Election 2020: Minnesota and around the region
The latest on local races and Election Day news in Minnesota and neighboring states.
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Judges dismiss Trump claims in Georgia, Michigan
Judges in Georgia and Michigan have quickly dismissed Trump campaign lawsuits, undercutting a campaign legal strategy aimed at attacking the integrity of the voting process in states where the result could mean President Donald Trump’s defeat.
Read more here.
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'Count every vote!': Large postelection protests seen in several U.S. cities
Some of the protests had been planned ahead of Election Day. But they were intensified by President Trump's attempts to pronounce himself the winner of a presidential race that's still playing out. In Minneapolis, police issued citations to hundreds of protesters after a march went through downtown and onto Interstate 94.
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2020 demonstrates power, limits of DFL urban dominance
MPR NewsDemocrat Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump handily in Minnesota, largely because of a huge advantage in Hennepin County. Here’s why the DFL win at the top of the ticket didn’t filter down to legislative races. -
Trump backers demand Michigan vote center 'Stop the count!'
People wanting to be election challengers yell as they look through the windows of the central counting board as police were helping to keep additional challengers from entering due to overcrowding on Wednesday in Detroit. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio) By The Associated Press
Dozens of supporters of President Donald Trump chanting “Stop the count!” descended on a ballot-tallying center in Detroit on Wednesday, while thousands of anti-Trump protesters demanding a complete vote count in the still-undecided presidential contest took to the streets in cities across the U.S.
In New York City, thousands marched past boarded-up luxury stores on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue, calling for every vote to be tallied. The march was largely peaceful, though police made at least 20 arrests after a smaller, rowdier group began protesting police misconduct.
In Chicago, protesters demanding a complete count marched through downtown and along a street across the river from Trump Tower.
Similar protests — sometimes about the election, sometimes about racial inequality — took place in at least a half-dozen cities, including Los Angeles, Seattle, Houston, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis and San Diego.
Michigan has been on edge for months over fears of political violence. Anti-government protesters openly carried guns into the state Capitol during protests over coronavirus restrictions in the spring, and six men were arrested last month on charges of plotting to kidnap Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer
The Detroit protests started shortly before The Associated Press declared that former Vice President Joe Biden had won Michigan.
Video shot by local media showed angry people gathered outside the TCF Center and inside the lobby, with police officers lined up to keep them from entering the counting area. They chanted "Stop the count!” and “Stop the vote!”
Earlier, the Republican campaign filed suit in a bid to halt the count, demanding Michigan's Democratic secretary of state allow in more inspectors. Trump has repeatedly insisted without evidence that there are major problems with the voting and the counting.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a Democrat, insisted both parties and the public had been given access to the tallying “using a robust system of checks and balances to ensure that all ballots are counted fairly and accurately.”
On Tuesday night, scattered protests broke after voting ended, stretching from Washington, D.C., to Seattle, but there was no widespread unrest or significant violence.
In Portland, Ore., Richard March came to an anti-Trump protest on Wednesday despite a heart condition that makes him vulnerable to COVID-19.
“To cast doubt on this election has terrible consequences for our democracy," he said. "I think we are a very polarized society now — and I’m worried about what’s going to come in the next days and weeks and months.”
The prolonged task of counting this year's deluge of mail-in votes raised fears that the lack of clarity in the presidential race could spark unrest.