Tag: Challenging

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Politics

Supreme Court docket to listen to Mississippi abortion case difficult Roe v. Wade

Supreme Court to hear Mississippi abortion case challenging Roe v. Wade

The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear arguments in a major Mississippi abortion case that pushes the limits of abortion laws set by the landmark reproductive rights case, Roe v. Calf, which were cemented, could reset.

The case will be the first major abortion dispute in which all three people appointed by former President Donald Trump will be considered in the Supreme Court, including the newest member, Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

The Supreme Court announced in an order that it would hear the dispute, Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, 19-1392. The court will hear the case during its term in office from October. A decision is expected to be made in June 2022.

The case concerns a 2018 Mississippi abortion law that bans abortions after 15 weeks with limited exceptions. The law was blocked by the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals. Under the existing Supreme Court precedent, states cannot prohibit abortions that occur before the fetus is viable, typically about 22 weeks or later.

In this case, Mississippi is asking the judges to re-examine that viability standard. The state argued that the viability rule prevents states from adequately defending maternal health and potential life.

“It is long time the court reassessed the wisdom of the profitability rule,” Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch wrote in a brief report filed with the judges.

The Mississippi abortion clinic that challenged the law, the Jackson Women’s Health Organization, called on the Supreme Court not to take the case.

“In an uninterrupted series of decisions over the past fifty years, this court has ruled that the constitution guarantees everyone the right to choose whether to continue a pregnancy before viability,” wrote Hillary Schneller, an attorney who runs the clinic represents, in a file.

Schneller said Mississippi’s argument was based “on a misunderstanding of the core principle” of previous Supreme Court rulings.

She wrote, “While the state has interests throughout pregnancy.”[b]Prior to viability, state interests are not strong enough to support an abortion ban. “

Conservatives passed a number of bills that challenged Roe and were passed in 1973 in hopes of getting the court to reconsider its previous precedents. With the people appointed by Trump, the nation’s Supreme Court now has a Conservative majority of 6-3.

The struggle for abortion revitalized the confirmation hearings for Barrett, a devout Catholic who, after the death of the liberal judiciary, was the favorite among anti-abortion groups to seek the success of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

While Barrett has not made her exact legal views on abortion clear from the bank, the Democrats have taken up her earlier comments identifying aborted fetuses as “unborn victims” among other potential harbingers of their views.

The other two Trump nominees on the bench, Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, voted last June to allow a restrictive abortion law to come into effect for Louisiana in the first major reproductive rights case before them. Chief Justice John Roberts, a Conservative, sided with the Liberals in the 5-4 decision that blocked the law.

In a statement, Center for Reproductive Rights President Nancy Northup said: “Alarm bells are ringing loudly about the threat to reproductive rights.”

The Center for Reproductive Rights represented the abortion clinic alongside the Paul Weiss law firm and the Mississippi Center for Justice.

“The consequences of a Roe reversal would be devastating. Over 20 states would directly ban abortion. Eleven states – including Mississippi – currently have trigger bans on the books that would immediately ban abortion if Roe is overturned,” Northup said.

Diane Derzis, owner of the Jackson Women’s Health Organization, said in a statement, “As the only abortion clinic in Mississippi, we see patients who spent weeks saving the money to travel here and pay for childcare for shelter.” and everything else. “

“If this ban went into effect, we would be forced to turn many of these patients away and they would lose their right to abortion in that condition,” Derzis said.

Fitch, the Mississippi attorney general, said the state legislature “enacted this law in accordance with the will of its constituents to promote the health of women and preserve the dignity and sanctity of life.”

“I continue to advocate for women and defend Mississippi’s legal right to protect the unborn,” she said.

Anti-abortion groups welcomed the Supreme Court move. Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser said the court’s decision to hear the case was a “landmark opportunity,” citing the enormous number of bills recently passed to improve access to abortion to restrict.

“Across the country, state lawmakers acting according to the will of the people have introduced 536 pro-life bills aimed at humanizing our laws and challenging the radical status quo imposed by Roe,” she said.

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Business

Macy’s retailer workers rating victory in difficult self-checkout

Macy's store employees score victory in challenging self-checkout

People wear face masks as they walk through Herald Square in New York City on January 8, 2021.

Angela Weiss | AFP | Getty Images

When Macy’s introduced a new self-checkout feature on its mobile app in 2018, the department store pointed out how customers could browse stores but skip the hassle at the checkout. For some business partners, however, this triggered alarm bells – and feared that this would jeopardize their jobs or dock their pay.

