President Donald Trump is expected to cede control of the White House to President-elect Joe Biden within 56 days.
Trump is planning a trip to Pennsylvania on Wednesday as some state lawmakers meet
President Trump plans to fly to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania on Wednesday, where a handful of Republican Pennsylvania lawmakers will meet over the 2020 election, sources familiar with the schedule confirm to ABC News.
The exact details of Trump’s journey are still being worked out and could be done away with altogether, the sources say, adding that Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani pushed the president to join.
As of now, the sources add that Trump plans to fly to Pennsylvania via Marine One in Pennsylvania and what he does on the ground remains unclear, but he may also be meeting this group of state lawmakers.
Multiple sources say senior aides from the White House officials and campaign aides tried on Monday to convince Trump to not make the trip.
Trump’s campaign announced that Giuliani and his team will travel to Pennsylvania for a strictly Republican “Majority Political Committee” hearing at the Wyndham Hotel in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, at 12:30 p.m. At least seven senators will be in attendance, including the elected Senate leader, according to a press release posted on the Pennsylvania State Senate website, at least seven state senators will be in attendance, including the elected Senate majority leader.
The Senate’s website calls it an “informational meeting on election issues in 2020.” It will be streamed.
The press release contains a statement by Sen. Doug Mastriano, who requested the meeting.
“Elections are a fundamental tenet of our democracy – sadly, Pennsylvanians have lost faith in the electoral system,” said Mastriano, who recently called for the resignation of Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar for negligence and incompetence. “It is unacceptable.”
“Over the past few weeks, I have heard from thousands of Pennsylvanians regarding issues experienced at the polls, irregularities with the mail-in voting system and concerns whether their vote was counted,” said Mastriano. “We need to correct these issues to restore faith in our republic.”
Pennsylvania certified its results for Joe Biden on Tuesday only.
In a statement on Tuesday evening, the Trump campaign praised the upcoming public hearings of state legislatures in Pennsylvania, Arizona and Michigan, while the president’s campaign continues to look to the state legislature to help overturn the election, though that states say it is not possible.
Hearings will follow both Michigan and Pennsylvania to certify their election results this week.
Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, will appear at Wednesday’s hearing in Pennsylvania, where he will make a “presentation,” the statement said.
The Pennsylvania Senate Republicans called the hearing a “briefing on electoral matters for 2020” in a tweet Tuesday.
After Trump’s campaign released their official statement, a spokesperson for Michigan House Speaker Lee Chatfield told ABC News that the House Oversight Committee will not conduct a meeting next week for an election hearing.
Trump’s legal team “has been invited to submit written testimony instead,” spokesperson Gideon D’Assandro told ABC News.
Trump’s campaign also continues to pressure state lawmakers to take action, writing that “they have the sole authority to select their representatives to the Electoral College.”
Pennsylvania and Democratic Party officials filed a response to the Trump campaign’s attempts to reverse the 2020 election, urging the Third Circuit Court to dismiss a campaign request that would maintain their legal effort.
“It is beyond time for this baseless litigation to come to an end,” lawyers for Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar, noting that Trump’s campaign team, led by Rudy Giuliani, seeks to reinstate claims it had already “abandoned for tactical reasons” in the lower court.
Regarding the Trump campaign’s allegations that pollsters could not “meaningfully” observe the number of votes, Boockvar’s team writes that Trump’s campaign failed to prove that “even a single vote that was improperly counted,” much less enough votes to change the election. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court had previously ruled that survey observers had been granted sufficient access under state law.
