Kayleigh McEnany & Ronna McDaniel Press Conference Transcript: Lawsuits Over Election Disputes

Kayleigh McEnany: (00:29)
To the campaign. This election is not over. Far from it. We have only begun the process of obtaining an accurate, honest vote count. We are fighting for the rights of all Americans who want to have faith and confidence, not only in this election but in the many elections to come. There is only one party in America that opposes voter ID. One party in America that opposes verifying signatures, citizenship, residency, eligibility. There is only one party in America trying to keep observers out of the count room and that party my friends is the Democrat Party.

You don’t take these positions because you want an honest election. You don’t oppose an audit of the vote because you want an accurate count. You don’t oppose our efforts at sunlight and transparency because you have nothing to hide. You take these positions because you are welcoming fraud and you are welcoming illegal voting. Our position is clear. We want to protect the franchise of the American people. We want an honest, accurate, lawful count. We want maximum sunlight. We want maximum transparency. We want every legal vote to be counted and we want every illegal vote to be discarded. Unlike our opponents, we have nothing to hide.

The integrity of our election matters. The Constitution of the United States matters. What we have seen across the country is Democrat officials systematically trying to do an end run around the constitution to tip the scales of election in their favor. As Justice Gorsuch wrote in DNC v. Wisconsin State Legislature, “Our effort to uphold the constitution is tested by hard times, not easy ones. Last minute changes to longstanding election rules risk other problems too, inviting confusion and chaos and eroding public confidence in electoral outcomes.”

Pennsylvania is a case study in just this. Allow me to just broadly review three points that have happened in Pennsylvania. Number one, in Philadelphia, poll watchers who are legally permitted to be there and observe the vote count were blocked from observing the count. Our poll watchers were put behind barricades in a massive room. They were many feet from the counting process and in fact when you look at all of the tables many hundreds of feet in fact from the tables in the very back. They were completely in the dark, completely unable to oversee the vote count as was their legal right. An observer on the scene described it this way. “Imagine being on a football field. You’re on the ten yard line and expected to make a call in the end zone on the other side of the field.”

Is is unacceptable. An intermediary court ruled on the side of the campaign, on the side of transparency in allowing the poll watchers to observe the count, but what did the Democrat Pennsylvania Supreme Court do? They issued an administrative stay effectively pushing back our poll watchers and denying them the access they deserve to sit and watch the count. Ask yourself this. What are Pennsylvania Democrats hiding? Why can’t poll watchers simply observe the count?

Second is Article One, Section Four of the United States Constitution clearly states this, “The time, place and manner of holding elections for senators and representatives shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof.” That’s right, the state legislature is constitutionally the one making the decision, but the Supreme Court of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Kathy Boockvar and the Democrat-tilted Pennsylvania Supreme Court had continually disregarded the constitution, making decisions clearly in the domain of the Pennsylvania legislature.

In fact, maybe there’s a reason the Secretary of State Boockvar keeps substituting her will for that of the legislature in a completely unconstitutional fashion. Perhaps it’s because she has motive. In fact, she has shown her partisan hatreds, tweeting this, using the title “president” before the word “Trump” really just means the office of the presidency. We see where her motives stand. Finally, a mere survey of the facts shows that voters in blue counties like Philadelphia County were given certain privileges that voters in red counties were not afforded. The constitution’s equal protection clause requires uniform standards but Democrat election officials created disparities depending on where citizens lived and where they voted in the state. Some counties set up satellite offices for backdoor early voting, whereas other counties did not. Some counties allowed pre-canvassing where other counties did not. Voters in some counties were allowed to cure their ballots whereas voters in other counties were not. What Pennsylvania has done is provide a case study into how to tip the scales of an election to functionally favor the Democrat Party.

This has gone on nationwide, and I’ll leave you with this. In DNC v. Wisconsin State Legislature, in another attempt to count late ballots that arrived after the election, Justice Gorsuch wrote, “Nothing in our founding document contemplates the kind of judicial intervention that took place here, nor is there precedent for it in 230 years of the court’s decisions.” He went on to say, “No one doubts that conducting a national election amid a pandemic poses serious challenges, but none of that means individual judges may improvise with their own election rules in place of those the people’s representatives have adopted.”