Three years later, a union representing Macy’s employees won a victory in questioning the technology-based approach and determining how it cuts them out of commissions. An independent arbitrator ruled last week that Macy’s had breached its collective bargaining agreement, saying the company must exclude commission-paid departments like men’s suits and cosmetics from self-checkout.

The complaint was filed by approximately 600 employees in six stores in the Boston and Rhode Island area that are part of the United Food and Commercial Workers. UFCW represents 1.3 million workers, including over 11,000 Macy’s workers in major cities such as Seattle, San Francisco and New York City.

The labor dispute highlights the tension between technology and retail workers. For years, retailers, from department stores to large grocers, have tried to keep up as online giant Amazon and ecommerce brands that go direct to consumers stole market share.

Amazon has made technology a key feature as it expands its own stationary footprint. In the convenience stores called Amazon Go, high-tech camera systems are used that automate the check-out. This speeds up payments for customers and eliminates the need for cashiers. It is believed that this technology will be rolled out in at least some of its large Amazon Fresh grocery stores. In addition, the palm scanning payment system is also being rolled out to Whole Foods stores.

With the pandemic, the debate has come back to the fore. Consumers have downloaded apps and introduced new modes of shopping like roadside pickup to limit business travel and social distance during the health crisis. Along the way, buyers have learned to love the added convenience these services provide. This is an additional urgency for retailers to adapt their digital options, supply chain and workforce to keep up with consumer preferences.

For example, contactless payments have become mainstream, according to Mastercard. It found that 41% of in-person transactions worldwide in the third quarter of 2020 were contactless, up from 37% in the second quarter and 30% last year.

Stay competitive

Santiago Gallino, a professor at Wharton School who specializes in digital transformation, said retailers in particular are under pressure to “reinvent themselves and rethink the role of employees” or face extinction. The industry is littered with warning messages, from RadioShack to Toys R Us.

Macy’s does not want to join this list. It has struggled with years of decline in sales. Sales decreased for three consecutive years from 2015 to 2017. Sales fell again in 2019. The pandemic exacerbated the challenge with stores temporarily closing and annual sales falling about 28%.

In the arbitration, Macy’s said the technology “is needed to stay competitive in an ever-changing retail market”.

While Macy’s refused to comment on the outcome of the arbitration, the ruling will have no immediate effect on customers.

The company expanded the self-checkout function (Scan and Pay) to all 500 or so Macy’s stores in 2018. Customers could scan barcodes on items with their cell phones and apply vouchers or loyalty program discounts themselves, but had to receive security labels from an employee. The function excluded some departments, e.g. B. Items with large tickets such as mattresses and fine jewelry.

Macy’s took the feature offline in October due to technical improvements and has no schedule for when it will be brought back, company spokeswoman Blair Rosenberg said. It would not be available in stores under arbitration.

However, Macy executives have announced that they will be focusing their investments on digital business. At a virtual conference hosted by Goldman Sachs in September, Felicia Williams, Macy’s interim chief financial officer, said using technology – including self-checkout – to improve the customer experience is a priority.

As retailers adapt to stay relevant, Wharton Gallino executives have to strike a delicate balance: adding technology that customers want and emphasizing the importance of employees even as their job descriptions change.

“When it comes to manpower and hourly reductions, the response from these salespeople is no surprise,” he said. “But if the retailer explains the changes the industry is going through and how the employees are adding value in this environment, then I would hope that both the employees and management can get to a better place.”

He said commissions have gotten harder in a digital world too. In the past, retailers used pay to fuel employee efforts on the sales floor, from picking up customers of other sizes to recommending goods. The payout was made for the sales rep when he checked out a customer.

Increasingly, however, customers come to a store to try on a pair of shoes, rummage through aisles or ask questions – only to later buy the item online. This can make it harder to keep track of the employee’s role in that sale, even if they were instrumental in influencing that sale, he said.

“The cause-and-effect link isn’t that clear,” he said. “The moment that connection is broken, my sales rep may lose the incentive to be helpful and pay attention to a customer’s needs.”

With stores serving more than showrooms, retailers need to think about new ways to motivate strong customer service.

‘Just the beginning’

As part of the ruling, Macy’s will have to make a repayment that employees at those six stores with total sales of approximately $ 2,000 would have made through scanning and paying.

