Black Voters Sue Trump

The NAACP suit claims Trump is trying to 'coerce' officials
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 22, 2020 2:00 PM CST
Black Voters Sue Trump
In this Nov. 17, 2020, file photo, Wayne County Board of Canvassers Republican chairperson Monica Palmer, left, and Democrat vice chair Jonathan Kinloch discuss a motion to certify the election during a board meeting in Detroit.   (Robin Buckson/Detroit News via AP, File)

Black voters in Detroit are suing President Trump and his campaign over their attempt to overturn the 2020 election results, ABC News reports. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund filed the suit Friday for three voters, saying the president's campaign was trying to "coerce" and "intimidate" officials into stopping the certification of results in Wayne County, home of Detroit. "Central to this strategy is disenfranchising voters in predominately Black cities," the suit argues. "Repeating false claims of voter fraud, which have been thoroughly debunked, Defendants are pressuring state and local officials in Michigan not to count votes from Wayne County, Michigan (where Detroit is the county seat), and thereby disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of voters."

The suit adds that Trump's tactics "repeat the worst abuses in our nation's history" in denying Blacks "a voice in American democracy." The lawsuit highlights a battle among Wayne County officials about whether to certify the votes; at issue were numerical imbalances similar to ones that occurred in the 2016 election and 2020 primaries without drawing much attention, per the Detroit News. Just this week, two GOP officials begrudgingly certified the November votes, then met with President Trump and said they had changed their minds. But Michigan officials said it's too late to turn back. Meanwhile, USA Today reports that Trump's legal team has alleged voter fraud in Michigan but apparently confused municipalities in Michigan and Minnesota in presenting their evidence. (More Election 2020 stories.)

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