The Tap: Friday, January 6, 2017

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The Tap covered election news, public policy, and other noteworthy events from February 2016 to February 2022.

Review of the day

The excerpts below were compiled from issue #47 of The Tap, which was published on January 7, 2017. READ THE FULL VERSION HERE.

Federal

U.S. Intelligence Report on Russian Involvement in the 2016 Election

• U.S. intelligence agencies released a declassified report on Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election. President Obama ordered the report on December 9, 2016. The report states:

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We assess Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump. We have high confidence in these judgments. ...We also assess Putin and the Russian Government aspired to help President-elect Trump’s election chances when possible by discrediting Secretary Clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him. All three agencies agree with this judgment. CIA and FBI have high confidence in this judgment; NSA has moderate confidence.

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The agencies involved in the report did not weigh in on whether such efforts had an impact on the outcome of the election, saying, “We did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of the 2016 election. The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political processes or US public opinion.”

• Trump received a briefing on the report on Friday. He released a statement, saying, “While Russia, China, other countries, outside groups and people are consistently trying to break through the cyber infrastructure of our governmental institutions, businesses and organizations including the Democrat National Committee, there was absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election including the fact that there was no tampering whatsoever with voting machines. There were attempts to hack the Republican National Committee, but the RNC had strong hacking defenses and the hackers were unsuccessful.”

Dan Coats as Director of National Intelligence

• Trump reportedly plans to name former Indiana Sen. Dan Coats as director of national intelligence (DNI). Coats retired from the Senate this year. He was most recently elected in 2010, but he also served in the Senate from 1989 to 1999 and in the House from 1981 to 1989. In his most recent stint in the Senate, he was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Coats was also the ambassador to Germany from 2001 to 2005. Rep. Todd Young, from Indiana’s ninth district, won Coats’ seat in the 2016 general election.

• The office of the DNI was created in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terror attacks with the goal of coordinating and integrating the efforts of the country’s various intelligence agencies. The DNI is the principal advisor to the president and the national security council on all security-related intelligence matters and serves as the head of the U.S. Intelligence Community, a group of 16 government intelligence agencies that includes the CIA. The position requires Senate confirmation. James Clapper is the current director.

The 2016 Election is Officially Over

• Congress met in a joint session this afternoon to count the votes from the Electoral College. Trump received 304 votes to Hillary Clinton’s 227. A total of 270 was needed to win. Trump was projected to receive 306 votes based on the results of the 2016 election, but two Republican electors in Texas voted for other individuals. Similarly, Clinton was projected to receive 232 votes, but five electors in Washington and Hawaii also voted for other individuals. Read more about that here. By our most recent count, the popular vote stands at 62,979,984 for Trump (46.2 percent) and 65,844,969 for Clinton (48.3 percent), a difference of about 2.8 million. If you’re interested in past instances of splits between the Electoral College and the popular vote, you should read this article.

• Several Democrats in the House objected to the vote count, arguing that voter suppression and Russian interference may have affected the outcome of the election. Federal law allows for such objections, but they can only have a potential impact if an objection is signed by a member of the House and a member of the Senate. No senators signed on this year. If one or more of them had, federal law stipulates that both chambers must independently vote on whether to sustain the objection. A sustained objection could lead to some votes being thrown out and possibly even change the outcome of the election. The last time both a member of the House and a member of the Senate signed on to an objection was in 2005, when George W. Bush was elected to a second term. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-Ohio) and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Cal.) objected to the count of Ohio’s 20 electoral votes, which went to Bush, on the grounds of alleged voting irregularities on Election Day. The House voted 267-31 against sustaining the objection, while the Senate voted in agreement 74-1. Bush defeated Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) 286 to 251 in that election.

Another Vacancy Appears

• George King, a judge on the United States District Court for the Central District of California, retired from the bench, creating an Article III vacancy. To enter into an Article III position, a judge must be nominated by the president. Nominations are then subject to the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate. Under current law, the Central District of California has 28 active judicial positions, and Judge King’s retirement created a fifth vacancy on that court.
  • For more information, see Ballotpedia’s Federal Vacancy Warning System

State

Abortion Legislation Hearings in Kentucky

• The Kentucky State Legislature approved a pair of abortion-related bills, and the legislation is expected to be sent to Gov. Matt Bevin (R) for his signature by Saturday. The first bill would restrict abortions after 20 weeks, and the other would require someone seeking an abortion to get an ultrasound first. The abortion bill was passed with an emergency clause, which means it would go into effect immediately after getting the governor’s signature. According to The Hill, similar 20-week restrictions in other states have already been upheld in state and federal courts. Kentucky recently became a Republican trifecta as a result of the 2016 elections, when the state House flipped from Democratic to Republican control.

Local

California Filing Deadline

• FILING DEADLINE: The deadline passed to run for school board in some California school districts. Ballotpedia covers two of the state’s largest school districts with a filing deadline on this date. The Glendale Unified School District (GUSD) and the Inglewood Unified School District (IUSD) will each hold general elections for three seats on April 4, 2017. GUSD and IUSD were the 44th-, and 124th-largest school districts in the state, serving 39,637 students during the 2014-2015 school year—roughly 0.62 percent of all public school students in the state.

Preview of the day

There were no items for this day in issue #46 of The Tap, which was published on December 17, 2016. See the "Review of the day" tab for more information.