Fernando Lemus, who represents the workers who filed the complaint as president of UFCW 1445, said the self-checkout feature triggered a small number of sales in stores. Even so, he said, employees want to make sure that changing responsibilities doesn’t lead to a cut in wages.

“As technology advances in this industry, we were concerned that this was just the beginning,” he said.

Over the past five years, he said, Macy’s employees in his local union have declined by about 33% as the retailer cuts its workforce – and some who still work in stores have taken on jobs like fulfilling online orders.

For Terri Barkett, who works at the Macy’s store in Warwick, Rhode Island, the umpire’s decision was a relief. Unlike some of her colleagues, she said her wages are not based on commissions. But she said she feared scanning and paying could ultimately result in deals with few, if any, cashiers.

Barkett has been with Macy’s for 19 years. She loves to help customers find the perfect birthday present or outfits for special occasions – and often looks high and low for the right color, style, or size. She believes the human connection is one of the retailer’s most powerful tools to deepen loyalty and generate higher sales.

Just this week, she said, she checked out a customer and noticed the Tommy Bahama logo on his shirt. She told him the brand was for sale and pointed to the display.

“He ran over there in a moment. He has two more [shirts]”, she said.” An app can’t see that. “

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Politics

The Covid Battle Will get Extra Difficult

The Covid Fight Gets More Challenging

Biden and the states are facing a rapidly changing virus while Republicans have already started 2022. It’s Tuesday and this is your political tip. Sign up here to receive On Politics in your inbox every weekday.

The impeachment managers of the house forwarded the impeachment article to the Senate yesterday.

The 2020 elections are hardly behind us, but the conversation about 2022 has inevitably already started.

Ohio Republican Senator Rob Portman announced yesterday that he would not run for another term next year to start a major battle in a GOP stronghold in the Midwest that will inevitably provide clues as to the direction of the Republican Party.

But the simple fact of Portman’s decision to withdraw – and the reasons he gave it – said something about the state of American politics. A veteran of the George W. Bush administration, Portman had developed a reputation in the Senate as a staunch conservative who nonetheless insisted on going down the aisle.

He helped enforce the new North American trade deal in 2019 and was part of the bipartisan coalition that pushed a pandemic relief package late last year and then pressured the House and Senate leaders to finalize it in late December.

Representative Jim Jordan, a die-hard ally of Trump, whose tumultuous district is likely to be redrawn this year – and not in his favor.

Covid19 vaccinations>

Answers to your vaccine questions

If I live in the US, when can I get the vaccine?

While the exact order of vaccine recipients may vary from state to state, most doctors and residents of long-term care facilities will come first. If you want to understand how this decision is made, this article will help.

When can I get back to normal life after the vaccination?

Life will only get back to normal once society as a whole receives adequate protection against the coronavirus. Once countries have approved a vaccine, they can only vaccinate a few percent of their citizens in the first few months. The unvaccinated majority remain susceptible to infection. A growing number of coronavirus vaccines show robust protection against disease. However, it is also possible that people spread the virus without knowing they are infected because they have mild or no symptoms. Scientists don’t yet know whether the vaccines will also block the transmission of the coronavirus. Even vaccinated people have to wear masks for the time being, avoid the crowds indoors and so on. Once enough people are vaccinated, it becomes very difficult for the coronavirus to find people at risk to become infected. Depending on how quickly we as a society achieve this goal, life could approach a normal state in autumn 2021.

Do I still have to wear a mask after the vaccination?

Yeah, but not forever. The two vaccines that may be approved this month clearly protect people from contracting Covid-19. However, the clinical trials that produced these results were not designed to determine whether vaccinated people could still spread the coronavirus without developing symptoms. That remains a possibility. We know that people who are naturally infected with the coronavirus can spread it without experiencing a cough or other symptoms. Researchers will study this question intensively when the vaccines are introduced. In the meantime, self-vaccinated people need to think of themselves as potential spreaders.

Will it hurt What are the side effects?

The vaccine against Pfizer and BioNTech, like other typical vaccines, is delivered as a shot in the arm. The injection is no different from the ones you received before. Tens of thousands of people have already received the vaccines, and none of them have reported serious health problems. However, some of them have experienced short-lived symptoms, including pain and flu-like symptoms that usually last a day. It is possible that people will have to plan to take a day off or go to school after the second shot. While these experiences are not pleasant, they are a good sign: they are the result of your own immune system’s encounter with the vaccine and a strong response that ensures lasting immunity.

