Politics updates: Audit says DNC made Iowa caucus chaos worse; Trump-appointed judge tosses another election lawsuit

USA TODAY's coverage of the 2020 election and President-elect Joe Biden's transition continues this week as he rolls out more of his picks for top jobs in his administration. With the final vote counts certified, the Electoral College will meet in statehouses across the U.S. Monday where the 538 electors will cast the ballots making Biden's victory official.

President Donald Trump has cleared the way for Biden's team to use federal resources and get briefings during the transition, although Trump has yet to formally concede the race.

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Audit finds National Democratic Party complicated Iowa caucus problems

The national Democratic Party "aggressively interjected itself" into the 2020 Iowa caucuses, slowing down and complicating the development of a reporting app that crashed on caucus night and delayed the tallying of results, an audit of the process found.

The Iowa Democratic Party commissioned the audit shortly after the Feb. 3 caucuses, hiring a pair of Democratic lawyers to examine the technical and procedural failures that prevented it from announcing a caucus winner for days after the high-profile contest ended.

The party released the results to its State Central Committee Saturday morning. A copy was obtained by the Des Moines Register, which is part of the USA TODAY Network.

On caucus night, the report says the DNC demanded access to the state party’s reporting data in real-time. It wanted access so that it could calculate the results to confirm the state's numbers before anything would be released to the public.

"When the DNC’s database conversion tool failed to work correctly, it caused the DNC to wrongly stop the IDP from reporting its results, and the IDP’s entire planned reporting process was thrown into disarray," the report said. "The DNC’s interjection was the catalyst for the resulting chaos in the boiler room and the IDP’s attempts to manually collect and confirm caucus results by hand."

The "boiler room" was a call center where the state party had staffed volunteers to take phone calls from precinct captains who wanted to report results over the telephone, rather than use the app. When the app failed, the call center was overrun.

– Brianne Pfannenstiel, Des Moines Register

Federal judge throws out Trump election lawsuit

A federal judge threw out one of President Donald Trump's election lawsuits Saturday.

U.S. District Judge Brett Ludwig – a Trump nominee – concluded the president didn't have the ability to bring his lawsuit in federal court and waited too long to file it.

Ludwig described the case as "extraordinary."

"A sitting president who did not prevail in his bid for reelection has asked for federal court help in setting aside the popular vote based on disputed issues of election administration, issues he plainly could have raised before the vote occurred," Ludwig wrote. "This court allowed the plaintiff the chance to make his case and he has lost on the merits. In his reply brief, plaintiff 'asks that the Rule of Law be followed.' It has been."

Trump sought to have the Republican-led Legislature, rather than voters, decide how to allocate Wisconsin's 10 electoral votes. In a hearing Thursday, Ludwig told Trump's legal team that giving that power to lawmakers would result in "probably the most remarkable ruling in the history of this court or the federal judiciary."

– Patrick Marley, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Wisconsin Supreme Court hears Trump election challenge

MADISON, Wis. – President Donald Trump's legal team goes before the state Supreme Court on Saturday in one of his last efforts to overturn Wisconsin's election results after a string of legal defeats.

The arguments — a rarity on a weekend — come a day after a judge turned down the Republican president's claims that several of Wisconsin's election practices violated the law and concluded election officials were right to give the state's 10 electoral votes to Democrat Joe Biden.

The justices will review that decision and are expected to rule before the Electoral College meets at noon Monday.

Trump faces a difficult path. The state Supreme Court last week ruled 4-3 against Trump and his backers in three lawsuits.

In addition, this week the U.S. Supreme Court turned away an attempt by Texas to rescind the results in Wisconsin and three other states, a federal judge in Wisconsin dismissed a lawsuit brought by Trump allies and a different federal judge expressed deep skepticism of yet another case seeking to prevent Wisconsin's electoral votes from going to Biden.

Biden won Wisconsin by about 21,000 votes out of 3.3 million cast, giving him a margin of victory of 0.6 percentage points. Trump paid $3 million for a recount in Dane and Milwaukee counties, but the recount slightly widened Biden's win.

