Washington Post: Pennsylvania emerges as ‘tipping-point’ battleground for Biden and Trump — before and after Election Day

10.11.2020 / By Michael Scherer, Michelle Ye Hee Lee, Amy Gardner and Josh Dawsey
Washington Post: Pennsylvania emerges as ‘tipping-point’ battleground for Biden and Trump — before and after Election Day

“There are a lot of eyes on the state that’s leading to a sense of increased voter anxiety,” said Suzanne Almeida, interim executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania, a voting rights group that is involved in some of the litigation. “There’s a universe of potential litigation out there, and I would be very surprised if we don’t see at least some of it after Nov. 3.”

Both parties are increasingly focused on the pivotal — and potentially messy — role that Pennsylvania could play in deciding the outcome of the presidential race.

President Trump’s campaign in recent days has redirected ad spending there from other northern battlegrounds, while Joe Biden’s campaign and supportive groups are increasing their spending in the state, which between its rolling rural expanses and major metropolitan hubs is seen as a classic political bellwether.

Both sides now see Pennsylvania, with 20 electoral college votes, as a must-win prize on the path to the 270 needed to win the White House, according to Democratic and Republican strategists. They also increasingly view the battle for those votes as one that could well continue beyond Election Day — with a growing list of balloting disputes and lawsuits setting the stage, if the race is close, for a contested election reminiscent of the Florida drama that transfixed the nation after the 2000 election.

Not only is Pennsylvania allowing anyone to vote by mail in a general election for the first time, but all the state’s polling places also have new voting machines, and the rules that govern the vote have been shifting in recent weeks, as the two parties in a state with divided government battle in the courts on multiple fronts. …

A federal judge on Saturday dismissed a lawsuit filed by Trump’s campaign seeking to block the use of drop boxes as receptacles for mail ballots, require ballot signatures to match voter registration records and allow nonresident poll watchers at polling places, ruling that the president’s claims of potential fraud were “speculative.”

The win has chilled Democratic concern, but the prospect of ballot challenges and litigation after Nov. 3 remains high. Both parties have assembled an army of lawyers to do battle over such matters as witness signatures, security envelopes and postmark stamps. Officials with both the Trump campaign and Republican National Committee have said they will challenge all ballots that arrive after Nov. 3 with no postmark.

“There are a lot of eyes on the state that’s leading to a sense of increased voter anxiety,” said Suzanne Almeida, interim executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania, a voting rights group that is involved in some of the litigation. “There’s a universe of potential litigation out there, and I would be very surprised if we don’t see at least some of it after Nov. 3.”

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