
President Donald J. Trump in the Rose Garden of the White House. (Official White House photo by Shealah Craighead)
With lawsuits already underway in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Georgia, the Trump campaign on Thursday morning announced two lawsuits in Nevada to stop the counting of what it calls "illegal votes."
Claiming to have evidence of dead voters and non-resident ballots, Trump campaign adviser Matt Schlapp emphasized the importance of Nevada's six electoral votes, with both the president and Democratic nominee Joe Biden having a path to 270 votes.
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"The presidency literally hangs in the balance," he said.
"What we want to be able to do is to make sure that the counting that occurred and the results that happened can be respected by every American voter across this land and truly across the world," said Schlapp.
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Both Republicans and Democrats need to be allowed to monitor the vote-counting, he said, "so that there is transparency."
Laxalt told Fox News' Tucker Carlson Wednesday night that there is "no question that Donald Trump would have won Nevada last night convincingly if we did not move to mail-in ballots."
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Meanwhile, the Trump campaign announced Wednesday it filed a lawsuit in Michigan to gain "meaningful access" to ballot counts and is filing for a recount in Wisconsin. A lawsuit was filed Wednesday night to temporarily halt the ballot counting in Georgia. And in Pennsylvania on Wednesday, President Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani explained why the campaign is suing to stop ballot counting in the state, where Trump holds a shrinking lead. The campaign also is intervening in an appeal before the Supreme Court to invalidate a decision to count mail-in ballots received by Friday.
Among many reports of alleged fraud, the Trump campaign points to allegations of vote dumps early Wednesday morning in Michigan and Wisconsin of more than 100,000 ballots in which the votes were 100% for Biden. Pollster Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight, who had predicted Biden had a 90% chance of becoming president, reported a dump of 23,277 votes in Philadelphia were "all for Biden."
On Thursday, an appellate court in Pennsylvania ruled Republican poll watchers can monitor ballot counts from six feet away after being pushed away as far as 100 feet.
"The media and the insiders in the city, they’ve been trying to count Donald Trump out for years," Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien told reporters on a call. "Donald Trump is alive and well."
"We will win Pennsylvania. I have as much confidence today as I had yesterday. We also won a major victory in Pennsylvania this morning that helps ensure the transparency and openness that Pennsylvania deserves is held true," he said.
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But after the order, Republican monitors were barred from entering the Philadelphia vote-counting center.
Jack Posobiec posted video of the confrontation:
BREAKING: Republican observers barred from entering Philly vote counting center even after receiving court order pic.twitter.com/9b6WIr7h4M
— Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) November 5, 2020
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In Georgia on Thursday morning, a judge threw out a Trump lawsuit seeking to stop ballot counting that alleged Republican poll watchers witnessed a woman mixing 53 absentee ballots that arrived to Chatham County after Election Day with ballots that arrived on Election Day. Thursday morning the Georgia secretary of state announced 50,000 ballots were still to be counted after previously indicating there were only 25,000 left. With 99% of the vote counted, Trump held a lead of just 0.27%.
Biden campaign lawyer Bob Bauer said Thursday the Trump lawsuits are part of a "broader misinformation campaign," and the claims are "meritless" and "silly."
Trump camp confident it will win Nevada
In Las Vegas on Thursday morning, Schlapp was joined by Director of National Intelligence Ric Grenell, former Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt and Nevada GOP Chair Michael McDonald.
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The Trump campaign, alleging "tens of thousands" of people who no longer are Nevada residents have voted, says it seeks not to stop the vote but to ensure that every legal vote is counted and not illegal votes are tallied.
Grenell said he's confident that when all legal votes are counted, Trump will win Nevada's six electoral votes.
See the Las Vegas press conference:
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Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske on Wednesday urged the public to be patient, saying the ballot count was "proceeding at the expected pace."
In a release of votes Thursday, Biden increased his lead from a little less than 8,000 votes to 11,438. Most of the votes yet to be counted come from Clark County, where Biden has an edge.
Later Thursday, the Clark County voter registrar, Joe Gloria, said at a news conference that he's unaware of allegations of vote fraud but would address any reports after the counting is completed. He said 51,000 ballots will be reported Friday, and the majority will be counted by Sunday. But he said others will be counted next week.
'Trying to steal the election'
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The Trump campaign's view of what happened Tuesday night was summarized by John Daniel Davidson, political editor of The Federalist.
"As of this writing, it appears that Democratic Party machines in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania are trying to steal the election," he said.
He noted that as "reporters and commentators went to bed early Tuesday morning, all three states were too close to call, but President Trump led former Vice President Joe Biden by comfortable margins — far beyond what had been predicted in the polls."
None of the networks called those states because mail-in ballots remained uncounted, but Trump's position looked good, he said.
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"Then, something strange happened in the dead of the night. In both Michigan and Wisconsin, vote dumps early Wednesday morning showed 100 percent of the votes going for Biden and zero percent — that’s zero, so not even one vote—for Trump," he wrote.
A woman monitoring the ballot counting in Detroit has asserted that at least 130,000 ballots -- all for Joe Biden -- were brought to the center in three vehicles at 4 a.m. Wednesday morning, the Gateway Pundit reported.
The only thing we did on Election Day was tell them how many votes they needed on Election Night. pic.twitter.com/lOG2iV4l2e
— Andy Swan (@AndySwan) November 4, 2020
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Among other evidence of vote fraud in Michigan:
- In Antrim County, Michigan, where Trump beat Hillary Clinton by 30 points in 2016, the initial vote totals showed Biden ahead of Trump by 29 points. Election officials say they are investigating the "skewed" results.
- As ballots were being counted in Traverse City, Michigan, a postal worker alleged he was ordered to backdate late mail-in ballots to make them valid, according to a Project Veritas investigation.
- A poll watcher in Michigan charged ballots were turned in with no names on them.
Ballots have been turned in with no names on them! pic.twitter.com/metDh2ItTz
— Mark Dice (@MarkDice) November 5, 2020
- A Detroit precinct chairman said numerous ineligible ballots were being reported.