Supreme Court rejects Republican demand to overturn Joe Biden's victory in Pennsylvania

The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected Republicans' latest attempt to undo Pennsylvania's certification of President-elect Joe Biden's victory on the campaign field.

Without comment, the court declined to challenge the Pennsylvania certification process by nullifying its postal votes. No judiciary registered dissent – which suggests that the decision could have been 9-0.

Governor Tom Wolf has already confirmed Biden's victory, and the state's 20 voters are due to meet on December 14 to cast their votes for Biden. Biden beat President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania by more than 80,000 votes, a state that Trump won in 2016. Most of the postal ballots were submitted by Democrats.

Within a few minutes, Donald Trump's election campaign triggered a text appeal to the supporters who had admitted defeat in court and said: “Everything Pres. Trump did it, is at stake on January 5th – the day before the meeting of Congress to confirm the result of the electoral college.

This is Trump's last chance to dismiss the election result by somehow convincing Congress to annul Biden's victory in enough states to bring his electoral college below 270 and leave it to the House to decide who President is. If the House can decide, each state delegation gets a vote, and Republicans have a majority in 26 state delegations – which apparently means Trump will be named president.

The Supreme Court's blow means his Conservative majority of 6 to 3 with three Trump judges on the bench has so far refused to help him.

The move came hours after the state of Texas joined desperate efforts to find a case that would turn election results on their head by suing four battlefield states that Joe Biden won for the way they did elections had carried out.

And just before the verdict was passed, Trump had annoyed that he had "won" an event at the White House in Pennsylvania – and the other swing states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Georgia – and said he wanted the judges of the Supreme Court "that" would have the courage to agree with him.

& # 39; I won. & # 39; Before the Supreme Court knocked down Donald Trump just before 5 p.m., he had railed at a White House event about vaccines he had "won" and demanded that the judges show "courage" by turning the election result upside down put

Apparently Unanimous: No judiciary registered an objection to the refusal to hear Republicans' plea to annul the Pennsylvania mail-in votes.

How the Trump Campaign Reacted: January 5th is the day before the Congress meeting to confirm the Electoral College result and, with it, Joe Biden's victory. The SCOTUS ruling means that Trump has effectively given up hope of conservative judges who will come to his aid

In the underlying lawsuit, Kelly and the other Republican plaintiffs sought either to ditch the 2.5 million postal ballot papers filed under the law or to wipe out the election results and instruct the Republican-controlled state legislature to select the Pennsylvania presidential electorate.

The state Supreme Court said plaintiffs waited too long to file the lawsuit and noted Republicans' staggering demand for an entire election to be retroactively overturned.

By immediately rejecting the case, the judges do not have to tell why they made their decision. No one noticed any contradiction, suggesting that it was a unanimous decision.

Northwestern Pennsylvania Republican Representative Mike Kelly and other plaintiffs asked the judges to intervene after the Supreme Court dismissed their case.

Republicans argued that Pennsylvania's expansive postal voting law was unconstitutional because it required a constitutional amendment to pass its provisions.

In the lawsuit, filed late Monday on behalf of the state of Texas, its attorney general Ken Paxton argued that Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia violated the constitutional electoral clause with their dramatic expansion of postal ballots amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Paxton is under investigation by the FBI for bribery and abuse of office. It's unclear if he and Trump coordinated along the way, but Trump tweeted that it showed "courage and brilliance".

Texas Governor Greg Abbott tweeted "God Bless Texas," while Senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn and Governor Greg Abbott made no comments.

By targeting the four swing states, Paxton's lawsuit seeks to either get the Republican majority representatives to nominate voters for the electoral college, transfer the majority to Trump, or completely invalidate their voters, thereby removing the majority of the Biden electoral college is reduced to under 270 and the decision is made on the presidency in the House of Representatives.

The Supreme Court doesn't need to take the case up and could just ignore it. The Michigan and Wisconsin attorneys general – both Democrats – mocked the legal offer and accused Paxton of running a "circus."

Paxton claims the four states went against their own constitutions to facilitate voting in the pandemic, and that doing so harmed Texas voters by violating the federal constitution's equal treatment clause.

"Whether well-intentioned or not, these unconstitutional acts had the same uniform effect – they made the 2020 election less certain in the accused states," the lawsuit said.

& # 39; These changes are contrary to relevant state laws and were made by non-legislative bodies without the consent of state legislators. The actions of these officials were thus directly against the constitution. & # 39;

The lawsuit came after another bad day for the president and his allies in court, when federal judges in Georgia and Michigan dismissed ally Sidney Powell's "Kraken" trials and on a pivotal date known as the "safe haven" when all state litigation must end at 11:59 p.m. Tuesday.

And his attorney Jenna Ellis was most recently diagnosed with COVID while Rudy Giuliani remains in hospital in Georgetown and is being treated for it. He is supposed to hold conference calls from his bed.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (right, with Trump in the Beast in 2018) has filed lawsuits against four states that voted for Joe Biden, asking the Supreme Court to elect Republican-led lawmakers and the presidency Donald Trump surrender

Response from Pennsylvania: Josh Shapiro, the attorney general, slammed the suit as a "circus".