– Patrick Marley, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Trump named 'Loser of the Year' by German news magazine

German news magazine Der Spiegel named President Donald Trump the "loser of the year" Thursday, the same day TIME named President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-Kamala Harris TIME’s 2020 person of the year.

The magazine bestowed the title – "Der Verlierer des Jahres" in German – on Trump in an article focused on the president's unfounded claims of widespread election fraud since his defeat.

"Nothing is normal under Trump," the article says. "He refuses to admit defeat. Instead, he speaks of massive electoral fraud, although there is no evidence for it. The whole thing is not surprising. Trump's presidency ends as it began. Without decency and without dignity."

Trump continues to refuse to concede after the Supreme Court rejected another lawsuit aimed at throwing out the election result and despite the official certification of the vote tallies ahead of the Electoral College vote Monday.

– Sarah Elbeshbishi

Sarah Palin stumps for Georgia's GOP senators

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is on the campaign trail in Georgia, campaigning for Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler in the lead up to their January runoff elections.

"Georgia we need you to not just show up Jan. 5, not just win, but to crush it," Palin told a packed parking lot of supports in Marietta Friday.

Palin, the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee, also repeated Trump’s baseless claims of voter fraud and that the election was "rigged."

The results of Georgia’s runoff elections will be the determining factor of what party will control the Senate. If Perdue and Loeffler’s democratic opponents Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock both win their races, the Democrats will control the Senate with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris able to break any ties.

"We’re going to keep making America Great," Palin said. "And Georgia, it’s in your hands."

– Sarah Elbeshbishi

GOP election official tells Wis. legislators no 'credible evidence of large-scale voter fraud'

MADISON, Wis. – A Republican member of the Wisconsin Elections Commission told legislative committees Friday that he has "not seen credible evidence of large-scale voter fraud in Wisconsin during the November election."

"There were no dumps of ballots during the night, none," Dean Knudson told lawmakers looking into the conduct of the Nov. 3 election that Democrat Joe Biden won by about 21,000 votes over President Donald Trump.

"There is no evidence of any fraud related to Dominion voting machines in Wisconsin," Knudson said. "Counting in Wisconsin did not stop and restart. Election observers were allowed to be present throughout Election Day and election night proceedings. The number of voters on our poll books match the number of ballots cast.

"There has been no criminal evidence presented to the Elections Commission that any of these problems occurred in Wisconsin," he said.

– Bill Glauber and Patrick Marley, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Trump supporters rally in DC

Thousands of supporters of President Donald Trump are expected to gather in Washington, D.C., on Saturday to protest what they believe was massive fraud in the Nov. 3 election despite any credible evidence such fraud occurred.

The conservative Women for America First obtained the permit for the protest, which will feature South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell, former national security adviser Mike Flynn, and ex-Trump aide Sebastian Gorka.

Trump, who is scheduled to attend the Army-Navy football game in West Point, New York, Saturday afternoon, tweeted that he only learned the protesters were gathering and vowed he will "being seeing them."

Counter-protesters are also expected to gather during the event. Clashes broke out between Trump supporters and counter-protesters at a similar rally in Washington last month, leading to the arrest of at least 20 people.

– William Cummings and N'dea Yancey-Bragg

Wisconsin GOP balks at forking over $3M for recount

MADISON, Wis. – The Republican-led Legislature's budget committee is holding up reimbursements to two counties for their recount costs.

President Donald Trump's campaign paid $3 million for recounts in Dane and Milwaukee counties, Wisconsin's two most Democratic areas.

But two top Republicans said Friday they were withholding the money from the counties for now. They did not explain why.

Lawmakers "are playing politics with money that isn't theirs," said Milwaukee County Clerk George Christenson.

"It's acting in bad faith," he said. "It's not their money. It's Trump's money and this is what he decided to spend it on."

– Patrick Marley, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Politics updates: Audit says DNC made Iowa caucus chaos worse