Eight GOP lawmakers from Kansas and Missouri sign onto effort to overturn election
Six Republican U.S. House members from Missouri and two from Kansas have signed onto a brief in support of a Texas-led lawsuit seeking to overturn the presidential election.
The unprecedented legal action seeks to prevent Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin’s electoral votes from being counted in an effort to subvert the will of the voters in those states, who supported President-elect Joe Biden.
The suit was filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who faces an FBI investigation for alleged bribery. The case has been widely criticized as a political stunt rather than a serious legal challenge.
“From the brief, it looks like a fella begging for a pardon filed a PR stunt rather than a lawsuit— as all of its assertions have already been rejected by federal courts and Texas’ own solicitor general isn’t signing on,” Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse, one of the few GOP lawmakers to acknowledge Biden’s victory, said in a statement Thursday.
But Sasse is in the minority among Republican officeholders in publicly opposing the lawsuit. As Trump continues his refusal to concede, Republicans at both the state and federal level have embraced the case.
Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt and Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt were among 17 Republican attorneys general to sign onto the case Wednesday despite widespread criticism.
The following day, 106 Republican members of the U.S. House signed onto an additional amicus brief in support of the lawsuit, including Senator-elect Roger Marshall, the Republican who currently represents western Kansas in the U.S. House.
Marshall voiced his support for the lawsuit Wednesday on Twitter.
“The Texas Attorney General has appealed to The SCOTUS to consider a lawsuit regarding alleged unlawful voting changes in four battleground states. We should all support ensuring our election was conducted constitutionally and ethically,” Marshall said.
Kansas also had record rates of mail voting, the practice at the center of Texas’ lawsuit against the swing states. However, no Republicans in Kansas have raised any issue with the state’s results after Marshall and other Republicans racked up wins there last month.
In addition to Marshall, GOP Rep. Ron Estes, who represents the Wichita area, signed onto the brief.
Rep. Steve Watkins, a Topeka Republican who lost his re-election bid and who personally faces pending prosecution for allegedly voting illegally in 2019, was alone among the state’s GOP House members in not signing the brief.
Five Missouri Republican lawmakers signed Thursday: Kansas City area Reps. Sam Graves and Vicky Hartzler, St. Louis area Reps. Ann Wagner and Blaine Luetkemeyer and southeastern Missouri Rep. Jason Smith.
Springfield area Rep. Billy Long, a vocal Trump supporter, was not among the 106 signatories on Thursday’s filing. But he was one of 20 additional Republican lawmakers who joined the brief Friday.
Trump’s campaign and other Republicans have lost more than 50 lawsuits seeking to challenge election results in both state and federal courts as judges have shown little patience for the unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud.
The same day that the federal lawmakers filed the amicus brief, 67 GOP members of the Missouri House filed a resolution to investigate voter fraud despite no evidence of illegal voting in those states—nor in Missouri.
The non-binding resolution from Missouri lawmakers will have no power to force other states to act. State Rep. Justin Hill, the Lake St. Louis Republican, called on Congress not to accept the electoral votes from the states if they did not conduct the demanded investigations.
States have already certified their results and will officially cast their electoral votes on December 14. Congress will meet to accept the results on January 6.
While Republican lawmakers could object to accepting the results, it would set off a fruitless procedural battle that would ultimately be blocked by the Democratic-controlled House.
This story has been updated to include Rep. Billy Long, whose name was added to the brief in a Friday filing.
This story was originally published December 10, 2020 at 5:25 PM with the headline "Eight GOP lawmakers from Kansas and Missouri sign onto effort to overturn election."