Wisconsin Reaction: Attorney General Josh Kaul compared his chances in court to Texas at the Ice Bowl

President Trump claims he "won" the election but suffered a number of defeats in court

Steve Vladek, a law professor at the University of Texas, described the lawsuit as "crazy" and as the "craziest" election lawsuit to date

Adulterer and an FBI Probe: Meet the AG behind Hagel Mary to annul the election

The FBI is investigating allegations that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton broke the law when he used his office for a wealthy donor.

Federal agents are investigating allegations by former Paxton employees that the Republican committed bribery, abuse of office, and other crimes to aid Austin real estate developer Nate Paul.

The investigation was reported by the Associated Press in mid-November.

Paxton has denied wrongdoing and declined calls to resign after his top MPs reported him to federal authorities in late September.

Trump ally: Ken Paxton with Eric Trump and his wife Angela – whom he's cheating on

It is unclear to what extent the FBI is investigating the allegations against Paxton. A spokeswoman for the agency in San Antonio declined to comment.

Paxton is accused of using his position as the best law enforcement officer in Texas to help Paul in a variety of ways.

At the center of their claims is the fact that Paxton hired an outside attorney to investigate the developer's allegations that the FBI failed to properly search his home and office over the past year.

Each of Paxton's accusers has resigned, been suspended, or released since reporting him. Last week, four of them filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the attorney general, claiming he had suppressed them in retaliation.

The full nature of the connection between Paxton and Paul remains unclear. In 2018 Paul donated $ 25,000 to the Attorney General's re-election campaign. The developer said in a recent statement that Paxton recommended a woman for her job at his company.

Two people previously told The Associated Press that in 2018 Paxton admitted to having an extramarital affair with the woman, who was then a Senate assistant. People spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.

Paxton has spent most of his tenure in office maintaining his innocence in the face of an unrelated securities fraud charge. The case has stalled for years due to legal challenges.

Trump has again called for other Republican states to join the lawsuit and a list of when their attorneys general's terms have expired – meaning they should face the primaries if they don't go along.

The lawsuit alleges that the four states should be instructed by the judges to return to lawmakers the power to select voters for the electoral college under Article 1 of the Constitution.

The constitutional electoral clause in Article 1 states that “the times, places and manner of holding elections for senators and representatives in each state are prescribed by its legislature” – determining the role of each state in conducting its elections .

For this reason, some countries allowed universal mail-in voting years ago, while others took a different course.

The lawsuit claims, however, that the four swing states have "flooded their citizens with millions of ballot requests and ballot papers contrary to legal controls on how they are lawfully received, rated and counted".

It calls for "non-legislative changes to the" electoral laws "of the accused states by state courts and election officials.

The lawsuit is asking the Supreme Court to postpone the December 14th electoral college meeting to allow an investigation. It accused the states of "rampant lawlessness" and tried to "usurp" the powers of their legislators.

The lawsuit seeks to return the nomination of voters to state legislatures – all of which are led by Republicans – for legislative nomination rather than referendum.

It is explicitly stated that if this does not happen, Texas AG would like to throw the election on January 6th. Each state delegation receives one vote, which would bring Republicans to a majority if they voted.

The Texas lawsuit alleges "rampant lawlessness" and cites some of the same allegations that have either been debunked or already thrown out of court.

For example, it cited "suitcases full of ballot papers pulled out from under tables after election observers were told to leave Georgia" despite an official from the Republican Foreign Minister's office in Georgia provided an affidavit stating that there was no wrongdoing.

"Our investigation and review of all security materials found that no mysterious ballot papers were tabled from an unknown location and hidden under tables, as some have reported," wrote investigator Frances Watson.

Texas itself allows mail-in voting but sets categories and requires a reason: traveling, over 65, imprisoned, or disabled.

Pennsylvania lawmakers voted for an apologetic mail-in vote in 2019 ahead of the pandemic. The democratic governor Tom Wolf signed the law, which was passed bipartisan.

The Supreme Court is not required to respond to the lawsuit – it can simply refuse to accept it.

So far, the Supreme Court has only considered one case filed by a Trump ally – an attempt to lose Republican Conor Lamb to invalidate postal ballot papers in his race at the Pennsylvania House. In this case, Judge Samuel Alito has asked that both sides submit pleadings by Tuesday.

Steve Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas, called the lawsuit "insane" and quipped on Twitter, "It looks like we have a new leader in" the craziest lawsuit alleged to challenge the electoral category. "

But other cases brought up by or linked to Trump have failed, with Monday being a particularly bad day.

Georgia reaffirmed its vote for Joe Biden after two recounts later that day, while former Trump campaign attorney Sidney Powell's "Kraken" charges were dismissed one morning by federal judges in Georgia and Michigan.

