aaron Ford

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sep 2024

14 fake electors from 2020 are Donald Trump electors again in 2024

Fourteen so-called fake electors who participated in former President Donald Trump’s 2020 scheme to throw the election results into chaos will once again serve as electors for Trump in 2024, including several who currently face criminal charges.

With input from the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee, Republican state parties in Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Nevada have renominated 14 of the 84 fake electors from the 2020 election. Wisconsin's electors aren't publicly available until the first week of October, according to state election officials. A legal settlement bars unauthorized Wisconsin 2020 electors from serving as electors for Trump again.

There are no repeat electors from 2020 on this year’s Republican slates for Arizona and Georgia, the other two states where fake electors signed certificates incorrectly declaring Trump the winner.

The 14 former fake electors who are serving again include the Nevada Republican Party chairman, the Republican National Committeeman from Pennsylvania and several current or former county chairs.

usatoday

"Politically or in terms of the health of our democracy, the idea that people who potentially committed a crime in trying to further a scheme to subvert the results of the 2020 election... the idea that they are in any way involved in politics is troubling," Director of the Safeguarding Democracy Project at UCLA School of Law Rick Hasen said.

While some may have acted with the belief that they were just a back up if there was a legal change to the outcome, Hasen noted, "some of them, there have at least been allegations that they knew what they were doing and they knowingly engaged in criminal conduct."

None of the 14 repeat electors responded to USA TODAY's attempts to contact them.

The Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee did not respond to a request for comment.

Trump is facing four felony charges in Washington, D.C. related to leading conspiracies to reverse the 2020 results and disenfranchise millions of voters. He has refused to commit to unconditionally accepting the results of the upcoming 2024 election, and while he has sometimes acknowledged that he lost the 2020 race, he has also continued to falsely tell supporters that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him.

Pending charges

Charges have been brought against the fake electors in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and Nevada, as well as some people working with Trump.

Some of the cases are moving very slowly. In August, a Maricopa County judge set a tentative trial date of Jan. 5, 2026, for Arizona's fake electors case. The state GOP did not renominate any of the 2020 electors. In Nevada, the state has appealed to the state supreme court a lower court decision to reject the fake electors case stating it had been filed in the wrong county.

More:‘Somewhat dicey' and ‘problematic’: Inside Trump's bid to have fake electors overturn 2020 election

Still, electors might think twice about being party to signing such certificates again, Hasen said.

"Anyone who's an elector who's asked to do something shady this time, might think, hmm, last time around, these people were indicted, so maybe I shouldn't do that," Hasen said.

Michigan

The Michigan Republican Party has renominated the most fake electors. Six names that appeared on a certificate falsely claiming that Trump had won the state are on the 2024 list of 15 electors provided by the Michigan Secretary of State's office: Amy Facchinello, John Haggard, Timothy King, Marian Sheridan, Hank Choate and Meshawn Maddock–a former co-chair of the Michigan Republican Party.

Trump lost Michigan in 2020 by about 154,000 votes.

All six of them face criminal charges. The trial has not yet been scheduled but isn't expected to begin this year.

Choate's attorney, David Kallman, said the pending 2020 charges shouldn't affect who is picked to be a 2024 elector. Choate has pleaded not guilty.

"This was another election year. This really has nothing to do with the last 2020, election," he said. "I don't think it really impacts the criminal case at all."

Kallman said that Choate didn't know he was doing anything wrong in 2020. He said Trump's attorney's told the electors that the certificate would only be used if Trump's campaign won a court case overturning the results of the election in Michigan or if the state legislature stepped in.

"My client was told by people he trusted, attorneys at this meeting, that this wasn't going to be used unless one of those things happened," Kallman said.

He said electors were only presented with the page to sign their names, not the page that falsely claimed that they voted in the Capitol building and that Trump won.

Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania Republicans submitted a list of presidential electors to the secretary of state’s office with five former fake electors: Bill Bachenberg, Bernadette Comfort, Ash Khare, Pat Poprik and Andy Reilly. The state has 19 electoral votes. Trump lost in 2020 by about 80,000 votes.

