Trump takes dispute on Pennsylvania vote to US Supreme Court
Washington, Dec 20 (efe-epa).- The reelection campaign of President Donald Trump on Sunday took its case disputing the results of the Nov. 3 election in Pennsylvania – a swing state that Democrat Joe Biden won, along with the national election – to the US Supreme Court.
In its case, Trump’s campaign contends that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court exceeded its authority by ruling against the president, claiming that the result of the US presidential election “hangs in the balance,” something that is not correct because Biden has been confirmed to have won the Nov. 3 vote, thus making him the president-elect and setting the stage for his inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021.
The suit is aimed at reversing three Pennsylvania Supreme Court cases concerning mail-in ballots and requests that the court reject the will of the state’s voters and allow the Pennsylvania General Assembly to pick its own slate of electors.
Even if the case succeeds, it would still not change the result of the Nov. 3 election because Biden won by a wide enough margin that he does not need Pennsylvania’s electoral votes to ensure that victory.
The lawsuit is part of the president’s ongoing strategy to reverse the result of the presidential election, a strategy that has resulted in numerous unsuccessful attempts to resort to the courts and has only served to nourish the political divisions in the US and further erode public confidence in the country’s democratic system.
In addition, the case has little chance of success, given that on Nov. 14 the US Electoral College confirmed Biden to have won the election, thus ratifying what the main media outlets had virtually assured via their forecasts more than a month before.
The aim of the Trump campaign is to invalidate hundreds of thousands of votes cast by mail in Pennsylvania, a method used by many millions of Americans to cast their ballots during the coronavirus pandemic.
The president has not acknowledged his defeat in the election and has been claiming, without proof of any kind, that massive election fraud denied him reelection, promising that he will continue fighting the election result in assorted US courts, a strategy in which so far he has had absolutely no success.
The Supreme Court has already ruled against Trump in an important case presented by Texas Republican leaders to invalidate the election result in the key states of Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, states that the current president won in the 2016 vote but which this time around he lost to Biden.
The US high court consists of three liberal justices and six conservative ones, the latter group including three justices nominated by Trump and later confirmed by the Republican-dominated Senate.
