Trump team says Democrats 'panicking' ahead of election

WASHINGTON

US President Donald Trump's re-election campaign claimed Monday that Democrats are "panicking" ahead of Election Day, claiming they are hatching a plot to "steal" the election.

Spokesman Justin Clark said presidential nominee Joe Biden's team is planning to file legal challenges for states to extend counting of mail-in ballots because the Democrat "has not run up a large enough lead in early votes in battleground states and they know that President Trump's in-person votes on Election Day will make up the difference and propel him to victory.”

“We fully anticipate that Democrats will be in court arguing to extend deadlines for accepting and counting votes mailed and received well past deadlines enacted by individual state laws," Clark claimed in a statement. “The last gasp of the Biden campaign will be ugly and it will be ruthless.”

Over 97 million Americans have already cast early ballots either in-person or by mail ahead of the Nov. 3 election with some states reporting early turnout that exceeds the total number of people who voted in the last presidential election.

Trump on Sunday said he would be sending a team of his lawyers into Pennsylvania "as soon as" polling places close in the state to fight efforts to extend mail-in ballot counting.

"I don’t think it’s fair that we have to wait a long period of time after the election," he said. "If people wanted to get their ballots in, they should have gotten their ballots in long before that -- a long time."

The state is pivotal to either candidates' success, and over 2.4 million people have cast early ballots by mail in the state. Those will not begin to be counted until after polls close at 8 p.m. local time (0100 GMT). And at least seven Pennsylvania counties may delay counting mailed ballots further until the day after the election.