Reilly, an attorney, is also the Republican National Committeeman from Pennsylvania.

The Pennsylvania electors wouldn't sign the fake certificate in 2020 unless the forms specifically said that their votes weren't to be counted until the courts ruled in Trump's favor. Therefore, electors have not been charged with a crime.

Khare, who has been an elector since 1990, told USA TODAY in April that he advocated to include that clause.

"We wanted to make sure that we’re not doing anything illegal," he said.

Nevada

The Nevada Republican Party renominated Michael McDonald, the chair of the state party, and Jesse Law, chairman of the Republican party of Clark County, both of whom signed the 2020 certificate although Trump lost the state by 154,000 votes. The state has six electoral votes.

McDonald, a longtime friend of Trump's who is senior adviser to the 2024 Trump campaign, and Law were among the electors indicted in Nevada. The case, which was dismissed over questions of whether it was filed in the correct county, has been appealed by Attorney General Aaron Ford, a Democrat, to the state Supreme Court.

Trump lost Nevada by more than 30,000 votes.

New Mexico

The New Mexico Republican Party renominated Deborah Weh Maestas, the former state party chair. The state has five electoral votes. It's role in the scheme was always considered an outlier. New Mexico is not a swing state and has supported Democrats in every presidential election since 2008. Trump lost there in 2020 but about 100,000 votes.

Like in Pennsylvania, the 2020 New Mexico electors wouldn't sign unless the forms specifically said that their votes weren't to be counted until the courts ruled in Trump's favor. New Mexico electors have not been charged with a crime.

More:Wisconsin is the last state that may prosecute Trump’s fake electors, but AG Josh Kaul is mum

A key legal change since 2020

Electors normally draw little to no attention. In a presidential election year, each party nominates state electors who will vote for their presidential nominee in the Electoral College if their candidate wins. Party leaders such as the county party chairs or local elected officials are normally selected. Their names must be submitted to the state before the election and made publicly available.

But in 2020 GOP officials in seven states that President Joe Biden won sent fake electoral certificates to Congress stating that former President Donald Trump had actually won. The certificates were an effort to baselessly convince lawmakers and Vice President Mike Pence that there were substantial questions about the outcome of the election in swing states.

The House Select Committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol and Trump's efforts to stay in power after losing the election found that the fake electoral certificates were part of a coordinated effort by Trump's allies to block Congress from certifying the election results. They wanted Congress to return th

Pence refused to accept, or even consider, the "alternate" electoral slates.

Jonathan Diaz, Director of Voting Advocacy for advocacy group Campaign Legal Center, said it is unlikely that scheme would be successful again. In 2022, Congress passed the Electoral Count Reform Act, which changed the rules so Congress can only count electoral certificates signed by the governor of the state or another official approved by state law when the House and Senate meet to count the votes on Jan. 6. It also raised the threshold for members of Congress to object to counting a state from one representative and one senator to one-fifth of each chamber. Also, in 2023 the Supreme Court ruled in Moore v. Harper that state legislatures have little power to overturn election results.

"It's really going to be much, much more difficult for a slate of fake electors to try the same kind of shenanigans that they did in 2020," Diaz said. "The [2022 law] was really targeted at plugging the holes that existed in the previous process, because the law was so old, and really making sure that the kind of effort that we saw focused on that joint session of Congress can't occur again."

*USA TODAY reporter Erin Mansfield contributed to this article

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an 11 23

in December 2020, six Nevada Republicans made efforts to overturn the presidential election results in the state.

According to an exclusive Politico report, the group of "Republican activists and operatives," at ex-President Donald Trump's request, "signed fake certificates on Dec. 14, 2020, falsely declaring themselves to be the state's duly appointed Electoral College representatives."

The state's Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford has been "quietly" probing the efforts of Nevada GOP chair Michael McDonald, Jim DeGraffenreid, "Jesse Law, the head of the Clark County Republican Party; Durward James Hindle III; Eileen Rice; and Shawn Meehan," Politico reports.

Per the report, recently, "Investigators have questioned witnesses about the attempts of the so-called alternate electors to present themselves as viable representatives of the states' voters, according to three people familiar with the probe. Investigators have also asked about documents those people prepared as part of the effort."

