In Georgia, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney has now rejected a lawsuit from former Georgia Republican Senator David Perdue that challenged the outcome of the 2020 presidential election on the basis of long-debunked claims of fraud. Perdue, who is running with Trump’s support against Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp, has established himself as a firm supporter of this bonkers nonsense.
Perdue filed the case late last year with an individual Georgia voter as an apparent co-plaintiff. The case claimed that Fulton County election workers “circumvented the majority vote of the people of the State of Georgia and thereby affected the outcome of the statewide general election on Nov. 3, 2020, in several races.”
There’s never been any real-world evidence in support of this idea. Specifically, the case also alleged that absentee ballots were tabulated multiple times and that fraudulent ballots were included in tabulations. Perdue also sought the completion of a so-called “forensic inspection” of absentee ballots cast in the 2020 elections — and McBurney shot down all of this. The judge said what Perdue presented merely constituted “speculation, conjecture and paranoia — sufficient fodder for talk shows, op-ed pieces and social media platforms, but far short of what would legally justify a court taking such action.”
There have been numerous pieces of litigation filed challenging the outcome of the 2020 presidential election on the basis of fraud claims — and not once has a court accepted the idea that Biden’s victory was the result of sweeping electoral misconduct. There’s more to this issue than the mere ridiculousness of it, however — if people like Perdue were to obtain power in key positions ahead of the 2024 presidential election, then they could be in a place to obstruct the electoral process. What if Trump runs again — and loses again? If he has people like Perdue in power in Georgia and Kari Lake as governor of Arizona, then he could feasibly count on these extremists to refuse to go along with the certification of the election outcome. In Arizona, Lake — who, like Perdue, is running in the Republican primary for governor — recently helped bring a lawsuit hoping to halt machine tabulation of votes in the state of Arizona, which is just ridiculous. There’s no real-world evidence of systematic integrity problems with vote tabulation equipment.
.@BrianKempGA and @DavidPerdueGA want to ban abortion — they stand against a vast, bipartisan majority of Georgians support Roe v. Wade.
We will defeat whomever is on the ballot in November and fight to protect reproductive rights in Georgia.
— Georgia Democrats (@GeorgiaDemocrat) May 4, 2022
Predictably, Perdue said he’d appeal McBurney’s ruling. Polling has him far behind (meaning almost 38 percentage points behind) Kemp — if Kemp finishes above 50 percent, the race is over; if he doesn’t, the top two finishers (presumably meaning him and Perdue) will face off in a subsequent run-off election featuring just the two of them. In a rare break with the former president, former VP Mike Pence recently rolled out support for Kemp’s re-election bid.
The former vice president will headline a get-out-the-vote rally for Kemp on May 23, putting him in direct conflict with Trump-endorsed candidate David Perdue. https://t.co/w1LaLJ0aH0
— HuffPost Politics (@HuffPostPol) May 13, 2022
