal Constitution, which says we’re going to exercise our Constitutional power here. So we’re going to do a resolution between the House and Senate, hopefully today. I’ve spent two hours online trying to coordinate this with my colleagues. And there’s a lot of good people working this here. The resolution is going to say that we’re going to take our power back. We’re gonna seat the electors. Now obviously we’re gonna need the support of the leadership of the House and Senate, we’re getting there on that.”

Bannon interrupted for clarification, that Senator Mastriano was indeed calling for the legislature to directly appoint the electors. “That is exactly what we’re going to do,” he added, saying that it will

“obviously be a struggle. We’re gonna hear the palpitations and you know the outcries of our Governor [Tom] Wolf and Secretary [of State Kathy] Boockvar, whose resignation should have happened months ago and she shouldn’t have ever been confirmed, but you know what, we have that power, and we’re going to take that power back because there’s so much evidence of shenanigans and fraud, we can’t stand aside and just watch this unfold around us.”

He explained that he doesn’t want to disenfranchise anyone, but “If there’s extensive shenanigans out there it’s up to the General Assembly to step in. So we have a fight on our hands and we’re gonna fight. We’re gonna take the fight all the way to the Supreme Court if we have to.”

Asked about the reception of this proposal from legislative leaders, the senator reported that he has lined up support in both the House and the Senate, and that the support is growing. He felt that at least 16 or 17 of the 29 Republican-caucusing senators out of a total of 50 supported the proposal, and at least half of the House, as well. “They are getting motivated. Sometimes it feels like we’re pushing from behind, but doing the right thing eventually catches on.”

Bannon inquired whether, since the 1938 legislation was a bill signed into law by the governor, would they require the governor’s signature, or could a joint resolution of the legislative houses itself be sufficient. Senator Mastriano responded that they were pursuing a joint resolution, which would not require the governor’s signature.

Senator Mastriano called for Pennsylvanians to call their elected officials to get on board the joint resolution to appoint the electors.

Mastriano thanked Twitter for the attention drawn to him by their decision to temporarily block his account, which boosted his followers tenfold.

Quoting Benjamin Franklin, he urged Americans to “hang together.”

Mastriano’s co-sponsorship memorandum, announcing the joint resolution and listing the four Senate cosponsors, as is the House version, listing two dozen cosponsors (as of this writing) are available online.