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On Tuesday, Texas Republican state officials sued Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Michigan in the US Supreme Court. The move came in a long-shot bid to challenge the victory of President-elect Joe Biden. It is part of an effort, election experts derided as nearly certain to fail and marking the latest in a deluge of far-fetched lawsuits GOP interests have filed to overturn the election results. The Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton is leading the lawsuit and alleged the battleground states acted unconstitutionally by changing their voting rules to expand access during the Covid-19 pandemic. Paxton also alleged that changing the voting rules opened the door to election irregularities in various forms. He claimed about voter fraud and impropriety in the election process that has been repeatedly struck down by other courts as not being supported by evidence.

Texas is looking to ask the Supreme Court to say the states’ election results are unconstitutional and can’t be counted, and order a special election to appoint presidential electors, for state legislatures to appoint them instead, or to just not have the states appoint any presidential electors at all. The lawsuit was brought directly to the US Supreme Court because the high court has jurisdiction to hear challenges between states, instead of going through lower courts first. There were many legal experts responding to news of filing the lawsuit by mocking it as ‘insane’ and a new leader in the craziest lawsuit filed to challenge the election category. The election law expert Rick Hasen described the suit as utter garbage and a press release masquerading as a lawsuit.

It is noteworthy that the legal challenge is likely to fail because it brought the legal challenge too late. The Supreme Court may find Texas does not have the standing to sue or there is no evidence to support that the state elections were unconstitutional. The states named in the lawsuit have blasted Paxton’s claims. The Georgia Attorney General’s Office issued a statement and said, “With all due respect, the Texas Attorney General is constitutionally, legally and factually wrong about Georgia”. The Attorney General of Michigan, Dana Nessel described the lawsuit as a publicity stunt and not a serious legal pleading. He said, “The erosion of confidence in our democratic system isn’t attributable to the good people of Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, or Pennsylvania but rather to partisan officials, like Mr. Paxton, who place loyalty to a person over loyalty to their country”.