>>You assume wrong.<<
Thank you, Agnes, for your description of the actual voting process.
All I would point out is that my post wasn’t assuming anything at all. I was just questioning whether others’ assumptions (and as you can see, there was a lot of assuming going on) were correct.
Your state’s process is definitely different than my state’s, although we also are stupid enough to allow an open primary. Why we would let a DEM choose a GOP candidate eludes me, entirely.
From your description, it should be easy to verify who voted illegally, although there’s still the issue of who they voted for on June 24th. Still, if the number of illegal votes cast by DEM primary voters far exceeds the margin of Cochran’s victory, it should be possible to get the result overturned.
By the way, if I were the judge in the matter, I’d call Cochran into court and have him personally explain why he felt entitled to request the state’s taxpayers to spend the additional money on yet another runoff, given that it was almost certainly due to his staff’s shenanigans that the first runoff had to be overturned. In other words, I’d try to shame him into doing the right thing, and conceding to McDaniel (assuming the number of illegal votes cast far exceeds his victory margin, of course.)
The GOPe should take zero pride in “winning” in this manner. I hope a few of them start to figure that out in the next couple of days.
Ummm, the state law is setup so that if no candidate gets a majority (50% +1) in the primary, then there will be one runoff between the top two. Neither Cochran nor McDaniels got as much as 50% in the primary, hence the runoff. This is normal, not something caused by McDaniel or Cochran.
Cochran's handlers would be happy to have the result stand.