A federal lawsuit filed Thursday sought to invalidate the votes cast by Ingham, Washtenaw and Wayne county voters in the presidential contest. It was withdrawn Monday.
On Monday, four Michigan voters voluntarily withdrew their lawsuit against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and state and local election officials asking the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan to exclude the votes cast by Ingham, Washtenaw and Wayne County voters from the statewide presidential results. A hearing on the case was never held. The federal lawsuit, filed Nov.11, was backed by True the Vote, a nonprofit with Tea Party roots that says it fights voter fraud. James Bopp Jr., the Indiana attorney behind the lawsuit, did not offer an explanation for the withdrawal. “Sorry because of atty. client privilege and because I do not telegraph my next moves, I cannot comment,” he wrote in an email to the Free Press. The lawsuit asked the court to stop the certification of Michigan’s presidential electors if these three counties’ votes were not excluded from the final tally for the presidential election. The state’s unofficial results show Democratic president-elect Joe Biden defeated President Donald Trump in Michigan by a margin of over 146,000 votes. Trump has refused to concede the election to Biden. Although the lawsuit sought to toss out the votes cast in the presidential contest in these three counties, the suit only contained one specific allegation related to Washtenaw County — that the number of registered voters exceeded the number of eligible voting-age citizens in the county — and none related to Ingham County. More: Pro-Trump forces spin legal wheels in challenging Michigan election results More: Trump lawsuit affidavits allege Michigan election misconduct, don’t show widespread fraud The lawsuit argued that if invalid ballots were counted, it would dilute the ballots cast by eligible voters. “If Defendants certify presidential-election results from counties where sufficient illegal ballots were included in the results to change or place in doubt the Nov.
