For a third time, Joe Biden has been declared the winner of Georgia’s presidential election.
A final tally announced by Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger showed that Mr Biden won the normally Republican stronghold by under 12,000 votes.
The state carried out a second recount of the 3 November vote following challenges from President Trump’s team.
Mr Raffensperger, a Republican, warned that debunked claims about voting fraud were “hurting our state”.
President Trump continues to refuse to accept defeat in the vote, alleging, without evidence, there has been widespread fraud.
States are facing deadlines this month to officially certify their results.
“We have now counted legally cast ballots three times, and the results remain unchanged,” Mr Raffensperger said at a news conference from Atlanta on Monday.
“I know there are people that are convinced the election was fraught with problems, but the evidence, the actual evidence, the facts tell us a different story,” he continued.
Mr Trump has failed to make significant headway in his legal challenges to the vote, which have been issued in several battleground states.
The third declaration of Mr Biden’s victory comes two days after Mr Trump travelled to the state to hold a rally for Republican senate candidates, but spent much of his visit attacking the state’s governor for not doing more to aid his legal challenges.
On Monday, federal judges in Georgia and Michigan dismissed more lawsuits brought by the Trump campaign.
The lawsuit in Georgia, which was brought by Trump ally Sidney Powell, had been dubbed the “Kraken” lawsuit after the former-Trump campaign lawyer threatened to release the mythical sea monster on the state’s electoral system.
But Mr Raffensperger said “the claims in the Kraken lawsuit prove to be as mythological as the creature for which they’re named.
“Georgians can now move forward knowing that their votes, and only their legal votes, were counted accurately, fairly, and reliably.”
BBC
