Former Republican governor calls Trump's attempts to stop counts 'un-American'

Tom Ridge called US president ‘wrong’

Former Republican Pennsylvania governor Tom Ridge called President Donald Trump’s attempts to stop votes being counted in multiple states as “un-American”.

President Trump claimed victory in the election on Wednesday morning, while he was shown to be winning Pennsylvania and Michigan by a large margin.

However, the results shifted more in favour of Democratic challenger Joe Biden when mail-in-ballots and city votes were counted as the night progressed. The states did not start counting mail-in-ballots until after polls closed.

Mr Biden was declared as the winner of Michigan on Wednesday evening, but Pennsylvania is too close to call, with the results expected later today after the Democratic candidate closed the gap behind Mr Trump to just 2 per cent with 14 per cent of votes left to tally.

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As the ballots started to shift towards Mr Biden during Wednesday, Mr Trump, alongside members of his family and campaign, declared that he had won Pennsylvania and called for votes to stop being counted.

Mr Trump tweeted on Wednesday afternoon: “We have claimed, for Electoral Vote purposes, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” as he falsely claimed that ballots had been dumped in Michigan.

Comments claiming the president had won Pennsylvania were also posted by the White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, the Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien, and Mr Trump’s eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump.

The Trump campaign also issued lawsuits in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Georgia, in an attempt to stop the counts in the states.

Mr Ridge, who also served as secretary of homeland security during George W Bush’s presidency, said on a call organised by a group called the National Council on Election Integrity, that Mr Trump’s comments were “wrong,” according to Yahoo News.

“I’m grateful and truly grateful that so many Republicans, so many conservative Republicans, have repudiated his remarks as being inappropriate — I’ll say un-American”, Mr Ridge said.

He added: “Because to a certain extent he’s trying to disenfranchise not only millions of Pennsylvanians, but millions of voters in Michigan and Wisconsin and Nevada and elsewhere.

“So, Mr President, you were wrong.”

Other Republicans criticised the president for his actions on Wednesday, as former New Jersey governor Chris Christie said that Mr Trump “undercut his own credibility” by declaring victory before the election had been declared.

While, Republican Ohio governor Mike DeWine told Fox News on Wednesday that although he still considers himself a supporter of Mr Trump, he will accept whatever the result is.

He said: “If it ends up being Biden, all of us will accept that, because that’s what we do in this country.”

As of the time of writing, Mr Trump is still leading Mr Biden in Pennsylvania by 2 percentage points, with 87 per cent of votes counted.

While in Georgia, Mr Trump has a lead of 0.3 per cent, with about 6,000 votes still left to be tallied by the state.

The Associated Press is still reporting both states as too close to call.

The Independent has contacted the Trump campaign for comment.