At least 50 Electoral College members who voted when Donald Trump was certified as the next US president may have been ineligible to do so, according to the findings of an extensive legal report.
A bipartisan team of lawyers from across the US compiled a 1,000-page briefing on voting eligibility for Congress members, who are due to give their final ruling on the Electoral College vote on Friday.
The report reveals “at least 50” votes by College members who met on 19 December were “not lawfully certified”, because the voters did not live in the congressional districts they represented, or held elected office in states which barred dual officeholders.
At the Electoral College meeting in December, Mr Trump won 304 votes and his election opponent Hillary Clinton won 227. Since 270 votes are required for a candidate to win the presidency, Mr Trump may not have enough eligible backers to take the role, if the report’s findings are correct.
The team, made up of senior lawyers and legal assistants, pointed to examples of multiple voters from Florida, North Carolina, Indiana and Texas who were not eligible to cast their vote and said Congress members should consider this when making their decision.
“We have reason to believe that there are at least 50 electoral votes that were not regularly given or not lawfully certified,” an executive summary of the report said. “The number could be over a hundred. We urge you to prepare written objections for 6 January.
“Specifically, at least 16 electors lived outside the congressional districts they represented in violation of state statutory residency requirements, and at least 34 electors held dual offices, in direct violation of statutes prohibiting dual-office holding.”
On Thursday, a Democratic congresswoman from Texas confirmed she and 10 colleagues were planning to contest Mr Trump’s election when members meet at the Capitol. "This is an American question of justice and fairness and the appropriate running of presidential elections," Sheila Jackson Lee told Politico.
The results of the Electoral College vote have only been challenged twice in 140 years.
