‘It’s not over’ – Trump clings on with Electoral College poised to seal Biden win

 

US President Donald Trump is not abandoning his hopes that he can remain president, even as the Electoral College that is expected to cast more than 300 ballots for president-elect Joe Biden meets on Monday to vote.

“No, it’s not over. We keep going. And we’re going to continue to go forward,” Mr Trump said of his campaign’s challenges to the results in an interview with Fox News.

On Friday the Supreme Court roundly rejected a lawsuit from Texas GOP Attorney General Ken Paxton which called for throwing out the election results in the four decisive swing states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Georgia, and Michigan — all of which broke for Democratic president-elect Joe Biden.

Republican lawmakers have either fallen in line behind the president or remained circumspect about his bluster.

On Sunday, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise said that he wouldn’t acknowledge Mr Biden as the president-elect even after the Electoral College’s expected vote for the Democrat on Monday.

In the president’s Sunday interview with Fox News, he resumed his criticism of Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp for refusing to overturn the Georgia election results, which would have disenfranchised millions of people in the Peach State who delivered a victory for Mr Biden at the ballot box.

“We have a governor, Republican governor, that’s worse than a Democrat,” Mr Trump said, claiming that it’s Mr Kemp’s actions that’s jeopardizing the campaigns of GOP Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue.

“He’s terrible, and he’s hurting Kelly and David very badly, the senators that are terrific people,” Mr Trump said of the senators who are in runoff races set for 5 January.

As the formalities of solemnising the 2020 presidential election drag on with the electoral vote on Monday and Congress’ certification of that vote slated for 6 January, Mr Trump lamented that time is running out.

“We’re going to speed it up as much as we can. But you can only go so fast. They give us very little time,” he said.

After most judges have dismissed Republican legal challenges to the election because the plaintiffs either haven’t had standing or because their evidence was sparse or nonexistent, Trump claimed that if only judges would agree to hear his campaign’s cases, then they would rule in his favour.

“But no judge has had the courage [to let the cases be heard], including the Supreme Court. I am so disappointed in them,” Mr Trump said.‘