WASHINGTON (CN) — Maybe looking for a Christmas miracle, President Donald Trump petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on another of his unsuccessful challenges to his 2020 election loss, this one focused on the law governing mail-in Pennsylvania ballots.
The high court — which only agrees to hear about 1% of the 10,000-plus cases it receives annually — is unlikely to entertain the petition. Just 10 days ago, the court thumb its noses at a Texas-led challenge that sought the extraordinary relief of throwing out the election outcome in four states Trump lost to President-elect Joe Biden: Pennsylvania as well as Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia.
By itself, the invalidation of Biden’s victory in the Keystone State would not give Trump a second term. Awarding all 20 of Pennsylvania’s Electoral College votes to Trump would still only give him 252, and the total need for victory is 270.
Trump’s attorneys nevertheless see a path to victory.
“In my view, if the court agrees with us and invalidates the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decisions, the rationale of the court as it interprets Article II of the Constitution, could in fact have nationwide impact,” Bruce Marks, an attorney for Trump with the firm Marks & Sokolov in Philadelphia, said in an interview Monday. “However, I can’t take that and apply it to any other state because I’m personally not familiar with the issues and the status of litigation in Wisconsin or Georgia or Nevada or any of the other states.”
Marks was a member of the Pennsylvania Senate for several months in 1994, winning a special election after a federal judge ruled that his opponent, William Stinson, engaged in voter fraud. A 2017 article from the Philadelphia-based Spirit News noted that Trump attended a 1994 fundraiser for Marks and that the Russian-speaking Marks has a law office in Moscow.
On Monday, Marks said he is only focused on issues involving the unconstitutional laws of the election in Pennsylvania.
While his office did not return a request for comment Monday, but Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro tweeted on Sunday the challenge was “another doomed attempt” to change nationwide election results.
Complete with hundreds of pages of exhibits, Trump’s latest court filing says the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was wrong to extend the time mail-in ballots could be received by and not further verify voters’ signatures on those ballots.
The campaign also will challenge rulings by that court that allowed for the alteration of state election laws before November 4, set parameters for canvassing observers to watch ballots be processed, and disregard address and date requirements for mail-in ballots.
Urging the court to appoint new electors who would stamp the state as Republican — more than a month after Biden was declared his home state’s victor by more than 70,000 votes — the campaign alleges violations of the Due Process clause of the Second Amendment.
“This case presents in stark relief several of the violations that occurred in Pennsylvania,” the petition states. “Together, those violations alone affected more ballots than the current margin of difference between the two principal candidates for President in Pennsylvania.”
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