Chris Christie dismisses Trump approach to overturn election as ‘absurdity’

Shant Shahrigian, New York Daily News

Earth to team Trump: Drop it!

That was the message from a handful of Republicans on Sunday as the commander-in-chief continued to fantasize about overturning the November election in spite of President-elect Joe Biden’s decisive victory.

Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey and an informal adviser to Trump, dismissed the president’s legal theory on overturning the election as an “absurdity.”

Christie was commenting on unsuccessful efforts to get the courts to toss out election results in battleground states.

“The legal theory put forward by his legal team and by the president is an absurdity,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The reason why the Supreme Court didn’t take it is because it’s an absurd idea to think that any state, or any number of states, no matter how good they are, can challenge another state’s right to run the election as they see fit. And also, there’s no evidence.”

On Friday, the Supreme Court rejected a lawsuit from Texas calling for Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin to be blocked from casting their electoral votes for Biden. The court stated that Texas didn’t have the standing to challenge election results in other states.

More than 100 House Republicans filed a brief last week supporting Texas’s claims.

But on Sunday, a top Republican senator called on Trump to finally accept the election results.

“The states have counted [and] certified their votes,” Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“The courts have resolved the disputes. It looks very much like the electors will vote for Joe Biden. And when they do, I hope that he puts the country first — mean, the president — that he takes pride in his considerable accomplishments, that he congratulates the president-elect and he helps him get off to a good start.”

House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) called for the legal process to play out, though he stopped short of acknowledging Biden as the next president.

“If you want to restore trust by millions of people who are still very frustrated and angry about what happened, that’s why you got to have this whole system play out,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Trump himself showed no signs of accepting reality on Sunday.

“How do states and politicians confirm an election where corruption and irregularities are documented throughout?” he ranted on Twitter. “A Swing State hustle!”

The Electoral College is set to officially vote for Biden as the 46th president of the United States on Monday.

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