Citing the nearly half billion dollars spent investigating claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, one lawyer suggested legislation aimed at making candidates bear the expenses of inquiries and other costs by making a deposit to be used to fund investigating their claims.
With Donald Trump and his key allies in Congress already making rumblings that they may not accept the results of the 2024 presidential election if he the ex-president loses again, attorney Burton D. Sheppard suggested state legislatures make them put up or shut up.
In a column for the New Republic, Sheppard said there is nothing keeping state legislatures from passing laws to "deter election denialism."
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Specifically, he recommended a combination of pledges and candidates putting up refundable deposits to keep campaigns from creating election chaos that ends up costing taxpayers.
"Under this proposal, state legislatures would require candidates to sign binding pledges, under penalties of perjury, that they will accept the declared, official election results (after challenges, recounts, litigation, and so on). Candidates should be afforded an option to pledge early—within one week of Labor Day, say," he wrote before suggesting, "For candidates who agree to sign the pledge, that’s the end of it. But candidates who do not sign the pledge within a certain reasonable time frame will be forced, under these new laws, to put down a deposit. These deposits should be substantial."
Adding that the deposits should be put into an escrow account, he elaborated, "Then the law would impose a deadline for candidates to decide to sign the pledge—ideally, two weeks before Election Day. If they sign the pledge by that deadline, their deposit is returned to them and they can spend it trying to get elected. Thus candidates are highly incentivized to sign—and agree to the democratic outcome.
But what about those candidates who still hold out and don’t sign?
Under Sheppard's plan, the state keeps their deposits. Forfeited funds will be used to defray potential governmental costs precipitated by the actions of election deniers. State legislators would establish methods, priorities, and recipients for the distribution of proceeds."
The end result, he explained is to get candidates to live under the threat that raising the specter of a stolen election has the potential to "blow a hole" in their campaign cash.
"Elections have no meaning if candidates insist that the results are legitimate only if they win. Similarly absurd is allowing candidates to wait to see the outcome and then decide whether they will abide by it," he concluded.
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