Rachel Maddow opened her show last night expressing her surprise at how busy a news day it was, given government was completely shut down for President George H.W. Bush's funeral service. Don't feel bad for her, though - you know she loves it. Frankly, I love it, too. One of the many topics she got to dig her teeth into was that of voter fraud. No, not the kind Republicans scream about to justify their racist policy of making voting harder for marginalized citizens. This is actual, factual voter fraud happening in plain sight, in her words, unraveling before our very eyes thanks to the "lying fake news."

Maddow predicted that there is no way the results of North Carolina's 9th District election will be certified. Republican Mark Harris was declared the winner, but we are learning that there has been a professional-grade ballot-destroying effort in place on his behalf to defeat the Democrat he was facing in November's election. Not only that, this illegal scheme was apparently in place back in May, and helped him defeat the incumbent Republican he was facing in the primary! Boy, they sure aren't afraid to eat their own, are they?

Maddow slammed the DC Republicans in Congress for their silence on this.

And in theory, Republicans are supposedly very fired up about the grave threat of election fraud in this country, right? I mean, that's the Boogie Man they trot out to justify all their policy preferences for making voting harder, for restricting access to voting in ways that particularly target likely Democratic voters, especially racial minorities, or people who are poor, or college students, or immigrants. On this one, this thing in North Carolina, Republicans in Washington have been remarkably silent. And this one really does look like that rarest of American electoral problems. This really does look like an industrial strength, ballot-stealing, ballot-stuffing, professional operation that not only helped Mark Harris appear to win that seat, it looks like the same operation run by the same people may have helped this guy, Mark Harris, oust the incumbent Republican member of Congress that used to represent that district, back in the primary in May. There was a different Republican that held the seat. Right? He was ousted when he lost his own primary to this man, Mark Harris. It looks like the same illegal tactics may have been used by contractors working for Mark Harris that worked for him in the primary, as worked for him in the general election, which has now resulted in a Congressional seat that nobody knows that what to do with. This professional election-rigging operation in this one Congressional District 9 in North Carolina not only screwed up the one Congressional election, but it also appears to have cost a Republican Congressional incumbent his seat, a few months ago, but still, the Republicans in Washington cannot come up with a single word to say about it. They have been fundamentally and absolutely silent on this. Isn't this supposed to be your thing? That you worry about all the time?

Perhaps the prospect of the Democratic majority in the House, and them holding hearings into this fraud might jar them into a bit of action. This morning, NC Republicans are making a bit of noise about being open to new elections.

Personally, though, I prefer Nate Silver's take on it.