The dam continues breaking against President Trump.
Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) implored Trump to stop stonewalling President-elect Joe Biden’s formal transition process in an op-ed published Monday. Portman is one of the few Hill Republicans who have recently come around to accepting the reality that Trump’s presidency will end in January, following the sitting president’s unsuccessful legal attempts at delegitimizing the election process.
After saying that he supported Trump and his campaign’s right to legal action, Portman noted that the sitting president’s lawsuits for the past three weeks have been “resolved” in their failure to prove Trump’s bogus allegations of widespread voter fraud. Portman predicted that the same scenario will happen with the remaining Trump campaign’s lawsuits in the next couple of weeks.
“There were instances of fraud and irregularities in this election, as there have been in every election,” Portman said. “It is good that those have been exposed and any fraud or other wrongdoing should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, but there is no evidence as of now of any widespread fraud or irregularities that would change the result in any state.”
Noting that states have completed counting votes and that most battleground states are expected to certify their election results this week, in addition to the completion of some state recounts, Portman signaled that there is virtually no chance of states suddenly handing Trump an election victory.
“Based on all the information currently available, neither the final lawful vote counts nor the recounts have led to a different outcome in any state,” Portman said. “In other words, the initial determination showing Joe Biden with enough electoral votes to win has not changed.”
Portman went on to demand that General Services Administration chief Emily Murphy aid in Biden’s smooth transition by issuing an ascertainment that would allow the President-elect’s team to contact federal agencies and receive funds that an incoming administration is entitled to.
“This is only prudent,” Portman said. “Donald Trump is our president until Jan. 20, 2021, but in the likely event that Joe Biden becomes our next president, it is in the national interest that the transition is seamless and that America is ready on Day One of a new administration for the challenges we face.”
Portman’s op-ed comes a day after Sen. Lisa Murkowski — who was one of the first few Republicans to outright acknowledge that Biden is President-elect — demanded that Trump stop impeding Biden’s formal transition process, following the sitting president’s failed effort to strongarm Michigan GOP lawmakers into swaying the swing state’s election results in his favor.
— Sen. Lisa Murkowski (@lisamurkowski) November 22, 2020