Will mRNA vaccines change my genes?

No. Moderna and Pfizer vaccines use a genetic molecule to boost the immune system. This molecule, known as mRNA, is eventually destroyed by the body. The mRNA is packaged in an oily bubble that can fuse with a cell, allowing the molecule to slide inside. The cell uses the mRNA to make proteins from the coronavirus that can stimulate the immune system. At any given point in time, each of our cells can contain hundreds of thousands of mRNA molecules that they produce to make their own proteins. As soon as these proteins are made, our cells use special enzymes to break down the mRNA. The mRNA molecules that our cells make can only survive a few minutes. The mRNA in vaccines is engineered to withstand the cell’s enzymes a little longer, so the cells can make extra viral proteins and trigger a stronger immune response. However, the mRNA can last a few days at most before it is destroyed.

If Jordan can win a statewide primary to follow Portman, it would mark a major victory for Trumpism in a state where Republican voters have historically been balanced between working-class white voters and more affluent suburban white Republicans. Think of John Kasich, and before that of William Saxbe: This is not supposed to be the most Trump-friendly Republican state.

The opposite is true in Arkansas, where Trump enjoyed some of his strongest support in the 2020 election (62 percent voted for him). That seems to make it fertile ground for Sarah Huckabee Sanders, former Trump White House press secretary, who yesterday announced her offer for Arkansas governor, her father’s old job.

If she wins, it would set a clear flag for Trump’s influence, at least in the strongest Republican stronghold.

Sanders sounded Trumplike in her announcement video that was posted on Twitter. “With the radical left now in charge of Washington, your governor is your last line of defense. In fact, your governor must be on the front lines, ”she said. “Today I announce my candidacy for governor of Arkansas.”

New York Times Podcasts

Ezra Klein, founder of Vox.com and newly hired columnist for the New York Times Opinion, recently recorded the first episode of his podcast for us. In it he spoke to Dr. Vivek Murthy, Biden’s candidate for General Surgeon, a position he previously held from 2014 to 2017.

They talked about the challenges the coronavirus pandemic continues to bring, the politicization of science and how the country can overcome the crisis.

“There are times, you know, when we’re 50 states and there are times when we’re one nation,” Murthy said at one point. “This is a time when we need to be one nation. And if we don’t, we will not reverse this pandemic and we will keep losing more people to this terrible virus. “

Listen to the episode here. You can listen to and subscribe to “The Ezra Klein Show” on Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher (How to Listen).

On Politics is also available as a newsletter. Sign up here to have it delivered to your inbox.

Is there anything you think we are missing? Do you want to see more? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com.

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Business

Jack Ma Seems in Public After Difficult Beijing: Dwell Enterprise Updates

Jack Ma appears at a livestream event on Wednesday.

Here’s what you need to know:

Jack Ma has shot action scenes with great martial artists, sang duets with pop stars and has appeared at corporate rallies as a glam rocker and as a masked Michael Jackson impersonator. He’s not a wallflower.

The speculation was rife after the prominent entrepreneur and co-founder of the Alibaba Group disappeared from the public eye late last year. He had criticized the Chinese regulators for their overly cautious stance on the country’s financial system, and the authorities took action against his business empire shortly thereafter. He then began to skip previously planned appearances, raising questions about his fate in China and the global news media.

Mr Ma now appears to be trying to calm the speculation.

On Wednesday he appeared in public for the first time since the end of October. He spoke at a livestream event honoring educators in China’s village schools. He didn’t address his problems, but said he would spend more time in philanthropic endeavors.

“During that time, my colleagues and I learned and thought,” he said, according to a transcript of his comments on the local news media. “We will throw ourselves more resolutely into the philanthropy of education.”

Mr. Ma, a former English teacher, said it was the responsibility of business people of his generation to work towards shared prosperity by revitalizing rural areas and developing village education. His speech was in line with his recent efforts to move away from Alibaba’s day-to-day activities and focus more on philanthropy, although he continues to have significant influence on his business empire.

His remarks were covered extensively in the state-run Chinese news media, which at least indicated that Beijing’s censorship machine approved of his remarks. His appearance made it easier for some investors, who gained around 9 percent in Alibaba’s Hong Kong-traded stocks in afternoon trading.