They have taken a global pandemic and turned it into a nationwide electoral epidemic. They have taken, based on what they call a natural disaster, they have used that and turned this into a national disaster, and with that, I’ll turn it over to Matt Morgan, general counsel for the campaign.

Matt Morgan: (06:36)
Thank you Kayleigh. As Kayleigh stated, the election is not over. Tabulation and canvassing continues across the United States and today in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, The Donald J. Trump for President and two representative voters filed suit against the secretary of state and select counties, alleging two things, number one, a violation of equal access based on a lack of meaningful observation and transparency, particularly in Democrat-controlled counties, and secondly a violation of equal protection based on disparate treatment between Republican voters and Democrat voters, but what does this mean in layman’s terms? What does this mean for all of you? What this means is if you are a Democrat in Philadelphia, you are allowed to work outside the bounds of the restrictions on fixing defective ballots, sometimes referred to as curing, but if you’re in Republican counties in the state of Pennsylvania, you are not allowed to do that because they are strictly following the text of the statute in Pennsylvania.

Secondly, if you are a Republican in the city of Philadelphia for example, you are not allowed meaningful access to the observation of the vote tabulation process. If you’re a Democrat in a Republican-leaning county in the state of Pennsylvania, you were allowed that access to meaningfully view the ballots as they are being counted. In Philadelphia and Allegheny Counties, there were over 682,000 ballots that were tabulated outside the view of our observers who were entitled by law to review those ballots and we believe that a meaningful review of those ballots could discern that there were ballots that were illegally counted. Our relief that we are seeking at this point is to enjoin the Secretary of State from hurrying to certify the results before they are completely tabulated or canvassed so that we can obtain that meaningful review and discern within those 682,000 ballots at least and there may be more throughout the state whether or not there was disparate treatment for Republican voters and Democrat voters in the states and whether Democrat voters were disproportionately allowed to cure or fix their ballots in some locations in the state and not others.

For example, even at a minute level here today, we are very close, we are very close to the automatic recount statute in Pennsylvania and this lawsuit itself could change that or swing that small discrepancy. So this is the relief we are seeking at this time but I would also urge the press and those out there that this is step one of a process. We are within our rights to look into these irregularities. We were within our rights to observe the votes as they are being tabulated. We will observe those and we believe that this lawsuit takes us one step closer to closing the gap in the vote differential in Pennsylvania and at this time I will turn over to the Republican chairwoman, Ms. McDaniel.

Ronna McDaniel: (09:38)
Thank you all for coming. I am going to start with some of the irregularities we have seen in the state of Michigan specifically and then I’ll go a little bit broader but Michigan is my home state and in the county, Wayne County, Republican poll watchers were denied their legal right to monitor the election and purposely kept in the dark, both literally and figuratively, poll watchers or election workers blocked windows and padlocked doors. Obviously that’s not going to instill confidence. There are thousands of reports of poll watchers being intimidated and unable to do their job and as of 4:00 p.m. this afternoon, 131 affidavits have been completed just in Michigan with over 2,800 incident reports that have been submitted to us since Election Day. Two new lawsuits were filed today by people who were working in Detroit and a whistleblower who has gotten their … We have gotten their information at the Eastern District Court of Michigan.

As you guys can understand with 2,800 incident reports, this is a lot to track down. It means we’re interviewing these people, we’re getting their statements and we’re turning them into affidavits, but that takes a lot of time and effort. As Matt has mentioned, there’s a canvas process and a certification for a reason but I will just tell you the distress that I’m hearing in my state from people who were at TCF and the way they were treated is deeply alarming. I hope you go and look at this. I hope you look at these affidavits and I hope you hear from the people that were there who feel like they were denied transparency and saw wrongdoing in Detroit. We should all be alarmed by this, no matter where you are on the political spectrum.

