The Trump/Republican lawsuits challenging the results of the presidential election aren’t getting much traction, which is no surprise, but the reason why may be a bit more nuanced than the press has been reporting. Though I don’t profess any expertise in the area, I do have some experience.

As a young lawyer, I was first staff counsel and then the political appointee corporation counsel for a small city. During one hotly contested election, which was decided by only a few dozen votes, there was a challenge by the losing candidate, who pointed out that in one voting machine in one district the total votes cast for the mayoral candidates was markedly lower than the totals for the mayor’s line in every other machine in every district, and also well below the total votes for other items further down the ballot in that specific machine. It appeared that something had gone wrong.