Trump calls for recount in Georgia after winner certified by Biden

• Lawyers for the Trump campaign said in a statement on Saturday that they had called for a recount in Georgia, after election results showed President-elect Joe Biden won the state.
• The petition was filed a day after Brad Raffensperger, Republican Secretary of State for Georgia, said he had officially certified Biden as the winner of the state’s presidential election.
• Friday’s certification came after an audit that included a manual recount of more than 5 million paper ballots, which showed Biden had won the state by more than 12,000 votes.
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Lawyers for the Trump campaign said in a statement on Saturday that they had called for a recount in Georgia, after election results showed President-elect Joe Biden won the state.

The petition was filed a day after Brad Raffensperger, Republican Secretary of State for Georgia, said he had officially certified Biden as the winner of the state’s presidential election.

Friday’s certification came after an audit that included a manual recount of more than 5 million paper ballots. Final results showed Biden received 49.5% of the vote versus 49.3% from President Donald Trump, with the president-elect winning by more than 12,000 votes.

“Today, the Trump campaign filed a petition for a recount in Georgia,” the Trump campaign said in a statement. “We ensure that all aspects of Georgia State law and the US Constitution are respected so that every legal vote is counted.”

The statement also highlighted the importance of signature matching for mail-in ballots, which is done upon receipt of the ballot, before it is counted.

Raffensperger, who has received threats for his job overseeing the elections, expressed full confidence in the vote count.

“The election appears to be very precise,” Secretary of State told Insider Grace Panetta. “And as a Republican I’m disappointed, but as secretary of state my job is to report specific results.”

In an editorial published in the Washington Post on Saturday, he again defended the accuracy of the count, saying “Georgia’s electoral system has never been so secure or trustworthy.”

Georgian law allows a candidate to request a recount if the results are less than 0.5%. Biden beat Trump by 0.25%.

Georgia has turned around for Biden after supporting Trump in 2016, marking the first victory for a Democratic presidential candidate in the state since 1992.