TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody has joined nine other Republican state attorneys general in challenging the results of the presidential election.
The coalition of Republican attorneys general on Monday filed an amicus brief that urges the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the dispute.
At issue is a September ruling by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court that allowed the state to count mail-in ballots received up to three days after the Nov. 3 general election. The U.S. Supreme Court justices were split on the issue in a 4-4 decision last month, an outcome that upheld the state high court's ruling.
The amicus brief states that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's decision "overstepped its constitutional responsibility" by violating a federal law that sets Election Day as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.
"Worse still, the decision exacerbated the risk of mail-in ballot fraud by permitting mail-in ballots that are not postmarked or have no legible postmark to be received and counted several days after the election," Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt wrote. "The decision provided a window of time after Election Day, when the preliminary results were announced, in which unscrupulous actors could attempt to influence a close presidential election in Pennsylvania and elsewhere. And it enhanced the opportunities for fraud by requiring boards of elections to count late-received ballots even if there is no evidence that those ballots were cast before Election Day, because they have no legible postmark."
Joining Schmitt and Moody are the attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas.
Although Democratic presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden is the projected winner of the election, President Donald Trump has not conceded, instead questioning the validity of the results and vowing to continue the fight in the courts.