Mr. Ma, who led Alibaba from its founding in 1999 to its rise as one of the largest and most valuable technology companies in the world, has long been cautious of the Chinese government. Like many entrepreneurs in the country, he has forged ties with the Beijing Office to avoid regulatory issues.

However, the rise of Alibaba’s sister company Ant Group brought it increasingly into conflict with China’s state-dominated financial system. The Ant Group, which was once a subsidiary of Alibaba and provides services such as electronic payments and credit, now plays a huge role in the financial lives of many Chinese people. It had planned an IPO in Shanghai and Hong Kong late last year, which was widely expected to be the largest fundraiser of its kind.

In October, at a public event, Mr. Ma accused Chinese state-run banks of acting like “pawn shops” and the country’s financial regulators to limit innovation through risk obsession.

About a week later, the government stopped the Ant Group’s IPO and later ordered it to change its business practices. Then an antitrust investigation began against Alibaba.

In the midst of the official setback, Mr. Ma began to withdraw from previously planned appearances, including serving as a judge on a talent show he launched on the theme of African entrepreneurs. This sparked speculation, especially after severe penalties were imposed on other entrepreneurs who questioned the Chinese office.

Janet Yellen appears before the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday. Recognition…Anna Moneymaker for the New York Times

Republicans on Tuesday announced their opposition to President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s economic plans and urged Janet L. Yellen, his Treasury candidate, to defend a $ 1.9 trillion stimulus proposal that the more direct payments to individuals would allow unemployment benefits and money for states and cities.

The Republican opposition on the Senate Finance Committee during the confirmation hearing of Ms. Yellen underscored the challenge the future Biden administration will face in trying to get its proposal through Congress as it has one in the Senate and House of Representatives has tight control.

“We’re looking at another loss of spending,” said Senator Patrick J. Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania. “The only principle of organization that I can apparently understand is to spend as much money as possible, seemingly to spend it.”

Mr Toomey questioned Mr Biden’s plans to send more money to states and cities, a move Republicans opposed last year and which has been removed from the last round of stimulus talks to raise the $ 900 billion Dollar help win package. He also expressed concern about Mr. Biden’s proposed tax hikes and his request to raise the minimum wage to $ 15.

South Carolina Republican Senator Tim Scott took up Mr Biden’s call to raise the $ 7.25 minimum wage, arguing to Ms. Yellen that doing so would harm small businesses while they are vulnerable and result in more job losses.

Other Republicans complained that Biden’s economic plan was fiscally irresponsible given the country’s growing debt burden and the federal budget deficit that exceeded $ 3 trillion last year. Louisiana Republican Senator Bill Cassidy said Mr. Biden’s plan was not targeted enough and that it was not an efficient use of federal resources to provide additional direct payments of $ 1,400 to some people who have lost jobs.

Ms. Yellen dismissed her arguments point by point, arguing that doing too little to stimulate the economy would be more expensive in the long run. She said economic research has shown minimal job losses from raising the minimum wage, citing studies by neighboring states when one imposes an increase and the other does not.

She also argued that unemployment benefits, supplemented by an additional $ 400 per week under Mr. Biden’s plan, are not enough to address families’ financial troubles and that the $ 1,400 stimulus tests are important in situations where a person, generally a woman, is present, has left a job to look after children who are out of school.

“There are many families who face exceptional financial burdens that are not covered by unemployment benefits,” she said.

Ms. Yellen has given some assurances to Republicans who fear the Democrats will repeal the entire 2017 tax bill that cut taxes on individuals and businesses. She said that while Mr Biden would like to make changes to the law, including increasing the corporate tax rate, such measures are not an immediate priority.

“The focus right now is on providing relief and helping families keep a roof over their heads and food on the table, not on collecting taxes,” she said.

The revitalized paycheck protection program is off to a smoother and slower start than last spring, when desperate borrowers inundated banks with loan applications and overwhelmed government computer systems.

The program largely opened on Tuesday when the Small Business Administration, which manages the aid program, accepted applications from all lenders. The agency allowed a small group of lenders and small banks to submit their applications last week.

In the first week of the program, the agency approved around 60,000 applications from nearly 3,000 lenders, it said on Tuesday. These requests totaled $ 5 billion, consuming approximately 2 percent of the $ 284 billion the program makes available.

