Dem
51
GOP
49
Donald Trump's campaign and the RNC seem to be more focused on hiring "election integrity" lawyers and poll watchers than on knocking on doors. The RNC will hire more people for challenging the election results than for any other department it has. The lawyers will gather evidence for the lawsuits that will inevitably follow a Trump loss. They will try to get the courts to invalidate the election results in any states Trump loses.
That may not be so easy, though. The Electoral Count Reform Act states that the certificate of ascertainment, which lists the legal electors, must be signed by the governor or some other official (invariably the secretary of state) if state law requires that. The problem for Trump is that most of the key officials in the swing states are Democrats. Here is the list:
| State | Governor | Secretary of State |
| Arizona | Katie Hobbs (D) | Adrian Fontes (D) |
| Georgia | Brian Kemp (R) | Brad Raffensperger (R) |
| Michigan | Gretchen Whitmer (D) | Jocelyn Benson (D) |
| Minnesota | Tim Walz (D) | Steve Simon (D) |
| Nevada | Joe Lombardo (R) | Francisco Aguilar (D) |
| New Hampshire | Chris Sununu (R) | David Scanlan (R) |
| North Carolina | Roy Cooper (D) | Elaine Marshall (D) |
| Pennsylvania | Josh Shapiro (D) | Al Schmidt (R) |
| Wisconsin | Tony Evers (D) | Sarah Godlewski (D) |
Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) have already proved they are straight shooters. New Hampshire could be problematical, but it has only 4 EVs . Nevada has 6 EVs, but if Gov. Joe Lombardo (R-NV) tries to play games, in the resulting lawsuit, the Democratic secretary of state will be on the other side. He could say: I am the person who counted the votes and Biden won.
The RNC strategy is not only post-election, but also pre-election. For example, it has filed lawsuits to prevent ballots that are postmarked before Election Day but arrive afterwards from being counted. Many states have specific laws allowing ballots that arrive within a certain window after Election Day to be counted. Would the Supreme Court dare tell the states these laws are somehow unconstitutional, when the Constitution says nothing about the matter other than the state legislatures shall determine how the electoral votes are cast? Another possible issue is counting or not counting ballots where the voter has failed to write the date on the envelope.
The DNC is also building a legal team and filing lawsuits already. For example, it is challenging a 2023 law in North Carolina that makes it harder to register on Election Day, something traditionally allowed in North Carolina.
The RNC, in particular, is making a bigger effort to win on legal grounds than the DNC. But the downside of this is that the DNC has more money to go out and get voters to cast ballots for Joe Biden. In the long run, trying to get more votes may be a better strategy than trying to get the courts to reverse an election after you have lost it. (V)