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US President Donald Trump pauses as he talks about the “Operation Warp Speed” program, the joint initiative of the Department of Defense and HHS that has reached agreements with several drug manufacturers in an effort to help accelerate the search for effective treatments for the ongoing coronavirus disease (COVID -19) pandemic, during an event at the White House Rose Garden in Washington, USA, November 13, 2020 (File photo by CARLOS BARRIA / Reuters)
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump, hit by back-to-back setbacks in his desperate attempt to reverse the U.S. presidential election, persisted on allegations of massive voter fraud on Saturday, two weeks after Democrat Joe Biden was declared president-elect.
Trump, a Republican, has refused to admit that Biden won and seeks to invalidate or change the results through lawsuits and recounts in various battle states. However, his campaign has been unable to provide any evidence of his claims of widespread and coordinated voter fraud.
His efforts, which critics call an unprecedented push by a sitting president to subvert the will of the voters, have so far had little success in court or on the ground.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced Friday that a manual recount and audit of all votes cast had confirmed Biden as the winner in the southern state. He is the first Democratic presidential candidate to win Georgia in nearly three decades.
Two top Michigan Republican lawmakers struck another blow Friday when they said after a meeting with Trump that they had no information that would change the outcome of elections in the state.
“(As) legislative leaders, we will follow the law and follow the normal process regarding Michigan voters,” said Michigan Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield, in a joint return.
On Saturday, Trump said the media was misinterpreting the statement, in which the couple also said they had faith in a review of Michigan’s election process by state lawmakers.
“Massive electoral fraud will be displayed!” Trump wrote on Twitter.
With the certified vote in Georgia, the Trump campaign now has two business days to request a recount there. Trump’s legal team has already said it plans a lawsuit in the state, but has not provided details.
After a series of court defeats, Trump’s new campaign tactic is to convince Republican-controlled legislatures in Biden-won battle states to sideline the results and declare Trump the winner, according to three people familiar with the plan.
The long-term effort is focused on Michigan and Pennsylvania for now, but even if both states switched, Trump would have to reverse the vote in another state to jump ahead of Biden in the Electoral College.
Such an event would be unprecedented in modern American history.
defend yourself
Some groups were fighting back with their own legal actions.
On Friday, a group of black voters in Detroit and a voting rights organization filed a lawsuit in federal court accusing Trump and his campaign of violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by falsely claiming voter fraud and trying to overturn the voting rights. results in Michigan and other states pressuring officials not to count or certify votes or to install pro-Trump voters.
“To carry out this strategy, Defendants openly seek to disenfranchise black voters, including voters in Detroit, Michigan,” the lawsuit says. More than 78% of Detroit residents are black, according to US Census data.
Detroit lawyers also asked a judge to reprimand Trump’s campaign for spreading “disinformation” in a court file about the certification of Wayne County, where the city is located.
Biden, who has denounced Trump’s attempt to reverse the election results as “totally irresponsible,” was supposed to spend Saturday meeting with transition advisers.
Trump participated in a virtual summit of the 20 largest economies in the world and then went golfing at his club in Sterling, Virginia.
Senior Republicans have been largely silent on Trump’s unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud or have defended his right to seek redress, but the pressure was building after several doubts expressed Friday.
Two Republican sources said that a press conference Thursday in which Trump’s attorney Rudolph Giuliani accused Democrats of participating in a “national conspiracy” to manipulate vote totals, although they admitted he had no evidence, may have been a turning point for some former allies.
The General Services Administration, led by a Trump appointee, has yet to acknowledge Biden’s victory, preventing his team from gaining access to government office space and funds normally provided to an incoming administration before the Inauguration Day on January 20.
Critics say Trump’s delay and refusal to concede have serious implications for national security and the fight against the coronavirus, which has killed nearly 255,000 Americans.
Public health experts say an increased social mix and indoor gatherings as the weather turns chilly ahead of the Thanksgiving and Christmas season is fueling a worsening contagion, depleting already overwhelmed healthcare systems in some states.
The single-day death toll surpassed 2,000 this week for the first time since late June, according to a Reuters tally.
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