US Election Explainer: Trump’s Legal Challenges

As President Donald Trump continues to promote falsehoods about the election, his legal team has so far failed to gain ground in court without evidence of widespread fraud, which experts agree does not exist.

Despite that, Trump and his Republican allies are moving forward with several cases aimed at blocking or delaying the certification of election results in key states on the battlefield won by President-elect Joe Biden. Republicans complain that, among other things, their observers were not allowed to properly review the ballot processing.

Experts say Trump has almost no chance of reversing the election. But his repeated unsubstantiated claims that the race was rigged is undermining public confidence in the electoral system while instilling in his supporters the idea that Biden will be an illegitimate president.

Where are the Republican electoral challenges in six states:

ARIZONA

THE CASE: The Arizona Republican Party is trying to block the certification of election results in the state’s most populous county, Maricopa, until the court rules on the party’s lawsuit calling for a manual recount of a sample of ballots. An audit already completed by the county found no discrepancies, authorities said.

WHAT HAPPENED: The judge was expected to issue a decision on Thursday.

In a separate case, the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee had sought to delay the certification of election results in Maricopa County. Republicans called for manual inspection of the ballots in the Phoenix metropolitan area, claiming that some votes were improperly rejected. A judge dismissed the case on Nov. 13 after campaign attorneys acknowledged that the small number of ballots in question would not change the outcome of how Arizona voted for president.

GEORGIA

THE CASE: A high-profile conservative attorney, L. Lin Wood Jr., filed a lawsuit in an attempt to block the certification of the election results in Georgia. Wood alleges that Georgia illegally changed the process for handling absentee ballots. Wood’s lawsuit points to a legal settlement signed earlier this year that addresses allegations about the lack of state standards for judging signatures on absentee ballot envelopes. Georgia’s undersecretary of state has called Wood’s case a “foolish and unsubstantiated claim.”

WHAT HAPPENED: A judge has scheduled a hearing for Thursday to consider a request for a temporary restraining order to stop the certification.

MICHIGAN

THE CASE: The Trump campaign filed a lawsuit in an attempt to block the certification of election results in the state, alleging that election officials “allowed fraud and incompetence to corrupt the conduct of the 2020 general election.” Trump’s legal team alleged that his observers were prevented from properly observing the vote count, that ineligible ballots were counted, and that Republican challenges to the ballots were ignored.

Another lawsuit filed this week on behalf of two candidates for the elections asks a court to stop the certification of the election results until an independent audit is completed to “ensure the accuracy and integrity of the elections.”

WHAT HAPPENED: The Trump campaign dropped its case Thursday, citing statements by Wayne County Republican pollsters who initially blocked certification of election results in Michigan’s largest county before approving them Tuesday. The two tellers now say they want to change their position again, but officials say there is no way they will rescind their vote.

Attorneys for the two poll contestants also abruptly dropped their lawsuit this week without explanation.

NEVADA

THE CASE: The Trump campaign is asking a judge to overturn Nevada’s election results or set them aside and declare it the winner, arguing that illegal or inappropriate votes were cast and that the use of optical scanning to process signatures on mail ballots violates state law. Trump’s lawsuit, filed Tuesday, repeats arguments that judges in Nevada and elsewhere have already rejected. It states that the votes were cast on behalf of the deceased, that election observers were not allowed to witness “key points” of the prosecution, and that people in American Indian territories were illegally given incentives to vote.

In a separate court filing this week, a voting watchdog group led by a former conservative state lawmaker wants a judge to block state certification of the elections.

WHAT HAPPENED: There have been no failures in either case.

PENNSYLVANIA

THE CASE: A Trump campaign case aims to prevent the state from certifying the election, claiming that Philadelphia and six counties mistakenly allowed voters to correct problems with mail-in ballots that would otherwise be disqualified on a technicality, such as missing an envelope. secret or a signature. The total number of ballots affected was not expected to come close to Biden’s margin of more than 80,000 votes.

WHAT HAPPENED: Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, signed the case this week after others abruptly pulled out, and the former New York City mayor argued in court Tuesday for the first time since the 1990s. Giuliani made wild accusations and unsubstantiated by a national conspiracy by Democrats to steal the elections. The judge did not immediately issue a ruling and canceled a hearing that was scheduled for Thursday, but set a schedule for both parties to file new submissions this week.

WISCONSIN

THE CASE: The Trump campaign on Wednesday called for a recount in the counties covering Milwaukee and Madison, both Democratic strongholds. He alleged, again without evidence, that the absentee ballots were tampered with or illegally cast and that government officials violated state law.

WHAT HAPPENED: Biden leads Trump by 20,000 votes statewide. The recount requested by Trump will begin Friday and must be completed by Dec. 1, the deadline for the statewide vote to be certified. State and local election officials reiterated that there was no evidence to back up Trump’s claims.

– Associated Press writers Jacques Billeaud in Phoenix, Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Ken Ritter in Las Vegas, Kate Brumback in Atlanta, and Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, contributed to this report.