GOP senator congratulates Biden, says Trump should accept results

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) on Saturday night congratulated Joe Biden as the president-elect while calling on President Trump to “accept the outcome of the election” and allow a smooth transition process.

Toomey issued a lengthy statement urging Trump to accept the election results showing a win for Biden after a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by the Trump campaign alleging widespread ballot fraud in Pennsylvania.

“With today’s decision by Judge Matthew Brann, a longtime conservative Republican whom I know to be a fair and unbiased jurist, to dismiss the Trump campaign’s lawsuit, President Trump has exhausted all plausible legal options to challenge the result of the presidential race in Pennsylvania,” Toomey said in a statement.

Toomey, who has announced his retirement from politics at the end of 2022, also recognized Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) as the president-elect and vice president-elect.

“I congratulate President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on their victory. They are both dedicated public servants and I will be praying for them and for our country,” he said.

Toomey is the fifth Senate Republican to congratulate Biden on winning the 2020 presidential election.

GOP Sens. Mitt Romney (Utah), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Susan Collins (Maine) and Ben Sasse (Neb.) have already congratulated Biden.

Toomey previously said it was “quite likely” that Biden would be the next president, though he said it was not yet a 100 percent certainty.

Other Republican senators have said they expect Biden to be inaugurated on Jan. 20, including Sens. John Cornyn (Texas), Marco Rubio (Fla.) and James Risch (Idaho).

Toomey issued his statement after Brann, a federal judge for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, issued a strongly worded opinion dismissing the Trump campaign’s lawsuit seeking to delay certification of election results in the commonwealth.

The judge took Trump’s lawyers to task for making “strained legal arguments without merit” and “speculative accusations” not based on evidence.

Brann, an appointee of former President Obama, derided the Trump campaign’s lawsuit as a “Frankenstein’s Monster” that sought to disenfranchise nearly 7 million voters in Pennsylvania.

The lawsuit cannot be resubmitted since it was dismissed with “prejudice.”

Toomey noted the decision “follows a series of procedural losses for President Trump’s campaign.”

He pointed out that officials in Georgia certified Biden’s win in that state on Friday and that Michigan state lawmakers rejected “the apparent attempt by President Trump to thwart the will of Michigan voters and select an illegitimate slate of electoral college electors.”

Toomey said the recent developments “confirm that Joe Biden won the 2020 election and will become the 46th president of the United States.”

Toomey will be the next chairman of the Senate Banking Committee if Republicans keep their majority in 2021 by winning at least one of two runoff Senate races in Georgia scheduled for Jan. 5. He says he will retire from Congress at the end of 2022 and return to the private sector.