SAN FRANCISCO — THIS IS NOT A DRILL. A federal appeals court held a hearing ON A SUNDAY. Judges wore robes on the Lord's day of brunch, and nobody has been able to reach the brunch.
Stay with me, because the facts here are real and the panic is mine. According to Reuters, ABC News and the Los Angeles Times, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit heard arguments Sunday afternoon in the Justice Department's emergency bid to force California to set aside about 20,000 mail ballots from voters the federal government flagged as "likely" noncitizens, until their citizenship is confirmed. Two of the judges are Trump appointees and one is a Biden appointee. The hearing ran nearly two hours, Democracy Docket reported. The panel did not rule. A decision is expected soon. A lower-court hearing is set for Tuesday.
Two hours. On a Sunday. In California. I need everyone to take a knee.
Now for the part that has me pacing in the newsroom. California's side, according to the LA Times, argued that the federal voter list is unreliable and that complying could disrupt the election. Read that sentence slowly. A state whose vote counts famously take weeks is worried something might slow down the vote count. That's like a sloth filing a noise complaint against a speed bump.
The state's lawyer told the court this was "an emergency of their own making." The Justice Department's filing, meanwhile, described California counties processing ballots "as steadily as a metronome." I have never heard California's ballot counting described as a metronome. I have heard it described as a glacier, a long weekend, and "check back Thanksgiving."
To be fair, and I am always fair even at full volume, the judges were tough on the Justice Department too. Judge Mark Bennett, a Trump appointee, asked how the court even had jurisdiction, and pressed the government on why it waited until about three weeks before the election to sue, according to Democracy Docket. So nobody walked out of that courtroom with a clean shirt. That's because it was Sunday. Laundry day.
Meet Gloria, 71, a made-up retired poll worker in Fresno who heard the words "rare Sunday hearing" on the radio and immediately assumed the Rapture had started with the appellate courts. Gloria has stockpiled canned peaches and a backup "I Voted" sticker. She is now refusing to leave the house until the Ninth Circuit issues a ruling or a weather advisory, whichever comes first.
What happens next? The panel rules. Somebody appeals. A district judge holds a hearing Tuesday. And California keeps counting, at the speed of California, which experts describe as "eventually."
We'll stay on this story around the clock. Except Sundays. Apparently those are taken now.
This article is satire. The Demorat is a parody news site; real facts are drawn from the linked sources, and jokes, invented scenes, and fictional characters are not real.
The real story that inspired this
