Some legal efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential may not actually be independent efforts, according to a new report by The Washington Post.
"A conservative legal organization that has filed lawsuits challenging the election results in five states has a tie to President Trump’s legal team, raising questions about the independence of what has appeared to be an endeavor separate from the president’s last-gasp legal maneuvering," correspondents Jon Swaine, Rosalind S. Helderman, Josh Dawsey and Tom Hamburger report.
"Senior Trump campaign legal adviser Jenna Ellis serves as special counsel to the Thomas More Society, which has filed lawsuits through the newly formed Amistad Project alleging problems with the vote in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin," the newspaper reported. "The Thomas More Society confirmed her relationship to the group but said she is playing no role in its election-related activities. However, her affiliation with the organization — as well as other links between Trump’s team and the conservative group — suggest a coordinated effort to flood the nation’s courts with repetitive litigation that allows the president to claim the election results remain contested."
The group spent the summer trying to prevent increased spending on elections during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"The first glimpse of the Amistad Project came late this summer, when the new legal outfit popped up in courts across the country, trying to stop county election officials from taking grants to bolster their operations amid the pandemic," the newspaper reported. "Last month, the Amistad Project announced in a news release that the Trump campaign would join the group on 'a case-by-case basis' in challenging election results across the country. The statement, which has since been taken offline, quoted Trump’s personal attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani calling Amistad 'our partner in the fight to ensure the integrity of our elections.'”
"The Amistad Project has uncovered an organized effort involving multiple private organizations and partners working with government officials to design, fund, and implement an improper and illegal scheme to create an unconstitutional two-tiered election system to deliver the presidency to Joseph R. Biden," Giuliani said in November, as was reported by Sinclair Broadcasting at the time.
"The group’s tactics have [complimented] the president’s own legal and public relations strategy, and its work has been promoted by both Trump and his influential allies in the conservative media," The Post explained. "The small group of lawyers helping to drive the Amistad effort include a former Kansas attorney general barred from practicing law due to professional misconduct, and a Minnesota attorney who has advocated policies such as restricting the number of Americans who are not Christian or Jewish."
Read the full report.