It’s the latest Hail Mary.
Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) is leading an inevitably doomed lawsuit against Vice President Mike Pence — who will preside over Congress’ tallying of the Electoral College’s votes on January 6 — that seeks to hijack the final step in formalizing President-elect Joe Biden’s victory.
Gohmert, joined by Arizona’s 11 GOP state electors, filed the suit on Sunday requesting that Judge Jeremy Kernodle, a Trump appointee who presides over the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, give Pence the power to magically replace President-elect Joe Biden’s electors in swing states with pro-Trump ones when Congress officially counts the Electoral College’s votes and cements the election results on January 6.
Election law expert Rick Hasen kept it blunt: “No, this won’t work.”
Pence’s office did not respond to TPM’s request for comment.
Though Gohmert’s absurd ploy won’t go anywhere, it illustrates how Trumpworld is putting the squeeze on Pence to help Trump steal the race, however preposterous those efforts may be.
The vice president, put in the decidedly uncomfortable position of overseeing the count as Trump falsely claims those votes to be illegitimate, reportedly has tentative plans to make himself scarce right afterward: A trip to Bahrain, Israel and Poland that begins on the very day of the joint session, according to Politico.
Read the lawsuit below:
In the end, it’s all just a bunch of kernodling.
Faithfully executing constitutional duties equals being put in a “decidedly uncomfortable position.” – Today’s Neo-fascist Republican Party in a nutshell.
It’s worthy of snark, but it is terrifyingly dangerous and further exposes the American Republican Party to worldwide scrutiny–and labeling by some–as a organization working to remove the right of American citizens to choose their leaders.
“Cartoonish gambit” pretty well describes everything Gohmert does.