In addition to that, we’ve heard hundreds of instances of election workers who were verbally accosted … They verbally accosted our poll watchers and refusals to let them challenge questionable ballots. Election workers were wearing Biden T-shirts and applauding when our poll watchers were kicked out. Imagine volunteering and going and spending your night because you care so much about the integrity of the election and then to be kicked out and to be cheered as you are leaving. This does not instill confidence in our democracy and these are good people. I know most of these people. Of the few ballots that Democrat election workers did allow us to challenge, our observers say those ballots were then moved back into the regular pile after our poll watchers were intimidated and pushed from the process.

There is a canvas for a reason. There is a certification process for a reason, and unlike Election Day, we need these processes to be transparent. Already in Detroit, we are hearing incidents and we will have affidavits to this effect of people not being able to meaningfully canvas and discrepancies that we’re seeing in Detroit specifically. So just after, a week after the polls closed, Democrats and the media want to ignore these clear irregularities and rush to call states as won and end the certification and canvas process. We’re hearing we need to unite, we need to come together. Well for the thousands of people who spent time and hours going out to be part of this process who feel disenfranchised who don’t feel like there was transparency, we can’t do that unless we search out all these irregularities. Even one instance, even one instance of voter fraud should be too many for all of us.

We intend to ensure that every lawful voter has their vote counted in accordance with the law. That observers are granted the access they are due under state law and that any irregularities that have occurred, whether by malicious intent or incompetence, are investigated to the fullest extent allowed under the law. We will not give up on this process until every last issue has been uncovered. The RNC has deployed legal teams in multiple states to investigate clear irregularities with voting, counting and tabulation and we will work with state and local authorities to ensure that a legal count is conducted in accordance to each state’s laws and that every vote is counted.

If the shoe were on the other foot, if it were this close the other way, if President Trump was in the lead in all these states, the media would be screaming. This isn’t over, the race isn’t over, we need more time to count and make sure it’s right but because it’s Biden in a very slight lead, the media demands the race is over and there is nothing to see here. The American people need to have confidence in their elections. There are over 150 Americans who voted in this election and they deserve to know that their votes were counted accurately. Right now, and I can say this as I’m hearing calls and I’m hearing from people across the country, they do not have confidence that that happened. So I am asking the media, interview these people. Talk to these people. Do not just dismiss these allegations out of hand, these irregularities. Go research it, because this is a problem when people are not being able to transparently watch the election counting which they are legally allowed to do. It creates division in our country. Republicans and Democrats should be allowed to observe this process, but in this case it’s Republicans that were not allowed to.

We will continue to fight. President Trump will continue to fight for us and we’ll continue to fight for him. Please visit gop.com to donate and if you see signs of voter irregularity, go to 888-503-3526. Thank you.

[inaudible 00:14:53] I’ll take a few questions. Yep.

Speaker 4: (14:55)
Kayleigh, it sounds like … Do you know that fraudulent voters were actually cast are or you simply saying we don’t know [inaudible 00:15:05]

What we are asking for here is patience. Ronna just mentioned to you the more than I believe it was 130 affidavits in Michigan alone. We’re aware of all the reports of thousands of votes in Nevada that were cast by those who were not eligible. We’re hearing these reports, we’re seeing them come in, we are vetting them. We are getting affidavits, so right now we would point you to all of that, that information is publicly available but what we’re asking for right now is patience as we explore these equal protection claims among others.

Can I add to that? Let me just add a couple things in this recent lawsuit. One, we do have a whistleblower which I discussed earlier this week who was in Detroit as an election worker, not as a Republican poll watcher, who under affidavit, says that they were told to backdate ballots. That their supervisor came and they were there on November 4, ballots that came in with no date, they were told by the supervisor, backdate the ballots to November 2 or November 3 so they will count. So that has been submitted to the U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Michigan. That is via affidavit.

If you look at the recent lawsuit and Mike Reed can get you the information on this lawsuit, let me just share. An election employee with the City of Detroit working at a polling location for three weeks prior to the election, this City of Detroit employee directly observed on a daily basis other City of Detroit election workers and employees coaching voters to vote for Joe Biden and the Democrat Party. This employee witnessed these workers and employees encouraging voters to do straight Democrat ballot and witnessed these election workers and employees going over to the voting booths with voters in order to watch them vote and coach them who to vote for.

