Trump Successfully Blocks Recount In Pennsylvania, As Green Party Drops Effort

President-Elect’s Supporters Also Challenging Recounts In Michigan, Wisconsin

Donald Trump’s campaign has successfully blocked a statewide recount of votes in the presidential election in Pennsylvania. 

Green Party candidate Jill Stein initiated recounts in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin — three swing states where Trump narrowly defeated Hillary Clinton — after a successful fundraising drive. 

But even though he maintained throughout his campaign that the election would be “rigged,” Trump and his supporters challenged all three recounts in court. 

On Saturday, the Green Party announced it is dropping the Pennsylvania recount effort, saying it can’t afford the $1 million bond a judge had set, the Associated Press reports. 

Stein wanted to explore whether machines were hacked and election results manipulated in Pennsylvania. But Trump’s attorneys argued in court there was “no evidence — or even an allegation — that any tampering with Pennsylvania’s voting systems actually occurred.” 

The AP reports that an updated count Friday showed Trump leading Clinton by 49,000 votes in Pennsylvania, or 0.8 percent — above the 0.5 percent trigger for an automatic recount. 

Trump’s supporters have also filed lawsuits seeking to block the recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin, The New York Times reported Friday. 

While the recounts have generated hope among some Clinton supporters, one expert told the NYT that the chances that they could overturn the election result are “essentially zero or infinitesimal.” 

BuzzFeed’s Chris Geidner reports that the Green Party’s decision to drop the Pennsylvania recount “ends any remaining doubt … about whether Donald Trump is the victor in the 2016 presidential race.” 

“With Pennsylvania off the table, even a flip in the Michigan and Wisconsin results would still leave Trump at 280 electoral votes — 10 above the 270 necessary to become the next president,” Geidner writes.