In an unprecedented move, President Donald Trump has stated that his campaign will ask the Supreme Court to bring an early halt to vote-counting while the results of the US presidential election are still being determined.
Trump made the announcement at the White House during a 2:12am post-Election-Day speech, where he declared victory over Democratic challenger Joe Biden despite several key states having not yet called for either candidate.
The president accused the Democratic Party of “fraud” as justification for the move. “This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country. We were getting ready to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election. So our goal now is to ensure the integrity – for the good of this nation, this is a very big moment – this is a major fraud on our nation.”
“We want the law to be used in a proper manner, so we’ll be going to the US Supreme Court,” Trump continued. “We want all voting to stop. We don’t want them to find any ballots at four o’clock in the morning and add them to the list. Okay? It’s a very sad moment.”
The statement appeared to throw doubt on the legitimacy of mail-in ballots, which Trump and other Republicans have repeatedly decried during the run-up to the election.
The Biden campaign quickly hit back against Trump’s statement, with campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon calling the move “outrageous, unprecedented, and incorrect”.
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“Nearly 100 million people cast their ballot before Election Day in the belief — and with the assurances from their state election officials — that their ballot would be counted,” Dillon said. “Now Donald Trump is trying to invalidate the ballot of every voter who relied on these assurances.”
The Biden campaign added that they have legal teams standing by to resist any attempt by Trump to act on his statement and take a case to the Supreme Court.
Should the Court be asked to intervene, the decision would be put to a 6-3 conservative majority of justices – three of whom Trump himself has appointed to the bench.
