Stein escalates Pa. recount effort

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is taking her bid for a statewide recount of Pennsylvania’s Nov. 8 presidential election to federal court.

After announcing Stein and recount supporters were dropping their case in state court, lawyer Jonathan Abady said they will seek an emergency federal court order Monday.

“Make no mistake — the Stein campaign will continue to fight for a statewide recount in Pennsylvania,” Abady said in a statement Saturday night. “We are committed to this fight to protect the civil and voting rights of all Americans.”

He said barriers to a recount in Pennsylvania are pervasive and the state court system is ill-equipped to address the problem.

Stein has spearheaded a recount effort in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, three states with a history of backing Democrats for president that were narrowly and unexpectedly won by Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton.

Stein has framed the campaign as an effort to explore whether voting systems had been hacked and the election result manipulated. Stein’s lawyers, however, have offered no evidence of hacking in Pennsylvania’s election, and the state Republican Party and Trump had asked the court to dismiss the state court case.

The recount-campaign decision came two days before a hearing was scheduled in the case. Saturday’s filing to withdraw the case said the Green Party-backed voters who filed it “are regular citizens of ordinary means” and cannot afford the $1 million bond ordered by the court by 5 p.m. Monday.