(The Center Square) – The latest election lawsuit in Wisconsin is not coming from either President Donald Trump or presumptive President-elect Joe Biden.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Tuesday sued Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia over how each state handled last month’s election. Specifically, Paxton is accusing the states of using the coronavirus to get around election laws.
“The four states exploited the COVID-19 pandemic to justify ignoring federal and state election laws and unlawfully enacting last-minute changes, thus skewing the results of the 2020 General Election,” Paxton said in a statement. “The battleground states flooded their people with unlawful ballot applications and ballots while ignoring statutory requirements as to how they were received, evaluated and counted.”
Paxton wants the legislature in each of the four states to name their own electors, and ignore the results of the election.
“Elections for federal office must comport with federal constitutional standards. For presidential elections, each state must appoint its electors to the electoral college in a manner that complies with the Constitution. The Electors Clause requirement that only state legislatures may set the rules governing the appointment of electors and elections and cannot be delegated to local officials. The majority of the rushed decisions, made by local officials, were not approved by the state legislatures, thereby circumventing the Constitution,” Paxton explained.
Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul immediately dismissed the idea.
“I feel sorry for Texans that their tax dollars are being wasted on such a genuinely embarrassing lawsuit. Texas is as likely to change the outcome of the Ice Bowl as it is to overturn the will of Wisconsin voters in the 2020 presidential election,” Kaul said on Twitter Tuesday. “As we are in various other meritless cases challenging the results of the election, the Wisconsin Department of Justice will defend against this attack on our democracy.”
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel called the lawsuit a “publicity stunt” in a statement released Tuesday morning.
“The motion filed by the Texas Attorney General is a publicity stunt, not a serious legal pleading,” she said.
“The erosion of confidence in our democratic system isn’t attributable to the good people of Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia or Pennsylvania but rather to partisan officials, like Mr. Paxton, who place loyalty to a person over loyalty to their country,” Nessel continued. “The Michigan issues raised in this complaint have already been thoroughly litigated and roundly rejected in both state and federal courts – by judges appointed from both political parties. Mr. Paxton’s actions are beneath the dignity of the office of Attorney General and the people of the great state of Texas.”
After Michigan and Wisconsin certified vote totals, Joe Biden was declared the winner in both states.
By Benjamin Yount | The Center Square
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Reposted with permission
