The Supreme Court issued the latest rejection of an election fraud challenge in under 10 words, denying three cases filed by pro-Trump attorney Sidney Powell and others Monday morning.
The succinct dismissal of the three “release the Kraken” cases marks only the latest blow to former President Donald Trump’s legal efforts to overturn President Joe Biden’s November election victory. Powell and other Trump-aligned attorneys pleaded with the nation’s highest court for “extraordinary” speed in addressing their petitions. They described the cases against Arizona and Wisconsin’s election results as being of the highest “public importance.”
But the Supreme Court’s brevity in responding clearly illustrated that the justices did not agree with the importance of Powell’s filing: “The petitions for writs of mandamus are denied,” the court announced Monday.
The Supreme Court’s denial for an “extraordinary writ of mandamus,” which would have forced lower courts to take immediate action on the cases, did not address any of the four questions posed by Powell, a former federal prosecutor. Instead, the court’s casual rejection of the petitions comes as only the latest of dozens of legal challenges Trump-aligned attorneys had hoped would be seen favorably by the high court.
Last week, the Supreme Court declined a stay in the case of Trump v. Vance, allowing the Manhattan District Attorney’s office to finally get a hold of the former president’s tax records. In the weeks after the November election, Powell was officially removed from the Trump legal team after several states rejected its voter fraud challenges.
Each of the four questions asked by Powell and fellow counsel in their petition to the Supreme Court appeared to make assumptions about voting fraud having occurred in the November presidential election.
“A. Whether presidential electors have standing to challenge the outcome of a presidential election for fraud and illegality that cause the defeat of their candidate?” read one of the unanswered questions submitted by Powell.
An independent forensic audit of the Arizona election results, a process led by state GOP chairwoman Kelli Ward and the Republican-controlled state legislature, found “no evidence of vote switching” in Maricopa County. Dominion Voting Systems, an electronic voting hardware and software company, had been baselessly accused by Trump-aligned lawyers of skewing the results in Biden’s favor.
An ethics complaint filed with the D.C. bar last week seeks to punish several attorneys behind the “boldly frivolous” election lawsuit between Texas GOP Congressman Louie Gohmert and former Vice President Mike Pence. The case aimed to allow Pence to simply not count Biden’s winning vote totals in order to keep Trump in the White House. The complaint seeks to potentially disbar the pro-Trump attorneys for filing frivolous lawsuits, a violation of ethics rules.
Powell’s ongoing attempts to overturn the presidential election results have resulted in legal complaints being directed right back at her. Dominion included Powell as a defendant in a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit filed last month. MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell and Trump personal attorney Rudy Giuliani are also named defendants.