Trump's path to victory? The lawsuits

A number of forum Trump supporters are still holding out hope of prevailing in this election based on expectations from a variety of lawsuits filed by Republicans. I was curious as to just how realistic these expectations are, so I did some research on the law suits. The following article gives a summary of them.

Republicans have won just one out of 21 lawsuits they've filed in the wake of Election Day so far

Here's the one case that was won by Republicans:
On Thursday, November 12, a Pennsylvania judge ruled that first-time voters were supposed to confirm their IDs with county boards of election by November 9, rather than November 12. The decision opens the door for disqualifying the votes of people who didn't verify their IDs in time.

It's not clear how many votes will be affected, and those ballots hadn't been counted yet anyway, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, so it seems irrelevant.

What's left:
Of the other 20 lawsuits, Trump and other Republicans have withdrawn from or lost 13 of them, and seven of them are still pending. So it would seem that Trump's "path to victory" entails prevailing in a sufficient number of those 7 pending lawsuits. The are:

Pennsylvania
1. The Trump campaign sued over alleged irregularities in the way ballots were counted throughout the state. They've argued that 14,000 votes should be thrown out. A judge hasn't yet heard the case, but it's hard to see how this will help much, if at all. The court filing cites only two specific instances of potential voter fraud. Both are in counties that voted heavily for President Donald Trump, so this is unlikely to make a difference. If all 14K votes are thrown out, these will clearly not be 100% Biden, so it seems unlikely to make up the 63K difference between Biden and Trump.

2.The campaign sued in yet another federal case to stop Philadelphia County from counting votes without Republicans present. The judge dismissed the case after Trump's lawyers said Republican election watchers were, in fact, present. The Trump campaign then appealed the decision in an attempt to re-count a few thousand ballots. A judge hasn't yet made a decision on the appeal. Since this involves only a few thousand votes, it also seems unlikely to make a difference in the election.

3. A lawsuit in Bucks County filed by Republican congressional candidate Kathy Barnette on Election Day made a technical challenge on the county's method of organizing ballots before counting them. She withdrew the case two days later and lost the election. The Trump campaign appealed that Bucks County case on Monday, and it's still pending. According the the Buck's County Courier-Times, Barnette's lawsuit would have invalidated 93 ballots, so this seems unlikely to make a difference

4. In a state court, Republicans challenged an instruction from the Secretary of State's office regarding provisional ballots, in particular: those that had some sort of problem but for which the voters were invited to fix the problems. A state appellate court judge dismissed the request but ordered the secretary of state to segregate provisional ballots in case their validity becomes contested. There were a total of 93K provisional ballots that were cast. I don't know how many of them had problems, but it's not likely a very high number.

5. The campaign filed a motion to intervene in a Supreme Court case brought by Republicans that centers on the deadline by which Pennsylvania officials are allowed to receive ballots. Pennsylvania's Supreme Court ruled that officials could receive ballots until November 6 as long as they are postmarked by Election Day. Republicans appealed the decision to the high court, which was deadlocked at 4-4 because Justice Amy Coney Barrett did not participate, leaving the lower court's ruling in place. The Supreme Court signaled it could hear the case again but has not yet granted the request to intervene. This seems the most significant case, potentially impacting as many as 10K ballots. If 100% of these ballots were for Biden (which seems unlikely), his lead will drop from 63K to 53K.

Bottom line for Pennsylvania: #1 & #4 seems the best hope for Trump, but best case for them will be cutting into Biden's margin of victory by 10-20K.

Michigan
6. In a federal lawsuit, the Trump campaign alleged a number of irregularities — such as that GOP election observers were told to stand six feet away from ballot counters because of the coronavirus — meant that Michigan should not certify its votes. The lawsuit doesn't make a single specific claim of voter fraud or electoral fraud but says the state's votes shouldn't be certified anyway. A judge hasn't yet heard the case. A win for Trump just means (heavily Democratic) Wayne County would have to recount. Biden won this county by 323K votes. Biden won the state by 146K votes, so a recount could only make a material difference if there was indeed severe fraud taking place. That seems unlikely, since the Biden's performance here was about on par with Clinton's in 2016.

