WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Former President Donald Trump considered replacing the acting attorney general with an official willing to pursue unsubstantiated claims of election fraud, and he pushed the Justice Department to ask the Supreme Court to invalidate President Joe Biden’s victory, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.
Citing people familiar with the matter, the Journal said the efforts in the last weeks of Trump’s presidency failed because of resistance from his Justice appointees who refused to file what they viewed as a legally baseless lawsuit in the Supreme Court.
Other senior department officials later threatened to resign if Trump fired then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, several people familiar with the discussions told the Journal.
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters on Saturday.
Senior officials including Rosen, former Attorney General William Barr and former acting Solicitor General Jeffrey Wall refused to file the Supreme Court case, concluding there was no basis to challenge the election outcome and the federal government had no legal interest in whether Trump or Biden won the presidency, some of these people told the Journal.
Photo Members of the New York National Guard march in formation on the east front of the US Capitol building on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, USA, 22 January 2021. Approximately 25,000 National Guard troops from all over the country were activated in order to protect the US Capitol and other locations in Washington following the January 6th attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob. EPA-EFE/SAMUEL CORUM
