Federal Judge Halts Trump Lawsuit Challenge To PA Mail Balloting And Dropboxes.
Reuters reported tonight that Judge Nicholas Ranjan “ordered a stay in President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign’s lawsuit seeking to ban drop boxes and other changes to Pennsylvania’s mail-balloting procedures.”
The Trump Campaign had filed a lawsuit against Pennsylvnania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar. The suit also named all 67 of the state’s county election boards as defendants.
The Trump Lawsuit seeks to ban the use of drop-boxes such as this one, which was set up for last spring’s primary, in the parking lot next to Township Administration Building in Ardmore.
Electionlawblog.org offered this analysis of Judge Ranjan’s ruling. “The judge found that many of the constitutional claims in the case depended upon interpretation of state law, and that the state law issues in the case were contested and being resolved now in state court proceedings. It is thus possible, after the cases are heard by state court and the rules clearly determined, that the Trump Campaign could seek to return to federal court to pursue federal constitutional claims. (It is also possible that the campaign will appeal this ruling and seek to get the abstention ruling reversed.)
There’s one interesting procedural aspect of the case. The court notes that if the Trump Campaign had sought a preliminary injunction, the court likely would have had to rule (and tentatively interpret the state law questions) before deciding on abstention. But the campaign did not seek this preliminary relief, thereby letting the court abstain. Seems like a potential blunder by the Trump lawyers in not seeking a preliminary injunction.”
Click here to see full ruling
On Friday (August 21), Goerie.com wrote, “Trump campaign attorneys submitted a 524-page discovery document containing emails, Right-to-Know requests to Pennsylvania counties, criminal court filings and news articles. However, in a supplemental response the attorneys said the campaign did not have to provide evidence of fraud to prove its case and they objected to the request for evidence because it ‘misstates the allegations’ in their suit.
‘Neither the original Complaint nor the Amended Complaint contains an allegation that ‘ballot harvesting,’ ‘manipulating and destroying ballots,’ double voting, and/or voter fraud from mail-in and absentee ballots actually occurred during the Primary Election,’ the campaign’s attorneys wrote.
‘Instead, the Complaint and the Amended Complaint both allege that Defendants’ hazardous, hurried, and illegal implementation of unmonitored mail-in voting … provides fraudsters an easy opportunity to engage in ballot harvesting, manipulate or destroy ballots, manufacture duplicitous votes, and sow chaos,’ they said.”