BY CORIE LYNN
More than two weeks have passed since the Nov. 3 Presidential Election, but the results have yet to leave the newscycle.
The election itself was a close one, with President-elect Joe Biden winning 51% of the popular vote and 306 electoral votes compared to President Donald Trump’s 47.2% and 232.
The post-election news coverage, however, does not end with these tight numbers. Instead, it centers on the response of Trump’s campaign and the Republican party, both of which have filed numerous lawsuits in battleground states like Arizona and Pennsylvania.
With the results seemingly sealed for Biden, why pursue legal action against the states?
According to Chair of the FHSU Political Science Department Dr. Larry Gould, Trump wants to use the lawsuits to steal back the election.
“[I]f the legal campaign could swing three of these critical states for Trump,” Gould said, “it could shift the electoral college victory to Trump.”
In USA Today’s guide to Trumps election lawsuits, the suits are shown to have been filed for claims varying from rejected in-person votes in Georgia to recounts in Wisconsin.
Most have been dismissed, but Trump is not the first candidate to try to win back an election through lawsuits.
“In the past, the primary request has been for recounts, although all of them have not changed more than 300-500 votes. Biden leads by thousands in all of the contested states,” Gould said.
The lengths, however, that Trump’s campaign is willing to go through to change the outcome of the election are atypical.
Even with two of the suits upheld and a handful still pending, change could only come from the electoral college.
Gould explained that, rather than altering the course of the election, the lawsuits are annoyances and a way for Trump to convince his supporters that fraud prevented his election. They have little impact on the election process itself.
“The only thing that will matter,” he said, “is if the Republican legislatures in these states select ‘faithless electors’ in the electoral college who would not follow the electoral vote majorities for Joe Biden and are willing to cast their college ballots for Donald Trump on December 14 when the Electoral College meets.”
With this in mind, the election lawsuits are more about slowing the transition, from one president to the next.
Besides the suits, Trump has also invited Michigan certification agents to the White House to win their sway, a strategy Gould describes as legal though ethically questionable.
“Doing this when thousands of Americans are dying from COVID-19 each day lays open the current president to charges of neglect, irresponsibility and historical judgement that could damage his legacy,” he said.
Practically speaking, the lawsuits from the Trump campaign and the Republican party will have little effect on the final outcome of the election. Similar methods have been tried before with no results.
The goal, then, of these lawsuits is to send a message.
While he does hope to sway the final voter tally, Trump is using the lawsuits to tell supporters and opponents alike that he sees the election as having been stolen from him and that he is willing to go great lengths to prove that he was wronged on Nov. 3.