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Since before Democrat Joe Biden’s victory was declared in the US elections, President Donald Trump was preparing a legal effort in more than five states in the country to try to reverse the results last Tuesday.
On the one hand, there will be counts in several of them, as the laws allow it as long as the difference is narrow.
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But in parallel there is a whole legal battle that will be fought in the country’s courts, since the president alleges that there was fraud and electoral rules were violated. While many of the president’s accusations seemed unfounded, others are more serious and will occupy global attention in the coming days.
Until this Saturday there were lawsuits going on in Michigan, Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona and Pennsylvania. But, undoubtedly, the eyes will be on the latter state, which was the one that the president gave to Biden and where the Trump campaign is paying more attention.
In total, there are half a dozen lawsuits in this state and on different fronts. A group of them are more associated with the electoral process, while others deal with alleged irregularities. Although with different nuances, the demands are very similar to those high in other states.
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The most serious, for the moment, are three. One has to do with the votes that came in after this Tuesday when the polling stations closed and whether they can be counted.
About a month ago, Democrats went to state court to ask a judge to extend the deadline for the arrival of the vote-by-mail because there were delays at the post office. In part, due to the large volume of mail that was being processed And, in part, because there were suspicions that the new post office director, who had just been appointed by Trump, implemented changes (including reducing staff) that were contributing to the situation.
On the streets, Trump’s critics flocked to the popular phrase he used on his television show ‘The Apprentice’.
As in other states of the country, it was a change that was requested to accommodate the reality of the coronavirus and allow more people to use the mail as a voting method to avoid contagion.
The judge agreed with them and gave three additional days for the arrival of the ballots, as long as the postage stamp showed that it was deposited before Tuesday at 8 pm when the elections closed.
The republicans demanded the decision before the Supreme Court of Justice of the State, claiming that the election rules were being changed at the last minute and that the only one with the power to authorize this change was the legislature.
Since the Court decreed that the judge’s decision was valid, the Republicans took their lawsuit before the Supreme Court of Justice at the national level.
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This court, still composed of eight members by the recent death of Ruth Bader Ginsberg (there are nine members), refused on two occasions to review the lawsuit, but in a split decision in which a conservative judge and three liberals lined up to say that they saw reason for now to reverse the decision of the State Supreme Court.
Still, they left the door open for further review. But since the conservative judge Amy Coney Barret, appointed by Trump a few days ago, has already entered the Court, it is believed that conservatives could prevail under the thesis that the constitution only gives the power to the legislature to establish electoral norms and does not foresee exceptional situations such as the coronavirus.
These types of judges who defend this legal doctrine in the US are called “originalitas” because their interpretation of the Constitution is literal.
But if they do, it would be controversial. First, because these are legitimate votes from Americans that would be discarded. And second, because when the Supreme Court did not object to voters using the three-day term, it created a right that it would now be eliminating when it is too late to correct. That is, if voters had known that their vote would not be counted if they were late, they could have chosen to vote earlier. or in person.
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Hundreds of people gathered near the White House in protest against Trump.
Michael Reynolds. EFE
Even if they decide to discard those votes that came later, they would not be enough to alter the result in the state. It is estimated that there are about 10,000 and Biden’s advantage, at the moment, is much higher than that number.
The electoral authorities, in fact, separated those ballots so that they would not be confused with the rest of the early vote that did arrive on time, anticipating that the Court could discard them.
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Second demand
The second weighty lawsuit has to do with the alleged interference to citizens to observe the vote count in the city of Pittsburgh (there is a similar demand in Michigan and another in Nevada) as allowed by law. The count, in fact, was partially suspended while the case was being evaluated by a judge who ordered that they be given more access.. Whether they had it or not is in dispute.
City officials say that if access was restricted it was to prevent a catastrophe, as many of these observers showed up with weapons and spirits high.
In the worst case, a judge could order that the count be repeated in this city, this time with full observation. But it is estimated that the Trump campaign will still ask for a recount in the state of Pennsylvania. That should clear up the doubts that exist regarding the vote in this city.
What occurs to me is that they are responding to the orders of the president demanding that they do something to change the result
Third claim
The third concerns a statement from the secretary of state that told voters in one county that they could correct mistakes on their cards by going to the polling stations.
And that’s supposed to be forbidden. Nobody knows yet if it is true or how many people would have “cured” their vote. The problem, moreover, is that in the midst of these types of lawsuits all kinds of accusations circulate on social networks and nobody knows which ones are real and which ones are invented, which today are very easy to build and propagate (alteration of videos, etc.).
That, however, is what the authorities will have to investigate.
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But, in an environment as politicized as the one that exists, it will not be easy and the loser will never be satisfied. Especially when the president himself already decreed, without starting those investigations, that the elections were stolen.
There is also an underlying issue that will weigh, particularly with the Democrats.
For none of them is it a mystery that many of these cases will end up reaching the Supreme Court, that at this moment it is composed of a clear conservative majority of six members and that three of them were chosen by Trump.
The president himself, in fact, has been telegraphing for a long time that he hopes that the Court will defend him and grant him the presidency, and if it happens, the social explosion could be immense.
Associated legal strategists in the Republican Party think that while the battle won’t be easy, Trump has claims that could be valid. “It is important that all votes are counted. But it is equally important to recognize that not all votes can be legal. Just as it is critical that all valid ones be added, it is critical that those that are not valid are excluded, “says attorney George Terwilliger, who was part of George W. Bush’s team in their dispute over the votes in Florida. after the 2000 elections.
But not everyone, even in this match, sees it that way. “It’s hard for me to understand what the legal strategy is here. What occurs to me is that they are responding to the president’s orders demanding that they do something to change the outcome. But what is known about these lawsuits is that none have the potential to change the course of the elections. They’re a small thing, “says Benjamin Ginsberg, who also worked with Bush on that effort.
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Trump also has a serious problem. Unlike Bush in 2000, where he only had to preserve the vote in a state where the count itself favored him, the president in this case would have to flip the result in three states where he lost to have a chance to stay with the White House. And dramatically.
In the case of Florida, Bush won by 537 votes. The president, in Pennsylvania alone, would have to get thousands of votes annulled – or a similar number appear in his favor.
SERGIO GOMEZ
EL TIEMPO correspondent
WASHINGTON