During the last two weeks while this same employee was working at the polling location, she was specifically instructed by her supervisors never to ask for a driver’s license or any photo ID when a person was trying to vote and as absentee ballots that existed were … All absentee ballots that existed were required to be input into the QBF system by 9:00 p.m. on November 3, 2020. This was required to be done in order to have a final list of absentee voters who returned their ballots prior to 8:00 p.m. on November 3, 2020. In order to have enough time to process the absentee ballots, all polling locations were instructed to collect the absentee ballots from the drop box once every hour November 3.

On November 4, 2020, a City of Detroit election worker was instructed to improperly pre-date the absentee ballots received that were not in the QBF. She was told to alter the information in the QBF to falsely show that the absentee ballots had been received in time to be valid. The election employee also observed a large number of people who came into the satellite location to vote in person but they had already applied for an absentee ballots. These people were allowed to vote in person and were not required to return the mailed absentee ballot or sign an affidavit that the voter lost the mail ballot.

Listen. Here’s the thing. Why aren’t you worried about these irregularities? No, this is a separate question. That is a separate question which is if you are finding these irregularities, if you have an election worker being told to backdate ballots, that’s a problem. We’re going to pursue all of this. Is it going to be enough? No, it’s going to take time. Is it going to be enough we don’t know? Is it going to take time? Yes, it’s going to take time but what we are seeing is deeply alarming. Along with the software situation we had in Antrim County which we need to get to the bottom of as well, now we have a whistleblower, and now we have 131 affidavits talking about irregularities and problems that were happening in Detroit. That’s just Michigan.

Speaker 5: (18:33)
Can you [inaudible 00:18:38] the name of the poll worker?

You can look at this lawsuit.

Mike, can you get them the lawsuit? We’ll get that out to you. I don’t know of that person’s name, it may be a whistleblower so they may be provided protections.

Speaker 5: (18:49)
Do you have any evidence that you can show us today that shows that illegal votes were cast?

Well I just … I think I just went through that with you with somebody backdating ballots, that’s called illegal. If you are changing the date on a ballot, an election worker, a whistleblower. We have to subpoena that and we’ll have to get that information but that’s going to be an investigation process but somebody was told you need to backdate ballots to make them legal, ballots that were illegal under the law.

Speaker 6: (19:20)
[inaudible 00:19:20] How did the conspiracy against red counties and Republican voters with the GOP [inaudible 00:19:26] … How are some Republicans.

I don’t think I can … Listen, how is it a conspiracy when a whistleblower from the City of Detroit is saying I was told by my supervisors to lie and backdate ballots? This is somebody protected under the law. There’s no conspiracy there. [crosstalk 00:19:43]

I can answer at least regarding the lawsuit today in Pennsylvania.

Speaker 6: (19:48)
Well the question was about the Republican Party picking up seats [inaudible 00:19:51]

No, no, but I’m saying … You’re saying … You’re talking about how the disparate treatment? So for example, in the City of Philadelphia, if you do not provide an inner secrecy envelope with your ballot as you return it, that is not supposed to count but what we know is happening in Philadelphia is somehow the City of Philadelphia knew, knew which ballots had inner secrecy envelopes and did not and were telling voters ahead of time, “Hey, you may not have included your inner secrecy envelope. You need to get in here and vote a provisional ballot and get that fixed,” but that was only happening in Philadelphia but not in … That was not happening in the rest of the state because the state law discourages that. So as Democrats were disproportionately voting by mail, they were disproportionately picking up those added votes in the city of Philadelphia [crosstalk 00:20:39]

Let me say one final thing. There were 682,479 ballots counted in Philadelphia and Allegheny County that there were no poll watchers allowed to watch. It’s the job of the media to ask the question why because all we are asking for is truth, transparency and sunlight here. That is all we are asking for and sadly we are asking the questions many of you should. [inaudible 00:21:10]

Kayleigh McEnany & Ronna McDaniel Press Conference Transcript: Lawsuits Over Election Disputes

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