The following podcast contains advertising to access an ad-free version of the LawFair

podcast become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash LawFair.

That's patreon.com slash LawFair.

Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, rational security, chatter, LawFair

no bull and the aftermath.

If it's, I refuse to accept the results, almost in the way that, you know, I refuse

to accept that my favorite team just lost that game.

It's almost a rhetorical thing, saying, I refuse to accept it and it really doesn't matter.

There is nothing in the constitution that says the losing candidate has to say the words

I accept or I concede this.

There's nothing there.

So technically it doesn't matter.

The problem is we've seen so many times in the past, what, three years and nine months.

We have seen so many cases where something that didn't matter suddenly does matter because

the violation of the norm leads to a refusal to enforce not only that norm but other issues

as well.

I'm Benjamin Widis and this is the LawFair podcast October 14, 2020.

The other day, David Pries, LawFair's redoubtable chief operating officer, penned a piece on

the site and titled the powerful norm of accepting the results of a presidential election.

It recounts the history or maybe I should say the lack of history of presidents doing what

the president and vice president recently did, which is not committing themselves to respecting

adverse results if the election doesn't go their way.

...