President Trump discussed the election with Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler, but the top state lawmaker’s office claims that the talks didn’t go exactly as initially reported.
Trump had two calls with Cutler, a Republican, about Pennsylvania election law, according to his spokesman, Michael Straub.
The Washington Post first reported the calls on Monday evening, claiming, “President Trump called the speaker of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives twice during the past week to make an extraordinary request for help reversing his loss in the state.”
But Straub took issue with that characterization, telling the Washington Examiner: “It was not a conversation about how to overturn the electors. Pennsylvania election law changed dramatically in the last 18 months. Cutler provided info on those changes — and also on illegal interventions by our state Supreme Court. Cutler further provided info on what our legislation could and could not do with regards to future legislative actions.”
Straub clarified that while the speaker did tell the president that the state’s Legislature would not be able to overturn its electors, the topic was not the primary subject of the two calls.
The Associated Press reported on Monday night the president “pressed for the state’s Legislature to replace the electors for President-elect Joe Biden with those loyal to Trump,” citing a “person briefed on the matter” who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.
“It was part of the conversation,” Straub said. “But I’m told it wasn’t a point of contention or pressure.”
Late last week, Cutler joined about 60 other Republican state lawmakers in urging Pennsylvania’s congressional representatives to object to the state’s electoral votes when Congress goes to certify the election results in January.
“The president said, ‘I’m hearing about all these issues in Philadelphia, and these issues with your law,'” Straub told the Washington Post. “‘What can we do to fix it?'”
Straub later told the Washington Examiner that as he was not on the call, he was merely paraphrasing the president and not quoting him directly.
The Washington Post reported on Saturday that the president pressed Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp to call a state Legislature special session to override the results and appoint electors who would back the president. Kemp told state lawmakers on Sunday he would not call a special session.
Trump lost Pennsylvania by 1.2 percentage points.
