Donald Trump trailed by around 1.48,000 votes, or 2.6 percentage points, in Michigan’s unofficial vote total
President Donald Trump’s campaign on Wednesday took another step forward in its legal strategy to reverse its electoral defeat in the United States by filing a lawsuit in Michigan, as Georgia announced a recount and President-elect Joe Biden focused on laying the foundations for his new administration.
The Republican president’s team have gone to federal court to try to prevent Michigan, a Midwestern battlefield state it won in 2016, from certifying the November 3 election results.
Trump tracked roughly 148,000 votes, or 2.6 percentage points, in Michigan’s unofficial vote totals.
Biden has a slimmer lead of just over 14,000 votes, or 0.3 points, in Georgia, a southern state that has not been supported by Democrats since 1992.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has announced a manual recount of all ballots which he says should start this week and end in time to certify the results before the November 20 deadline.
“It will take all the time we have left, that’s for sure. It’s a big lift,” Raffensperger said at a press conference.
Trump refused to concede the election to Biden, instead filing a wave of lawsuits in pivotal states in an attempt to support his unsubstantiated claims of widespread electoral fraud. The Michigan lawsuit also made allegations of misconduct during the vote, focusing on the Democratic stronghold of Wayne County, which includes Detroit.
Jake Rollow, spokesman for the Michigan State Department, said the Trump campaign was promoting false statements aimed at eroding public confidence in the Michigan election.
“This does not change the truth: Michigan’s election was conducted in a fair, secure and transparent manner, and the results faithfully reflect the will of the people,” Rollow said in a statement.
Prominent Republican lawmakers and other allies of Trump have backed the president’s strategy, saying he has the right to challenge election results. The complaint was filed a day after Biden called Trump’s non-compliance an “embarrassment.”
Judges have dismissed several of the lawsuits against Trump, and legal experts say the litigation is unlikely to change the election outcome.
While acknowledging that there was “no silver bullet” that would cancel the election, Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said Wednesday’s developments were part of a process that could pave the way to a second four-year term for Trump.
Previously, the Trump campaign has said it has evidence that a handful of the dead in Georgia voted in last week’s election.
VETERANS DAY
Biden took the election victory last Saturday by winning a series of battlefield states to exceed the 270 electoral votes needed for the state-by-state constituency. Biden won the national popular vote by more than 5 million votes, with some states still counting the ballots.
Biden is scheduled to meet with advisers on Wednesday who are helping him prepare to take office on inauguration day, Jan.20.
Trump laid a memorial wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery, his first public appearance other than two golf outings since Biden was cast as the winner on Saturday.
Although Trump made no remarks at the graveyard, in Twitter posts on Wednesday he maintained his account of voter fraud, referring to “a mountain of corruption and dishonesty” in attacking pollsters.
Nearly 80% of Americans, including half of Republicans, say Biden won the election, according to a Reuters / Ipsos poll released Tuesday.
Trump’s refusal to accept defeat, even as world leaders praise Biden and contemplate their future relationship with the United States, ends an almost four-year volatile tenure with the country deeply polarized and facing strong pressure. resurgence of coronavirus cases. During the campaign, Trump refused to engage in a peaceful transfer of power.
The Trump administration is not cooperating with Biden’s transition team, which has not been able to move into federal government offices or draw funds to hire staff.
The outcome of the election in a few states remained undecided, with Trump holding a lead in North Carolina and Biden in Arizona in addition to Georgia. Recounts are unlikely to change the results.
To stay in power, Trump would need to win the three undecided states and overturn the results in one or more states in Biden’s column.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