These numbers don’t include loan applications sent to the agency on Tuesday. This was the first day most lenders were allowed to submit loan applications. New fraud checks and other safeguards mean that most applications will take at least a day to get approval.

The program is open to both first-time and recurring borrowers: the hardest-hit small businesses, which have seen sales declined by at least 25 percent since the pandemic began, are eligible for a second loan.

Lenders said they are preparing for significant demand, particularly second-round loans. John Asbury, the executive director of Atlantic Union Bank in Richmond, Virginia, said he expected at least 60 percent of his bank’s 11,000 borrowers to return for another loan.

Finance officials have announced that funding for the program will be enough to meet all requests. Mr. Asbury hopes that’s true.

“We just don’t know how much rush we’re going to get,” he said. “We get a lot of calls.”

Mike Lindell, the executive director of MyPillow, with President Trump at a White House briefing in March.Recognition…Al Drago for the New York Times

Bed Bath & Beyond and Kohl’s said they would be dropping MyPillow products amid backlash to comments from Mike Lindell, the executive director of the bedding company, who promoted debunked conspiracy theories related to the election on social media.

Kohl’s and Bed Bath & Beyond acted after people put pressure on them on social media, according to an interview posted on a pro-Trump website called the Right Side Broadcasting Network on Monday. Mr Lindell, who said he spoke to Bed Bath & Beyond minutes before the interview, claimed, without citing any evidence, that the criticism came from fake reports.

Bed Bath & Beyond said Tuesday that its decision was based on the performance of MyPillow. “We have streamlined our range to discontinue a number of underperforming items and brands,” a representative said in a statement. A Kohl’s spokeswoman said “customer demand for MyPillow has declined” and that the chain had no plans to purchase future inventory after closing its offer.

Mr. Lindell, whose company is a major advertiser on Fox News, has become a prominent supporter of President Trump. He attracted a wave of attention last week after a photo of partially visible notes he carried into the White House showed a mention of the Insurrection Act. MyPillow also offered a “FightforTrump” discount code on the day of the Capitol Riots. On social media, groups like Sleeping Giants, formed to stifle advertising dollars for Breitbart News, have asked vendors for their support for MyPillow products.

Mr. Lindell railed against Sleeping Giants in the interview.

“These people don’t understand, they are scared,” said Mr. Lindell of Bed Bath & Beyond and Kohl’s. “They were good partners. In fact, I told them, come back whenever you want. “

Categories
Politics

Supreme Court docket Rejects Texas Lawsuit Difficult Biden’s Victory

Supreme Court Rejects Texas Lawsuit Challenging Biden's Victory

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded with his own letter on Friday morning. “Whatever Pennsylvania’s definition of turmoil,” he wrote, “moving this court to heal grave threats to Texas Senate suffrage and the suffrage of its citizens in presidential elections affirms the Constitution, which is the opposite of turmoil . ” ”

Allegations that the election was tainted by widespread fraud have been rebutted by Mr Trump’s own Attorney General William P. Barr, who said this month the Justice Department had not uncovered election fraud “on a scale that could have changed the election. “

Some 20 Democratic-led states, in a brief endorsement of the four battlefield states, urged the Supreme Court to “reject Texas’s last-minute attempt to discard the results of a popular vote that is safely monitored and certified by its sister states. ”

Georgia, which won Mr Biden by less than 12,000 votes out of nearly five million votes cast, said in his letter that it had handled his election with integrity and care. “In this election cycle,” the letter said, “Georgia has done what the constitution was empowered to do: it implemented electoral processes, managed the election in the face of the logistical challenges posed by Covid-19, and confirmed and confirmed the election.” Results – over and over again. Even so, Texas sued Georgia. “

Even ahead of Election Day, Mr Trump and his Republican allies filed nearly five dozen lawsuits against the treatment, casting and counting of votes in courts in at least eight different states.

They generally lost these cases and often drew blistering reproaches from judges who heard them. Along the way, Mr Trump has not nearly overturned election results in a single state, let alone the minimum of three he would need to claim Mr Biden’s victory.

The first set of measures preceded the elections and was aimed at ending or rolling back the voting measures that states across the country had been taking to deal with the coronavirus crisis. In Texas, for example, Republicans were prosecuting a failed attempt in federal court to stop the drive-through vote in Harris County, home of Houston. A similar move was taken in Pennsylvania to prevent the state from accepting postal ballot papers received after election day.