20 november 2020
17:42
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Donald Trump has used the endgame in his fight against the outcome of the US presidential race. Now that recounts and legal battles are not making much of an impact, he wants to put Republican MPs in front of him in conflicting states.
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Just under two weeks after Democrat Joe Biden has gathered enough electoral votes to be declared the winner of the US presidential race, current White House resident Donald Trump has still not resigned himself to the outcome. He continues to argue on Twitter regularly that there is ‘electoral fraud’ and that the victory is being stolen from him.
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In an effort to stave off defeat, Trump and his campaign team have been demanding recounts in several battle states over the past 2.5 weeks. His lawyers opened at the same time multiple legal fronts. Until now without any significant result. On Thursday, judges, including in Pennsylvania, referred three more complaints about irregularities to the trash.
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More lawsuits
Yet the billionaire has no intention of burying the hatchet. More lawsuits will follow in the following days. The Democrats are mastering national conspiracy theories to steal the election, ”Rudolph Giuliani, the current US president’s personal attorney, posited Thursday. He did not provide proof.
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The Democrats are mastering national conspiracy theories to steal the election.
Rudolph Giuliani
Advocaat Donald Trump
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The chance that one of these new things will change the election race after all, seems small. But that may no longer be Team Trump’s goal. By filing an endless series of complaints, they mainly hope to delay or block the final certification of the election results in some conflicting states.
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This way they want to gain time to launch a final offensive. Now that recounts and legal battles are not making sense, Trump and co. to harness state parliaments with Republican majorities.
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State Parliament
Usually the governor or the secretary of state, responsible for electoral processes, the result of a ballot box in their state. But Trump’s lawyers point to a phrase in the constitution to argue that that is actually the power of the state parliament.
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In addition, they are waving a law that says that the same body will take action if voters ‘fail to make a clear choice on election day’. The state parliament can pass a resolution stating that the “ballot battle was marred by irregularities, making the outcome unclear.” After which the members of parliament can send electors to the electoral college that the president officially elects on December 14.
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This is why the current election process is so dangerous. For so long, that revolved around respect for standards that has become a secret of how rickety the whole system is if someone decides to play the game very hard.
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Trump is primarily targeting Michigan, where Biden received more than 148,000 votes than his rival. The billionaire invited the Republican leaders of that state parliament to the White House on Friday to discuss the strategy with them. If he gets them along, fellow party members from Pennsylvania and Wisconsin can soon expect a ‘massage’.
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The tactic can only succeed if the current president gets all three states on his side. But even if the Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin state councils send Trump-loyal electors to the electoral college, the loot isn’t in. Because the governor can at the same time perfectly send the original electors, loyal to Biden and awarded on the basis of the election results, to that body.
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Old
When it comes to that, the US will be in unknown territory. The matter then lands on the plate of the National Congress. On January 6, 2021, the Senate and the House of Representatives will consider the election results. If a state sends two platoons of electors to the electoral college, Vice President Mike Pence as President of the Senate can decide to ban their votes from the results. It may then ultimately be the House that decides who will be inaugurated on January 20.
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The House may ultimately decide who will be inaugurated on January 20.
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This is why the current election process is so dangerous. For so long, that has revolved around respect for norms that has concealed how rickety the whole system is if someone decides to play the game really hard, ”said FairVote’s David Daley, who is campaigning for a reform of the electoral process.
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The ball seems to end up in the hands of Republican MPs in some struggling states in the following days. Are they willing to ignore the electoral intentions of millions of Americans and join Trump’s endgame? To be continued.
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