cover of episode Preparing For Trump’s Next “Big Lie,” with the Election Lawyer Marc Elias

Preparing For Trump’s Next “Big Lie,” with the Election Lawyer Marc Elias

2024/9/9
logo of podcast The Political Scene | The New Yorker

The Political Scene | The New Yorker

Chapters

Marc Elias, a prominent election lawyer, expresses concerns about the 2024 election, noting Trump's increased desperation and the improved competence of his legal team. Elias highlights the replacement of experienced election officials with election deniers and the escalating trend of anti-voting litigation aimed at disrupting the voting process and suppressing voter turnout.
  • Trump's legal team is more competent than in 2020.
  • Trump faces four criminal indictments, increasing his desperation to win.
  • Election deniers have replaced experienced officials in key swing states.
  • Republicans are filing lawsuits to upend voting processes and suppress voter access.

Shownotes Transcript

Of the sixty-five lawsuits that Donald Trump’s team filed in the 2020 election, Democrats won sixty-four—with the attorney Marc Elias spearheading the majority.  Elias was so successful that Steve Bannon speaks of him with admiration. 

Now Marc Elias is working for Vice-President Kamala Harris’s campaign, and, despite his past victories, Elias says that 2024 is keeping him up at night.  The bizarre antics and conspiracy theories of Rudy Giuliani are a thing of the past, Elias tells David Remnick: “We should all expect that they are more competent than they were before. And also Donald Trump is more desperate than he was before. … He faces the prospect of four criminal indictments, two of which are in federal court.” Election-denying officials are now in power in many swing states; Trump has publicly praised his allies on state election boards.  Elias fears the assault on the democratic process could be much more effective this time.  Still, some things don’t change. “I believe Donald Trump is going to say after Election Day in 2024 that he won all fifty states—that there’s no state he didn’t win,” Elias says. “That is just the pathology that is Donald Trump.”