Hillary lawyer: Following through even though Trump victories in WI, PA and MI “well exceeds the largest margin ever overcome in a recount”

The prof wrote about Green Party candidate Jill Stein filing for a recount in Wisconsin, and the clamoring calls from Hillary supporters for electors to change their votes have not diminished since she lost the presidential election to President-elect Trump.

Team Hillary’s top lawyer, Marc Elias of Perkins Coie LLP, says that the Hillary campaign WILL PARTICIPATE in the recount efforts even though they have found NO EVIDENCE of hacking or other interference with the election process.

Investigations have not "resulted in evidence of manipulation of results," Clinton's lawyer says. https://t.co/cCzMz0yUDl — David Lauter (@DavidLauter) November 26, 2016

Elias writes:

The campaign is grateful to all those who have expended time and effort to investigate various claims of abnormalities and irregularities. While that effort has not, in our view, resulted in evidence of manipulation of results, now that a recount is underway, we believe we have an obligation to the more than 64 million Americans who cast ballots for Hillary Clinton to participate in ongoing proceedings to ensure that an accurate vote count will be reported.

The ongoing proceedings to which he refers include Stein’s Wisconsin recount, and they will legally represent Hillary on the ground.

Elias continues (emphasis added):

Because we had not uncovered any actionable evidence of hacking or outside attempts to alter the voting technology, we had not planned to exercise this option ourselves, but now that a recount has been initiated in Wisconsin, we intend to participate in order to ensure the process proceeds in a manner that is fair to all sides. If Jill Stein follows through as she has promised and pursues recounts in Pennsylvania and Michigan, we will take the same approach in those states as well. We do so fully aware that the number of votes separating Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in the closest of these states — Michigan — well exceeds the largest margin ever overcome in a recount. But regardless of the potential to change the outcome in any of the states, we feel it is important, on principle, to ensure our campaign is legally represented in any court proceedings and represented on the ground in order to monitor the recount process itself.

Stein is also pursuing recounts in Michigan and Pennsylvania though Hillary’s own lawyers think there’s not much point in doing so.

They’re not alone in this assessment; it seems that Stein’s spoiler third-party run still chafes.

I really wish Jill Stein had not waited until after the election to be so concerned about a few thousand votes tipping the election to Trump — Dan Pfeiffer (@danpfeiffer) November 24, 2016

Indeed, it appears that the Obama White House is (or its “allies” are) not only against the recount efforts but that Obama himself called Hillary and told her to concede.

She complied, calling “Trump to congratulate him before campaign manager John Podesta had returned from the Jacob Javits Center, where he told her supporters to go home for the night because the final votes were being tallied.”

The Hill reports:

President Barack Obama called Hillary Clinton to persuade her to concede the White House on election night, according to a forthcoming book on Clinton’s defeat. Authors Amie Parnes, The Hill’s senior White House correspondent, and Jonathan Allen cite three Clintonworld sources familiar with the election-night request in the unreleased book from Crown Publishing. “You need to concede,” Obama told his former secretary of State as she, her family, and her top aides continued to watch results trickle in from the key Rust Belt states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The latter state, called after 1:30 a.m. by The Associated Press, was the clear tipping point for the White House race, ensuring Trump would crest over the 270 electoral-vote threshold needed to win. . . . . Obama allies are dead-set against the multi-state recount effort. Former Obama White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer mocked it on Twitter:

The amount of Democratic energy and money being wasted on recounts instead of trying to win the Louisiana Senate Race is mind boggling — Dan Pfeiffer (@danpfeiffer) November 24, 2016

UPDATE:

First comment from Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway on Clinton joining Wisconsin recount: "What a pack of sore losers." pic.twitter.com/fFAGRMn4FH — Kevin Cirilli (@kevcirilli) November 26, 2016



