[ad_1]
US President Donald Trump’s campaign filed lawsuits in Pennsylvania and Michigan, laying the groundwork to challenge the outcome on indecisive battlefields that could determine whether he gets another four years in the White House.
The new filings, which add to existing Republican legal challenges in Pennsylvania and Nevada, demand better access for campaign watchers to the locations where ballots are processed and counted, the campaign said. However, in one Michigan location in question, The Associated Press observed election watchers from both sides monitoring Wednesday. Nevada is also undecided.
The campaign also seeks to intervene in a Pennsylvania Supreme Court case over whether ballots received up to three days after the election can be counted, said deputy campaign manager Justin Clark.
Evan Vucci / AP
President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House in Washington.
The actions reveal an emerging legal strategy that the president had signaled for weeks, namely that it would attack the integrity of the voting process in states where the result could spell defeat.
There have been no reports of ballot fraud or any type of concern outside of Pennsylvania. The state had 3.1 million mail-in ballots that take time to count, and an order allows them to be counted through Friday if they are postmarked November 3 (local time).
READ MORE:
* Elections in the United States: the presidency is still in balance while Joe Biden wins Wisconsin
* Election in the USA: With all eyes on Pennsylvania, polling places across the state have long lines
* Elections in the United States: The United States on the verge of a nervous breakdown when the electoral campaign ends
Trump’s allies chanted, “Stop the count!” Inside the TCF Center, where the ballots were handled.
Detroit’s elections department was expected to finish counting absentee votes Wednesday night.
Michigan Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel said: “Michigan elections have been conducted in a transparent manner, with access provided for both political parties and the public, and using a robust system of checks and balances to ensure all ballots are counted fairly and accurately. “
More than 3 million absentee votes were cast in Michigan in the first major election since a new law made them available to any voter. But local election clerks were unable to start counting them until after polls closed on Tuesday.
Greg Wohlford / AP
Marian Collin Franco, 20, helps collect provisional ballots at the Erie County Courthouse on Election Day in Erie, Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said in an interview with CNN that the lawsuit was “more of a political document than a legal document.”
“There is transparency in this process. The count has continued. There are observers watching this count, and the count will continue, ” he said.
His campaign also announced that it would ask for a recount in Wisconsin, a state that The Associated Press called Democrat Joe Biden on Wednesday afternoon. Campaign manager Bill Stepien cited “irregularities in multiple Wisconsin counties,” without providing details.
Biden said the count should continue in every state, adding: “No one is going to take away our democracy, not now, not ever,” Biden said Wednesday.
His campaign did not immediately comment on new lawsuits in Michigan or Pennsylvania over observer access. But he has been seeking donations for what he calls the “Biden Fight Fund.”
“Our legal team is standing by, and they will prevail,” wrote campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon in a fundraising email sent to supporters early Wednesday.
The actions came as election officials counted votes in several swing states that are crucial to the outcome of the presidential election.
Meanwhile, the former vice president’s campaign welcomed the ongoing vote count and a lawyer for Biden’s campaign said they are ready for any legal fight. And Michigan Democrats said the lawsuit was unlikely.
Lonnie Scott, chief executive of Progress Michigan, a liberal advocacy group, said Trump only filed the lawsuit to prevent The Associated Press and other media from calling the race for Biden.
“This is a Hail Mary,” he said.
The campaign did not immediately release a copy of the lawsuit and it was unclear to which areas they argue they were denied access.
Election watchers from both sides abounded Wednesday at one of the main polling places in question: the TCF Center, The Associated Press noted. They registered at a table near the entrance to Hall E of the convention center and walked between the tables where the vote was being processed. In some cases, they came in droves and huddled together for a group discussion before fanning out. Uniformed Detroit cops were available to make sure everyone behaved.
Mark Brewer, a former state Democratic president who said he was watching Detroit’s vote count as a volunteer attorney, said he had been at TCF Stadium all day and had spoken to other people who had been there the past few days. He said Republicans had not been denied access.
Carlos Osorio / AP
A Detroit police officer prevents election hopefuls from entering the central tally board due to overcrowding, in Detroit, Michigan.
“This is the best absentee counting operation Detroit has ever had. They are counting the ballots very efficiently, despite the obstruction tactics of the Republicans. “
Republicans are already raising legal challenges involving absentee votes in Pennsylvania and Nevada, challenging local decisions that could gain national importance in closed elections.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump said he will take the presidential election to the Supreme Court, but it is unclear what he meant in a country where vote tabulations continue routinely after Election Day, and states largely set measure the rules about when the count should end.
“We will go to the Supreme Court of the United States; we want the voting to stop,” Trump told his supporters at the White House.
But the vote is over. It only counts what is happening throughout the country. No state will count absentee votes that are postmarked after Election Day.
The Biden campaign called Trump’s statement “scandalous, unprecedented and incorrect.”
“If the president makes good on his threat to go to court to try to avoid proper tabulation of votes, we have legal teams ready to be deployed to resist that effort,” Biden’s campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon said in a statement. . “And they will prevail.”
Election law expert Richard Hasen wrote in Slate Sunday that “there has never been any basis for asserting that a ballot that arrives on time cannot be counted if officials are unable to finish their count on election night.”
Ohio State University electoral law professor Edward Foley wrote on Twitter Wednesday: “Valid votes will be counted. SCOTUS would be involved only if there were votes of questionable validity that would make a difference, which might not be the case. The rule of law will determine the official winner of the popular vote in each state. Let the rule of law work. “
In either case, there is no way to go directly to superior court with a fraud complaint. Trump and his campaign could cite problems with the way votes are counted in individual states, but they would have to begin their legal fight in a lower state or federal court.
There is a Republican appeal pending in the Supreme Court on whether Pennsylvania can count the votes that arrive in the mail Wednesday through Friday, an extension ordered by the state’s superior court despite objection from Republicans. That case does not involve votes already cast and in the possession of election officials, even if they have not yet been counted.
The high court refused before the election to discard those ballots, but conservative judges indicated they could revert to the issue after the election. The Supreme Court also refused to block an extension for the receipt and counting of absentee ballots in North Carolina beyond the three days established by state law.
Even a small number of contested votes could matter if either state determines the winner of the election and the gap between Trump and Biden is so small that a few thousand votes, or even a few hundred, could make a difference.
