HARRISBURG, Pa. — As counting of ballots continued in Pennsylvania, top state officials responded to a lawsuit filed by the Trump campaign on Wednesday seeking to temporarily halt ballot counting.
Gov. Tom Wolf strongly condemned the suit as an attempt to disenfranchise legitimate Pennsylvania voters.
“I'm going to fight like hell to protect the vote of every Pennsylvanian,” Wolf said at an election update Wednesday evening. “I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure that every vote counts.”
The lawsuit challenges Pennsylvania's ballot extension that allows ballots to be counted if they arrive up to three days following the election.
It also seeks to stop counting of ballots until there is "meaningful transparency" in the process.
Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar, against whom the lawsuit is filed, responded that this election has likely been the state’s most transparent yet.
“We've got counties live streaming, we've got party and candidate representatives watching every step of that process,” Boockvar said. “It's just not happening. There's no evidence of anything like what was alleged.”
The strong response from the Governor’s Office and the Pennsylvania Department of State comes as the country waits to find out who won the critical battleground state.
Counting is going slightly faster than expected, Boockvar said. However, final results likely won’t be known for several days.
“We really won't know the full scope of the universe of ballots until the canvass is finished,” Boockvar said.
Wolf and Boockvar urged patience and said all ballots legally cast would be counted.
Ballots that arrive to county election offices will be counted, but because of the lawsuit will be segregated until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on the state’s extension to accept ballots.
“We will oppose any effort to shut down the vote,” Boockvar said.
As of 9:14 Wednesday night, 763,311 cast ballots had yet to be processed, according to the Department of State’s website dashboard.