A group of state legislators and voters asked the Supreme Court on Thursday for permission to join Texas’s lawsuit challenging 2020 election results in four states.
Meanwhile, a group of Michigan state legislators have also signed on to the brief asking to intervene in the case.
President Donald Trump and his allies have pinned great expectations on the Texas lawsuit, with the president characterizing the case as “the big one.” The court has not indicated whether it would take up the case, even though the justices have original jurisdiction over the dispute. This means that the court has the power to hear the case for the first time as opposed to reviewing a lower court’s decision.
“The Supreme Court has a chance to save our Country from the greatest Election abuse in the history of the United States,” Trump wrote in a Twitter statement on Thursday.
The legislators and voters are not the only people attempting to join the case. Trump and six states with Republican attorney generals—Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Utah—have also asked the top court to allow them to join Texas in the case.
The state of Texas had asked the Supreme Court on Dec. 7 for permission to sue Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin in an attempt to protect the integrity of the 2020 election.
The Lone Star State has accused the four states of changing election rules in violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Electors Clause, unequal treatment of voters, and causing voting irregularities by relaxing ballot-integrity protections under state law, opening up potential for voting fraud.
All four defendant states have filed their response to Texas’s request, opposing the allegations.
Thirty-nine states have revealed which side they stand on in this election saga, with 18 Republican attorney generals filing briefs backing Texas and 20 Democratic attorneys general supporting the defendant states.
Texas is hoping to obtain a declaration from the Supreme Court that the four states conducted their 2020 election in violation of the Constitution. It is also asking the court to prohibit the count of the Electoral College votes cast by the four states. For the defendant states that have already appointed electors, the suit is asking the justices to order state legislatures to appoint new electors according to the U.S. Constitution.
The proposed intervenors in the case are: Michigan state legislators Gary Eisen, John Reilly, Julie Alexander, Matt Maddock, Daire Rendon, Beth Griffin, Douglas Wozniak, Michele Hoitenga, Brad Paquette, Rodney Wakeman, Greg Markkanen, Jack O'Malley, Joe Bellino, Luke Meerman and Brianna Kahle; Pennsylvania state legislators Daryl D. Metcalfe, Mike Puskaric, Chris E. Dush and Thomas R. Sankey III; Wisconsin resident Ronald H. Heuer; Georgia resident John Wood; and Michigan residents Angelic Johnson, Dr. Linda Lee Tarver, and Kristina Karamo.