"The people have spoken," US District Court judge Linda V. Parker wrote in a blistering ruling in Michigan, dismissing Powell's allegations of rampant electoral fraud and widespread conspiracy to alter electronic voting records including Venezuela, Cuba, and China and North included Korea, the Democrats, some Republicans, and workers for Dominion, the IT specialist by choice.

Parker, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, said the case embodied the phrase "This ship has sailed".

"This lawsuit is apparently less about obtaining the relief the plaintiffs are seeking … more about the impact of their allegations on people's trust in the democratic process and their trust in our government."

Separately, it was revealed that Trump had called the Republican Speaker of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives twice in the past week to get the battlefield state legislature to overturn the popular victory for Joe Biden there.

The office of Speaker of Parliament Bryan Cutler confirmed the two calls to the Washington Post, making Pennsylvania the third state where Trump tried direct pressure to reverse the election results. He also attempted to intervene in Michigan and Georgia – three of the states named in the Texas lawsuit.

The appeal to the Supreme Court comes despite the fact that the judges were among the sharpest critics of the legal arguments put forward by Trump's legal team, often dismissing them with scathing language of denial.

This is true regardless of whether the judge was appointed by a Democrat or a Republican, including those named by Trump himself.

The court rulings that have rejected Trump's unfounded allegations of widespread electoral fraud have underscored not only the futility of the President the Lame Duck's attempt to sabotage the will of the people, but also the role of the courts in overseeing his unprecedented efforts at the Power to stay.

The complaints did not stop the litigation.

Despite those losses in court, Trump has claimed he actually won the election.

And he's moved out of the courts to speak directly to lawmakers as his losses mount. He brought Michigan lawmakers to the White House to suspend the vote and called Georgia Governor Brian Kemp asking him to set up a special term to reverse the states' results. Kemp refused.

And Trump tweeted in all caps: "I won the election, big."

While this is not the case, it is true that Trump is quick to run out of legal runway.

Of around 50 lawsuits filed, more than 35 were dropped or dismissed.

Many of the lawsuits indicate a lack of understanding of how elections actually work.

The lawsuit would result in the results in four battlefield states won by President-elect Joe Biden being discarded

In Georgia, US District Judge Timothy Batten, appointed by President George W. Bush, dismissed a lawsuit from Powell who left the Trump legal team a few weeks ago but has continued to spread flawed electoral claims.

Powell's lawsuit alleged widespread fraud designed to illegally manipulate the vote count in Biden's favor. The lawsuit said the program was carried out in a variety of ways, including ballot papers, votes cast from Trump to Biden by the electoral system, and issues with postal voting. The judge flatly denied these claims.

Batten said the lawsuit sought "perhaps the most extraordinary relief ever sought in federal court in connection with an election."

He said the lawsuit sought to ignore the will of voters in Georgia, which the state re-affirmed for Biden on Monday after three votes.

"They want this court to replace the verdict of two and a half million Georgian voters who voted for Joe Biden, and I am not ready," Batten said.

Much like Trump, his lawyers attempt to blame the judge's political leanings after their legal arguments have been invalidated.

When a federal appeals body in Philadelphia rejected Trump's campaign just five days after reaching court, Trump's legal advisor Jenna Ellis – who learned on Tuesday that she had COVID – called her work a product of the Pennsylvania's activist judicial machinery. & # 39;

But Trump appointed the judge who drafted the November 27 opinion.

& # 39; Voters, not lawyers, elect the president. Ballots, not briefings, make elections, ”wrote Judge Stephanos Bibas when the US 3rd Circuit Panel refused to prevent the state from confirming its results for Democrat Joe Biden, a demand he called“ breathtaking ”.

All three panel members were appointed by Republican presidents.

And they upheld the decision of a fourth Republican, U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann, a conservative lawyer and a member of the Federalist Society. Brann had described the campaign litigation, which was being discussed in court by Rudy Giuliani, as an "arbitrary" mess that resembled "Frankenstein's monster".

The lawsuits have also failed in state courts. In Arizona, Judge Randall Warner, an independent judge appointed by former Democratic governor Janet Napolitano in 2007, made an offer to reverse Biden's victory.

Arizona Republican Party leader Kelli Ward challenged ballot papers on Metro Phoenix that were duplicated because previous voter ballot papers were corrupted or untabbed.

Warner wrote, “There is no evidence that the inaccuracies were intentional or part of any fraudulent scheme. They were mistakes. Und angesichts der geringen Anzahl doppelter Stimmzettel und der geringen Fehlerquote zeigen die Beweise keine Auswirkungen auf das Ergebnis. & # 39;

In Nevada entschied Richter James Todd Russell in Carson City am Freitag, dass Anwälte republikanischer Wähler keine klaren oder überzeugenden Beweise für Betrug oder Illegalität vorlegten.

Die Richter in Nevada sind unparteiisch. Aber Russells Vater war von 1951 bis 1959 republikanischer Gouverneur des Staates.