Arizona
7. The Trump campaign filed a lawsuit in state court alleging that Maricopa County was improperly rejecting ballots cast by some voters. The case remains pending. If ruled in Trump's favor, there would be a recount of Maricopa County, which went predominantly for Trump. Recounts rarely make much of a difference, so the only way this helps is if it is true there were some improper rejections - and that this number makes up the 11K difference between Biden and Trump in Arizona.

My assessment: there is no realistic path to victory. Results for neither Michigan nor Pennsylvania are likely to be changed by the lawsuits, and even if they were - Arizona, Nevada, and Georgia still provide sufficient electoral votes for Biden to win.

I'm interested in hearing the perspective of Trump supporters, but please base your comments on analyses into the cases (or other cases I may have overlooked).

 

But ... but ... HILLARY!

 

Update: lawsuit #5 has been thrown out:

Fox News: Live Updates: Pennsylvania court rejects Trump effort to block 9,000 late-arriving absentee ballots.

We're down to 6 pending suits.

Hmmm. I wonder why noTrump supporters replied to this thread.

 

We never thought he had a path, only the left accused us of it.

Nice to see you folks are finally catching up.

 

Is the guy wrote THIS on the left?--

Why does the Fake News Media continuously assume that Joe Biden will ascend to the Presidency, not even allowing our side to show, which we are just getting ready to do, how badly shattered and violated our great Constitution has been in the 2020 Election. It was attacked,..

 

Probably

 

It's a direct quote from Trump's twitter.

 

There ya go then. He lies according to the left.

 

Erin Perrine clarifies Trump's path to 270 in this succinct Fox interview!

 

I didn't say anything about lying. I showed that Trump believes he can win, and there seem to be many on the right that also believe this (gfm7175, for example).The purpose of this thread was to show there are good reasons to reject Trump's claim, and to invite people who agree with Trump to provide objective support. You seem to believe Trump lost, so I applaud your rational view. But look around the forum, and you'll see many Trump supporters who agree with Trump that he can win (some believe he DID win).

 

She is batshit crazy which makes her perfect for the Trump campaign.

 

They are just having fun with you because you folks get so worked up.

 

Trump said publicly he has not even filed his biggest law suits and is about to do so. Keyliegh McEnany also publicly stated Trump was waiting for the right time and Rudy Guiliani said publicly they had enough evidence to overturn the election. Trump said it would be this week alot would come out. Why not give it the week and see what they have?

 

Hmmm, that would be the same Trump who promised Mexico would pay for the wall, he would release his taxes and that he had
a better health care plan ...

Bless your heart.

 

Rudy is making his move:

CNBC: Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani joins Pennsylvania court case

It's interesting that the Trump line has been, "count all the legal votes", and yet Giuliani's mission entails not counting some legally cast votes.

 

Oops. Rudy's case lost in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court:

NBC News: Pennsylvania Supreme Court rejects Trump campaign lawsuit over election observers in Philadelphia.

 

There is a more cynical take that Trump is collecting as much money as he can on the way out.

 

When Trump wanted Mexico to pay for the wall, they got a little 'confused' and put it in the wrong place

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/karlazabludovsky/guatemala-mexico-trump-wall

 

I'm expecting the Trump Tower Moscow project to take off next year.

 

I wonder how much the Trump brand has been helped or hurt by his Presidency.

 

Canadians...

 

Mexico did pay for part of the wall through being taxed as Trump pointed out.

 

48% of the country remain potential customers.

 

I think you're referring to the alleged benefits of NAFTA 2.0. Those benefits do not entail taking in money from Mexico, they entail macroeconomic benefits. Even accepting that there are benefits does not produce a piggy bank that Trump gets to spend any way he likes. It was BS when Trump said it in 2016, and it's still B.S.

 

Yessir. He may not have much appeal overseas, but I think a Trump property here might be quite well attended.