Pennsylvania Judge Orders Halt on Election Result Certification Amid Mail-In Vote Fight
President Donald Trump's legal fight over the Nov. 3 election has scored a win on Wednesday following a Pennsylvania judge's decision.
A Pennsylvania appeals court judge on Wednesday sided with Republicans, contradicting the state's election results.
The judge has ordered state officials to stop taking any further steps toward certifying the state's election results. The court's decision has kept the Trump campaign's allegations of widespread mishandling of ballots alive.
Trump's campaign team has claimed that ballots' mishandling has affected the election results in some states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Arizona.
Republican lawmakers, on the other hand, held a hearing on accusations of widespread voter fraud and other irregularities in the vote-counting.
Related story : Trump Campaign Sues Pennsylvania to Halt State Officials From Certifying Biden's Win
Rudolph W. Giuliani, the lead lawyer for the Trump campaign legal team, said that all they ask is that people will listen to facts that they are presenting and evaluate them. Giuliani added that they do not want to disenfranchise anyone.
Commonwealth Court Judge Patricia McCullough, Republican, had issued the order and set a hearing for Friday. However, she canceled it amid the appeal.
Republican Rep. Mike Kelly led the filing of a lawsuit on Saturday to challenge about 2.5 million mail-in ballots predominantly cast by Democrats.
Kelly said the GOP-controlled state legislature had failed to follow proper procedure when they voted last year to extend mail-in voting.
Earlier this month, another Pennsylvania judge has favored the Trump campaign team and ordered the state not to count some mail-in ballots that were missing proof of identification as well as cured ballots during an extended deadline, as reported by Forbes.
However, this ruling was said not to change the current vote counts, adding that this will not affect Democratic nominee Joe Biden's lead.
The Trump campaign and Republican National Committee filed a lawsuit last week challenging the state's secretary Kathy Boockvar's decision to extend the deadline for voters to provide proof of identification if it was initially missing from their mail-in ballots.
The deadline was extended from Nov. 9 to Nov. 12, according to a Forbes report.
In a ruling, Judge Mary Hannah Leavitt said that Boockvar does not have statutory authority to change the deadline. Leavitt added that election officials are enjoined from counting any ballots cured during the extended deadline.
But since the ballots had been already segregated, they were not included in the state's vote count. As a result, not counting these votes will not affect Biden's win in Pennsylvania.
Biden leads over Trump was at 53,580 votes in Pennsylvania.
The Pennsylvania lawsuit is one of the biggest among the number of charges the Trump campaign filed in battleground states. Trump also filed lawsuits in Michigan, Arizona, and Georgia.
Trump's election lawsuits triggered a series of death threats against election officials in some key swing states, as reported by the Business Insider.
The voting system implementation manager for Georgia's Secretary of State, Gabriel Sterling, said he experienced multiple attempted attacks on his emails. Sterling added that police protection had been provided around his home.
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