In a blistering ruling, a Philadelphia appeals court ruled Friday that the Trump campaign could not stop or reverse certification of voting results in Pennsylvania and reprimanded the president’s team, stating that “making an election unfair is it.” not make it. “
The 21-page Third Circle Court of Appeal ruling was a total denial of Mr. Trump’s legal efforts to halt the Pennsylvania certification process and was drafted by a judge he appointed to the bank himself. “Free, fair elections are the lifeblood of our democracy,” wrote Judge Stephanos Bibas unanimously on behalf of the court of appeal. “Fees require specific allegations and then proof. We don’t have any here. “
With scathing language, many courts have dropped an inexorable barrage of lawsuits filed by the Trump campaign and its supporters since election day. Nevertheless, the decision of the Third Circle was particularly open.
“Voters, not lawyers, elect the president,” the court said at one point. “Ballot papers, no briefings, decide about elections.”
The court accused the Trump campaign of engaging in “repetitive litigation,” noting that the public interest “counted the votes of all legitimate voters, not the disenfranchisement of millions of Pennsylvania voters who voted by mail “strongly advocated.
Although Republican plaintiffs continued to file lawsuits against the integrity of the elections and Mr Trump has not given up unfoundedly questioning the election results on Twitter, judges across the country – some of them appointed by Republicans – have held the line and ruled and moreover, legal action in several swing states lacks both merit and sufficient evidence.
Last week, a federal judge appointed by Mr. Trump in Atlanta denied an urgency motion to stop the certification of the Georgian voice, saying that such a move would create “confusion and disenfranchisement which I believe has no factual and legal basis”.
Then there was the judge, whose decision was upheld by the Third Circle, Matthew W. Brann of the Williamsport, Pennsylvania Federal District Court. When Judge Brann, a former Republican official and member of the Conservative Federal Society appointed by former President Barack Obama, acted Mr. Trump’s team suffered a first legal defeat last Saturday. He compared the suit to “Frankenstein’s monster” and said it was “randomly sewn together”. He also noted that the lawsuit was filled with “strained legal arguments” and “speculative allegations” that were “not supported by evidence”.
The Pennsylvania decision came on a day of unsubstantiated tweets from Mr. Trump that the election was “a total scam”, that he had “won a lot,” and that the news media “refuses to give the real facts and figures.”
When asked Thursday whether he would leave the White House if the electoral college formalized Mr Biden’s victory, as expected, the president said, “Sure I will.”
On Friday, shortly after the three-judge panel of the Third Circle made its decision, Jenna Ellis, an attorney for Mr. Trump, wrote on Twitter that she and Rudolph W. Giuliani, who heads the president’s election campaign, had planned to join Appeal to Supreme Court. On her Twitter post, Ms. Ellis accused “the Pennsylvanian judicial machinery” of covering up “allegations of massive fraud” even though all three panel judges were appointed by Republicans.
But even if the Supreme Court granted Trump’s campaign proposed reverse circuit motion, it wouldn’t do much, given the tight structure of the appeal.
Mr Trump’s attorneys had only asked the Court of Appeals for permission to file a revised version of his original complaint with Judge Brann. If the Supreme Court followed the strict terms of the appeal, it could only refer the case back to Judge Brann’s court for further action.
In a letter to Third Circle earlier this week, Trump’s attorneys suggested that the appellate court alone could undo the confirmation of the Pennsylvania vote, which took place Tuesday when Governor Tom Wolf signed off the list of 20 voters and consolidated the elected one President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory there. Georgia confirmed its vote last week after a recount of its five million ballot papers left Mr Biden’s victory intact. But Mr. Trump’s attorneys stopped formally requesting such a move.
However, the Court of Appeals rejected the proposal, stating that the campaign’s arguments for effectively overturning the Pennsylvania election were “unfounded” and “drastic and unprecedented.”
“This means would be disproportionate to the procedural challenges raised,” wrote the judges.
In the first complaint, campaign lawyers argued that there were widespread shortcomings in postal ballot paper in Pennsylvania and that Mr. Trump’s election challengers were not being given adequate access to monitoring votes and the number of votes.
However, the appeals court rejected these arguments as “vague and conclusive”.
Mr Trump’s attorneys have never alleged “that anyone treated the Trump campaign or Trump votes worse than the Biden campaign or the Biden votes,” the court wrote. “And federal law doesn’t prescribe election observers or how they can observe.”
The underlying lawsuit was hit by legal snafus almost from the start on November 9th.
A week after its filing, the Trump campaign was already in the third group of lawyers. On November 17, Mr. Giuliani appeared in person at a hearing before Judge Brann and made an incoherent opening statement mentioning Mickey Mouse, former Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, and the Philadelphia Mafia.
Mr Giuliani also contradicted Mr Trump – and his own public statements – by admitting at the hearing that no one accused Pennsylvania election officials of fraud.
“This is not a fraud case,” he said.
The appeals court seemed to throw this statement in Mr Giuliani’s face in its decision.
“Trump’s presidential campaign claims the Pennsylvania 2020 elections were unfair,” she wrote. “But as lawyer Rudolph Giuliani pointed out, the campaign does not advocate fraud.”
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