Wisconsin Supreme Court rules against Trump election challenge

The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled against President Trump in his election challenge on Monday.

The state’s highest court said the president’s request to toss out four categories of absentee ballots could not be granted.

“We conclude the Campaign is not entitled to the relief it seeks,” the court ruled.

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The decision was 4-3, with the court’s swing justice, Justice Brian Hagedorn, siding with the court’s liberal justices.

Justice Hagedorn also issued a concurrence, though, noting there were administrative issues with how some of the absentee ballots were submitted, but he did not acknowledge any widespread fraud.

Three of the court’s conservative justices noted in a dissent they would have tossed ballots that were cast out of compliance with state law.

“My conclusion that errors in the certification of absentee ballots require discarding those ballots is consistent with our precedent,” wrote Justice Patience Drake Roggensack. She was joined by Justices Annette Kingsland Ziegler and Rebecca Grassl Bradley.

The move comes after a Wisconsin county circuit court judge on Friday bucked the president’s lawsuit challenging more than 200,000 absentee ballots in the battleground state.

The president’s campaign challenged four sets of absentee ballots.

One classification was the absentee ballots lacking proper applications, while another group was mail-in votes that had missing information from envelopes.

The campaign also challenged absentee ballots that were cast by people identifying as “indefinitely confined,” saying the voters did not qualify for that categorization. Ballots submitted at Democracy in the Park events were also challenged, saying they were not conducted in a manner prescribed by state law.

“The challenge to the indefinitely confined voter ballots is meritless on its face, and the other three categories of ballots challenged fail under the doctrine of laches,” wrote Justice Hagedorn for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

The doctrine of latches prevents claims that were not brought in a timely manner.

“The Campaign’s delay in raising these issues was unreasonable in the extreme, and the resulting prejudice to the election officials, other candidates, voters of the affected counties, and to voters statewide, is obvious and immense,” the opinion read.

The court noted the campaign could have objected to the mail-in ballot applications or absentee ballot events before the election was held.

The ruling came as the Electoral College is set to convene Monday.