President Donald Trump is leaving no stone unturned in a bid to overturn the election results during his final days in office. As part of these efforts, the president asked the Supreme Court to restrict votes from four battleground states that did not vote for him.
Trump's request was part of a filing with the court urging them to involve himself in a lawsuit brought by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a bid to block millions of votes cast in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Georgia. Trump's new attorney, John Eastman pushed a racist conspiracy theory raising questions over the eligibility of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris for the role because her parents were immigrants, CNN reported.
The move also comes shortly after the high court turned down a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to restrict certification of the commonwealth's election results. The one-line order did not include a comment from any of the nine justices.
For several weeks, Trump has been pushing desperate appeals and dubious conspiracy theories about the Democrats stealing the election. The petition noted that America is split in ways that it has not been since the 1860 election and that the opposing sides have a high level of distrust between them.
The petition attributed this distrust to the fact that in the recently concluded election, officials in key swing states did not conduct their state elections in abidance to the state election law. Trump accused the battleground states of using the pandemic as an excuse and suspending the operation of multiple state laws meant to protect the integrity of the ballot.
The president is urging the court to restrict the states from using constitutionally infirm 2020 election results before the legislatures of the states evaluate the election results. He argued that the legislatures have the authority to select a new set of electors if any of the aforesaid states have already appointed electors to the Electoral College based on the election results.
Trump has been calling up for support from fellow Republicans in Washington, garnering mixed reactions. Louisiana's Mike Johnson, who is a supporter of Trump, emailed every House Republican asking for signatures for an amicus brief in the Texas lawsuit. In his email, Johnson noted that Trump is restlessly waiting to see who signs on the amicus brief.
One House Republican was put off by the email sent by Johnson, arguing that they are becoming a party of list-making. Attorney George Conway called the Texas lawsuit the most insane thing yet, adding that there was no merit to it.