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Republican leaders in four critical states won by US President-elect Joe Biden say they will not participate in a legally dubious plan to get their state’s electors to vote for US President Donald Trump.
His comments effectively shut down a half-baked plot that some Republicans raised as a last chance to keep Trump in the White House.
Republican Party state legislators in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have said they will not be involved in the selection of voters, who will ultimately cast the votes that ensure a candidate’s victory. Such a move would violate state law and the vote of the people, several noted.
“I don’t see, unless we find some kind of fraud, which I haven’t heard about, I don’t see us seriously addressing a change in voters,” said Rusty Bowers, Speaker of the Arizona Republican House of Representatives, who He says he’s been inundated with emails calling for the legislature to intervene. “They are required by law to choose according to the vote of the people.”
The idea loosely implies that GOP-controlled legislatures dismiss Biden’s popular vote victories in their states and choose to select Trump voters. While the ending was unclear, it appeared to hinge on the expectation that a conservative-leaning Supreme Court would resolve any disputes over the measure.
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Still, it has been promoted by Trump allies, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and is an example of misleading information and false claims fueling skepticism among Trump supporters about the integrity of the vote.
The theory is based on the fact that the United States Constitution gives state legislatures the power to decide how voters are chosen. Each state has already passed laws that delegate this power to voters and appoint voters for any candidate who wins the state on Election Day. The only opportunity for a state legislature to engage with voters is a provision in federal law that allows it if the actual election “fails.”
If the outcome of the election was unclear by mid-December, by the deadline for naming voters, Republican-controlled legislatures in those states could declare Trump won and name voters to support him. Or so the theory goes.
John Locher / AP
Republican leaders in four critical states won by President-elect Joe Biden say they will not participate in a legally dubious plan to get their state’s electors to vote for Trump.
The problem, legal experts note, is that the election outcome is by no means confusing. Biden won all the states in question. It is difficult to argue that the elections “failed” when Trump’s own Department of Homeland Security reported that they were not rigged and that they were “the safest in US history.”
No widespread fraud or vote counting issues have been found, showing Biden leading Trump by more than 5 million votes nationally.
The Trump campaign and its allies have filed lawsuits that aim to delay certification and potentially provide evidence of a failed election. But so far, Trump and the Republicans have had little success: At least 10 of the lawsuits have been rejected by the courts in the 10 days after the election. The most important ones that remain are asking the courts to prevent Michigan and Pennsylvania from certifying Biden as the winner of their elections.
But legal experts say it is impossible for the courts to ultimately prevent those states from appointing voters before the December deadline.
Evan Vucci / AP
US President Donald Trump has refused to admit defeat to Biden.
“It would take the most unwarranted and bizarre court intervention this country has ever seen,” said Danielle Lang of the Campaign Legal Center. “I have not seen anything in any of those lawsuits that has any kind of merit, much less enough to delay the appointment of voters.”
Even if Trump were to win a single court fight, there is another major hurdle: Congress would be the final arbiter of whether or not to accept the voters presented by the Republican legislatures. If the Democratic-controlled House and the Republican-controlled Senate could not agree on which electors to accept and who becomes president, the presidency would pass to the next person in line of succession at the end of Trump’s term and Vice President Mike Pence on January 20. .
That would be the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat.
“If this is a strategy, I don’t think it will succeed,” said Edward Foley, a constitutional law professor at Ohio State University. “I think we are in the realm of fantasy.”
But unsubstantiated claims about fraud and corruption have been circulating widely in conservative circles since Biden won the election. Asked this week if state lawmakers should overrule the official results, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said, “It should all be on the table.”
Carolyn Kaster / AP
The president-elect of the United States, Joe Biden, will be sworn in on January 20.
DeSantis urged Pennsylvanians and Michigan residents to call in state legislators and urge them to intervene. “According to article 2 of the Constitution, the presidential electors are made by the legislatures and the schemes they create and the framework. And if there is a deviation from that, if they are not following the law, if they are ignoring the law, then they can also provide solutions, “he said.
Republican lawmakers, however, appear to be holding their own. “The Pennsylvania General Assembly does not have and will not participate in the election of the state’s presidential electors or in deciding the outcome of the presidential election,” wrote top Republican legislative leaders, State Senator Jake Corman and Representative Kerry Benninghoff # in an October operation His offices said Friday they back the statement.
Wisconsin Assembly Republican Leader Robin Vos has long rejected the idea, and his spokesman, Kit Beyer, said he defended that position Thursday.
In Michigan, legislative leaders say any intervention would be against state law. Although the GOP-controlled legislature is investigating the election, State Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey told WJR radio station on Friday: “It is not expected that our analysis will result in any change in the result”.
