Trump Suffers Twin Defeats In His Effort To Overturn Biden’s Victory

US President Donald Trump received twin blows to his effort to overturn his defeat on Friday, with Georgia officials certifying President-elect Joe Biden’s slim victory there and Michigan Republicans declaring after a White House meeting that they had learned nothing to warrant reversing the outcome in their state.

“We will follow the law and follow the normal process regarding Michigan’s electors, just as we have said throughout this election,” Michigan Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and Speaker of the House Lee Chatfield said in a joint statement issued late Friday.

The developments came as a blow to Trump after the tumult of Thursday, when the president’s lawyers held a news conference on Capitol Hill in made incendiary and false claims that Biden rigged the election and proclaimed their intent to aggressively challenge the results.
Trump this week made an extraordinarily personal intervention in Michigan, where his lawyers hope to stall the state’s certification of the vote, set to be considered at a meeting Monday, and get the GOP-controlled legislature to appoint pro-Trump electors. Trump trails Biden in Michigan by about 156,000 votes.

But even after a personal invitation to the White House by the president, the state’s top two GOP lawmakers notably did not endorse his baseless claims of widespread fraud in the state and instead said they used the meeting to press Trump for more covid-19 relief funds.
“We have not yet been made aware of any information that would change the outcome of the election in Michigan,” Shirkey and Chatfield said in their joint statement.
“Michigan’s certification process should be a deliberate process free from threats and intimidation,” they added. “Allegations of fraudulent behaviour should be taken seriously, thoroughly investigated, and if proven, prosecuted to the full extent of the law. And the candidates who win the most votes win elections and Michigan’s electoral votes. These are simple truths that should provide confidence in our elections.”