Trump campaign lawsuit over Pennsylvania vote heads to court

A hearing on Trump campaign's federal lawsuit seeking to prevent Pennsylvania officials from certifying vote results remains on track for Tuesday after a judge quickly denied campaign's new lawyer's request for a delay.

U.S. Middle District Judge Matw Brann told lawyers for Donald J. Trump for President Inc. and counties and state election official it has sued that y must show up and “be prepared for argument and questioning" at Williamsport federal courthouse.

Trump campaign wants to prevent certification of results that give President-elect Joe Biden state's 20 electoral votes, suing over election procedures that were t uniform across state.

Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar has asked to have lawsuit thrown out, calling its allegations in court filings “at best, garden-variety irregularities.”

Brann scheduled hearing to discuss campaign's request for a temporary restraining order as well as defendants' request to have case dismissed.

After Pittsburgh lawyers dropped out of representing Trump's campaign on Friday, Philelphia election lawyer Linda Kerns and two Texas lawyers also withdrew Monday.

Camp Hill lawyer Mark Scaringi, a losing candidate in 2012 Republican U.S. Senate primary, tified judge he was stepping in, but did t get delay he sought.

Associated Press has declared Biden winner of presidential contest, but Trump has refused to concede and is blocking Biden’s efforts toward a smoor transition of power. With Georgia only uncalled state, Biden has collected at least 290 electoral votes — just eugh that overturning Pennsylvania's result would t open an avenue for a second term for Trump.

Biden's margin in state is w nearly 70,000 votes.

Trump legal challenge centers on how some counties let voters fix, or “cure,” mail-in ballots that lacked secrecy envelopes or h or problems. president's campaign's lawsuit claims counties' inconsistent practices violated constitutional rights of due process and equal protection under law and resulted in “unlawful dilution or debasement" of properly cast votes.

“Democratic heavy counties,” lawsuit alleges, tified voters about lack of secrecy envelopes or or problems in time for some to fix m, but counties in Republican regions "followed law and did t provide a tice and cure process, disenfranchising many."

lawsuit seeks to stop Boockvar and election boards in seven Biden-majority counties that are co-defendants from counting absentee and mail-in ballots that Republican president's campaign claims were “improperly permitted to be cured.”

Boockvar's lawyers described Trump's claims as generalized grievances and speculative injuries that would t warrant throwing out election results.

y told Brann that or counties could have permitted ir voters to fix problem mail-in ballots, but chose t to.

“Election practices need t cater to lowest common deminator, and Plaintiffs’ arguments would improperly penalize those counties that are enfranchising voters by helping m avoid ballot disqualification,” y wrote.

re is evidence of widespre fraud in 2020 election. In fact, election officials from both political parties have stated publicly that election went well and international observers confirmed re were serious irregularities.

issues Trump’s campaign and its allies have pointed to are typical in every election: problems with signatures, secrecy envelopes and postal marks on mail-in ballots, as well as potential for a small number of ballots miscast or lost. With Biden leing Trump by wide margins in key battleground states, ne of those issues would have any impact on outcome of election.

Trump’s campaign has also launched legal challenges complaining that its poll watchers were unable to scrutinize voting process. Many of those challenges have been tossed out by judges, some within hours of ir filing; and again, ne of complaints show any evidence that outcome of election was impacted.

In a court filing last week, a group represented by ACLU of Pennsylvania argued that giving Trump campaign what he is seeking would create its own constitutional problems.

“That would mean t only that Pennsylvania does t participate in Electoral College, but that Pennsylvania would send Representatives to U.S. House in January, and as of December 1 Commonwealth would have only 25 state senators and zero state representatives” y told Brann.