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President Donald Trump has asked the US Supreme Court to allow him to join a Texas lawsuit that seeks to reverse its electoral defeat by discarding the results of the vote in four states, a lawsuit that also garnered support from 17 other states.
In a court filing, Trump asked to intervene in the Texas lawsuit, the latest litigation to try to undo the victory of Democratic President-elect Joe Biden over the Republican president in the November 3 election.
In a separate brief, attorneys from 17 states led by Republican Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt also urged the nine justices to hear the case.
Efforts in court on behalf of Trump to challenge the election results have so far failed.
The lawsuit, announced yesterday by Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, targeted four states that Trump lost to Biden after winning them in the 2016 election.
Trump has falsely claimed he won reelection and has made unsubstantiated allegations of widespread election fraud. Election officials at the state level have said they have found no evidence of such fraud.
Writing on Twitter today, President Trump said: “We will intervene in the case of Texas (and many other states). This is the most important. Our country needs a victory!”
Election law experts have said that the Texas lawsuit has little chance of success and lacks legal merit.
“Both procedurally and substantively, it’s a disaster,” Justin Levitt, a professor of electoral law at Loyola Law School in California, said of the Texas lawsuit. “There is no possibility that the court will agree to take the case.”
2020 U.S. elections
In addition to Missouri, the states that joined Texas were: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, and Virginia Western.
All states were represented by Republican officials at the presentation. All but three of the states have Republican governors.
Officials in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have called the lawsuit a reckless attack on democracy. It was filed directly with the Supreme Court rather than a lower court, as is allowed for certain interstate litigation.
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