President Donald Trump says his campaign will join an improbable case before the Supreme Court challenging election results in Pennsylvania and other states that he lost.
That word comes as he tries to look past the justices’ rejection of a last-gasp bid to reverse Pennsylvania’s certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory. The high court has asked for responses by Thursday.
The suit from the Texas attorney general, Republican Ken Paxton, demands that the 62 total Electoral College votes in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin be invalidated. Legal experts dismiss Paxton’s filing as the latest and perhaps longest legal shot since Election Day, and officials in the four states are sharply critical of Paxton.
On Thursday, Trump’s official schedule includes a lunch with state attorneys general. Seventeen Republican attorneys general have joined the Paxton/Trump suit.
The lawsuit is a last-ditched effort to overthrow the results of the election, which saw more vote cast for Biden than any other candidate in American history.
Trump and his legal team has continued to allege that Biden fraudulently won the election. So far, Trump’s legal team has not been able to substantiate any fraud allegations in court, prompting one federal judge appointed by Trump to write in an opinion, “Charges of unfairness are serious. But calling an election unfair does not make it so. Charges require specific allegations and then proof. We have neither here,” 3rd Circuit Judge Stephanos Bibas wrote. Bibas was appointed by Trump to the federal bench in 2017.
Last month, a joint statement released by federal and state officials described the presidential election as the “most secure in American history.”
The letter was signed by leaders of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission and the National Association of State Election Directors, among others. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency was established two years ago as a branch of Homeland Security during the Trump administration.
In bold, the authors of the statement wrote, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.” This statement matches those from secretaries of state and boards of election throughout the US.
In response to the letter, Trump fired US election security head Chris Krebs.