Governor Bullock Files Brief Asking U.S. Supreme Court to Reject Texas Lawsuit

• December 11 2020

Governor Steve Bullock last night filed a brief telling the United States Supreme Court to reject a Texas lawsuit intended to reverse the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. Governor Bullock filed the brief because of grave concerns about attacks on the rule of law.

“Our democracy is not a game. The decisions of elected officials have real consequences for the rule of law and the underpinnings of our democracy that are more important than currying favor with an outgoing president. It is up to all of us to defend the rule of law and our representative democracy. Without it, we are lost.”

The Texas suit seeks to overturn election results in four states—Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Georgia—because they took actions to reduce the spread of the coronavirus during voting.

“Texas chose not to include the State of Montana, where President Trump and other Republicans were successful in a mail ballot election conducted to reduce the impact of COVID—underscoring, of course, that this action is less about election integrity than it is about attempting to overturn the will of the electorate,” Governor Bullock wrote in his brief.

The brief warns that “if Texas is successful in its suit, it would destabilize the results of elections in Montana and any other state that took valid state-law actions to minimize the impact of the virus on voting, including states that delivered victories to Republican candidates using mail ballots” and would “disenfranchise voters.”

Rather than adding his signature to a multistate brief, Governor Bullock wrote and filed his own—noting Montana’s unique experience protecting voters from the risk of coronavirus while holding a secure democratic election. Governor Bullock’s brief notes that the Montana Attorney General’s support for the Texas lawsuit is a “surprise” because “nearly identical claims arose in litigation in Montana this fall and were resoundingly rejected by a federal district court.” The Montana Attorney General conceded in a prepared press statement that he joined the Texas case even while recognizing it has a “slim chance” of success.

The U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr has stated that “we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election” and 56 lawsuits challenging the election results have been dismissed.

The brief is available from the Supreme Court here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22O155/163482/20201210234950524_22O155%20Bullock.pdf