[ad_1]
WASHINGTON (REUTERS) – The United States Supreme Court on Friday (December 11) abruptly ended a lawsuit brought by Texas and backed by President Donald Trump that sought to discard the results of the vote in four states, leading to him it was a crushing setback in his quest to undo his electoral defeat to President-elect Joe Biden.
The justices in a short order rejected Texas’ offer to file the extraordinary challenge against Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin directly before the Supreme Court, as allowed in some cases of inter-state litigation under a legal doctrine called “original jurisdiction.”
The case was brought Tuesday by the Republican attorney general of Texas, a Trump ally. The Republican president filed a motion Wednesday to intervene and become a plaintiff.
The conservative 6-3 majority of the Supreme Court includes three Trump-appointed justices and none of them commented on the unsigned order. Before the Nov.3 election, Trump said he expected the Supreme Court to decide his outcome.
“Texas has not demonstrated a judicially recognizable interest in the way another state conducts its elections,” the court order said.
Two of the court’s conservatives, Judge Samuel Alito and Judge Clarence Thomas, said they would have allowed Texas to sue, but they would not have stopped the four states from finalizing their election results.
There was no immediate response from the White House. A spokesman for Biden said it was no “surprise” that the high court rejected “unfounded attempts” to deny that Trump lost the election.
“Our nation’s highest court saw this seditious abuse of our electoral process,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, said on Twitter.
All four states in a court filing Thursday asked justices to reject the lawsuit, which they said had no factual or legal basis.
Biden won all four states. By 2016, Trump had won them.
The Trump campaign and its allies have lost numerous lawsuits in state and federal courts challenging the results of this year’s election.
Trump has falsely claimed that he won the Nov. 3 election and has made unsubstantiated allegations of widespread election fraud and a “rigged” system against him. State election officials have said they have found no evidence of such fraud.
Attorneys for Trump and his allies have presented no evidence in court of the type of fraud he has alleged. Texas has asked justices to dismiss the election results in all four states. Biden won all four states.
Trump had won them in the 2016 election. Trump and many of his fellow Republicans have made unsubstantiated claims that the expansion of voting by mail during the coronavirus pandemic led Biden to fraudulently win in electoral battle states.
Democrats and other critics have accused Trump of trying to break public belief in the integrity of American elections and sabotaging American democracy by trying to subvert the will of the voters.
Trump has refused to concede the election and many Republicans have failed to recognize Biden as president-elect. Biden will take office on January 20.
The Texas lawsuit argued that changes made by the four states to voting procedures amid the coronavirus pandemic to expand voting by mail were illegal.
Texas asked the Supreme Court to immediately block all four states from using the voting results to name presidential voters to the Electoral College, which is scheduled to formally choose the winner on Monday.
[ad_2]
