Trump-appointed judge says Gohmert’s lawsuit against Pence lacked standing

A court case filed by Republican Texas Representative Louie Gohmert, which sought to give Vice President Mike Pence the legal authority to singlehandedly overturn the results of the November presidential election, has been thrown out by Trump-appointee U.S. District Judge Jeremy Daniel Kernodle.

In his decision, Kernodle said that Gohmert and his other plaintiffs lacked the legal standing to argue their case.

“The problem for Plaintiffs here is that they lack standing,” Kernodle wrote in his decision. “Plaintiff Louie Gohmert, the United States Representative for Texas’s First Congressional District, alleges at most an institutional injury to the House of Representatives. Under well-settled Supreme Court authority, that is insufficient to support standing.”

Kernodle also made a similar determination for the other 12 plaintiffs, all Republican presidential electors for the state of Arizona, saying they lacked standing as they were essentially suing for an injury related to Pence, and not directly to them.

Gohmert’s lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District on December 27, sought to challenge the 1887 Electoral Count Act, a law that requires Pence to oversee congressional approval of the Electoral College’s final votes for president.

The lawsuit argued that the 1887 law violates the 12th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which plaintiffs claimed gives Pence the right to singlehandedly throw out any votes that were fraudulently obtained, regardless of whether the majority of Congress agrees.

Pence himself had asked for the case to be thrown out on technical grounds stating, “plaintiffs have sued the wrong defendant.”

Gohmert is expected to speak Friday night on the conservative-leaning network Newsmax about his reaction to the case’s dismissal. It is unclear whether Gohmert will appeal the decision to an appellate court.

Pence has yet to publicly comment on whether he will support efforts by congressional Republicans to oppose the Electoral College certification of results when he presides over a January 6 approval vote held by both chambers of Congress.

Pence has neither publicly acknowledged that he and Trump lost the November 3 presidential election, nor has he repeated the president’s unverified claims that widespread voter fraud caused them to lose.

He also hasn’t acknowledged the nearly 60 court cases from the Trump campaign and other Republicans seeking to overturn the election results that have all been withdrawn or dismissed from courts for lack of evidence, USA Today reports.

Newsweek contacted Gohmert’s office for comment.