Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe created quite the stir when his campaign hired the Elias Law Group, spending $53,680 on their services. The Elias Law Group is the firm that Marc Elias started earlier this year. Marc Elias is known for taking on cases involving election challenges — he’s represented Democrats in contesting elections.
That sparked many to wonder if McAuliffe was already anticipating losing and challenging the victory of his opponent, Republican Glenn Youngkin. It also reminds everyone how McAuliffe has basically been an election truther — “attacking democracy” by making comments questioning Stacey Abrams’ loss in Georgia in 2018. “She would be the governor of Georgia today had the governor of Georgia not disenfranchised 1.4 million Georgia voters before the election,” McAuliffe claimed earlier this month. McAuliffe has shown that he has no compunction about questioning the legitimacy of elections.
What’s also interesting about the hiring is that Elias is also a former partner in Perkins Coie — the DNC/Clinton law firm that paid for opposition research against President Donald Trump which included the Steele dossier. Now, the Durham probe has indicted one of the people who formerly worked for Perkins Coie, Michael Sussman. But that didn’t stop McAuliffe from choosing Elias.
George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley found that an “astonishing move.”
McAuliffe may be preparing to challenge any win by Republican Glenn Youngkin. He has given $53,680 to the Elias Law Group. McAuliffe does not appear disturbed by Elias’ highly controversial career or his possible exposure in the Durham investigation…https://t.co/Gb6YzAJmBo
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) October 28, 2021
“There are a host of election lawyers but McAuliffe selected an attorney accused of lying to the media, advancing rejected conspiracy theories, and currently involved in a major federal investigation that has already led to the indictment of his former partner,” Turley wrote.
“McAuliffe may be preparing to challenge any win by Republican Glenn Youngkin,” he wrote on Twitter.
So Fox ran the story about the hiring and then reached out to the McAuliffe people for their comment on what Turley had said about Elias.
But in response, the McAuliffe spokesperson, Christina Freundlich, apparently accidentally sent Fox a response meant for others saying “Can we try to kill this [the Fox story].” She further clarified, “To dispute the challenges of the election,” to try to defeat the obvious thought that they were thinking about challenging the election.
— Dr. Nickarama (@nickaramaOG) October 29, 2021
— Dr. Nickarama (@nickaramaOG) October 29, 2021
Whoops, what a way to step in it even more, revealing they were trying to kill the story. Meanwhile, they never gave Fox a formal response on the record. McAuliffe could write a book on how to completely implode a campaign within a few weeks.
When the campaign starts to slide, everything really does go bad apparently. As we reported, Youngkin has pulled ahead in the Real Clear Politics average of polls and he’s even burst ahead by eight percent in a survey of likely voters conducted by Fox as McAuliffe’s numbers have collapsed, 53% to 45%. So we may know very soon whether or not McAuliffe intends to challenge his loss because right now he appears to be in very deep trouble with Virginians.
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