Who Is Emily Murphy? Trump Official Delaying Transfer Of Power To Biden

Emily Murphy is one of the most powerful people in Washington these days, overseeing the government agency that doles out taxpayer dollars to enable a peaceful transition of power from president to president.

But Murphy is a staunch Republican appointed by President Donald Trump -- and she's not playing ball as long as her boss is contesting the outcome of the Nov. 3 election results, which right now have Democrat Joe Biden as the winner.

Trump or his supporters already has filed lawsuits in a handful of states, most notably Georgia, where the vote counting continues, and Pennsylvania, which gave Biden the Electoral College votes he needed -- the threshold is 270 -- to let him declare victory Saturday.

Members of the Electoral College cast their ballots Dec. 14 -- the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December as stipulated by the Constitution -- but the transition of power practically speaking begins immediate after the popular vote is tallied.

Murphy gets her power from the Presidential Transition Act of 1963, which calls of the GSA administrator to "ascertain" the winner based on the process detailed in the Constitution -- and she hasn't made that determination.

"An ascertainment has not yet been made,” GSA spokeswoman Pamela Pennington said in a statement carried by ABC News.

Murphy, a St. Louis native who is a lawyer, was appointed to lead the GSA by Trump in 2017. She came under fire fom House Democrats in 2018 for giving misleading information in a real estate matter that involved Trump's financial interest.

Lawmakers claimed she decided to keep the FBI building downtown so a developer wouldn't take the land for a hotel, which would compete with a Trump property. They accused Murphy of discussing the deal inside the Oval Office.

Biden supports took to Twitter over Murphy's foot-dragging, describing her as a “lunatic” supporter of the president and a traitor “engaged in sedition against America by refusing to authorize the transition to President-Elect Biden.”

A handful of others, though, pointed out Murphy is powerless without Trump's OK to put the transition wheels in motion: "Emily Murphy is 100% only doing what Trump tells her to do," one tweeter posted.