Politico notes DeGraffenreid "was in touch with Kenneth Chesebro — a lawyer working with the Trump campaign and a chief architect of the fake elector scheme — in the days before the activists signed the fake certificates, according to the House Jan. 6 select committee report."

Chesebro was indicted alongside Trump and 17 others by a Fulton Country grand jury in August on criminal charges related to their plan to overturn the election.

According to Politico, the attorney general "has previously sent mixed messages about the potential for a state investigation into the false electors' actions," suggesting in May thatcpiminal charges were unlikely.

"As you all know, I have been silent on Nevada's fake electors, except to say that the matter was on our radar," he said days later during a June testimony to the Nevada state legislature. "With it on our radar, we ascertained that current state statutes did not directly address the conduct in question — to the dismay of some, and I’m sure, to the delight of others."

However, Politico reports Ford then said during a September interview, "I've never said that we're not going to prosecute. It is not that I've said that I can do nothing. What I have said, and I've been precise with my wording on purpose, is we don't have statutes in this state that directly address the issue."

Politico report is here.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/4138124-trumps-fake-electors-7-states-he-lost/

no lnx

What’s happening with Trump’s ‘fake electors’ in 7 states he lost

BY NICK ROBERTSON - 08/04/23

Former President Trump was arraigned Thursday on four charges alleging that he attempted to orchestrate a scheme of fraudulent electoral college votes to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

In seven states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — so-called “fake electors” signed paperwork attempting to cast electoral college ballots for Trump instead of their states’ actual winner, President Biden.

The groups hoped that former Vice President Pence would count the fake electors’ certifications instead of the legitimate ones when the electoral college vote was certified on Jan. 6, 2021, changing the result of the election, the indictment alleged. None were successful.

Here’s what each state is, and isn’t, doing to investigate and prosecute them.

Arizona

A group of 22 Arizona Republicans, including the Republican Party chair and multiple state legislature members, signed papers intending to cast false electoral college votes in December 2020. That paperwork is now the focus of both a federal and state investigation.

State Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) ratcheted up her investigation into the group in July, requesting records from involved figures. The investigation is in its early stages.

Figures surrounding the case also received federal subpoenas for information and communication, according to local media.

Georgia

On the day that Georgia certified its electoral results in favor of Biden, 16 Republicans — led by the state’s Republican Party chair — allegedly met in a secret meeting in the state capitol to discuss plans to send an alternate slate of votes to Washington. The group also signed paperwork making their plans official.

The scheme is central to prosecutor Fani Willis’ (D) state probe into attempts to overturn the 2020 election, which may result in an additional indictment for Trump.

At least eight of the fake electors have signed immunity deals with Willis’ office, offering to cooperate in exchange for not being prosecuted.

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An independent reporter, who briefly barged in on the meeting, was called to testify to a grand jury debating whether to charge Trump, his attorney Rudi Giuliani and others this month.

The investigation is effectively complete, Willis said, and a grand jury is expected to decide on whether to charge Trump and others by the end of August.

Uniquely, the probe has also investigated Trump and his allies’ actions in other states.

The Georgia probe is the most significant of any state’s investigation into 2020 election meddling and is the only known case where Trump himself is a target of an investigation.

Michigan

FILE – Attorney General Dana Nessel speaks during a news conference in Detroit, Thursday, Oct. 14, 2021. Published reports say Nessel’s office is asking that a special prosecutor investigate whether the Republican candidate for state attorney general, Matt DePerno, and others should be charged in connection with an effort to gain access to voting machines after the 2020 election. DePerno has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump. (Max Ortiz/Detroit News via AP, File)

A group of 16 Michigan Republicans was charged with crimes related to a fake electors scheme last month, concluding an investigation by state Attorney General Dana Nessel (D) which began again in January.

Nessel initially referred the charges to federal prosecutors in early 2022 but pursued a state case again after federal officials failed to pursue charges after a year.

The group met in the basement of the state Republican Party headquarters and signed documents claiming to be electoral college voters, prosecutors allege. Some of them later showed up at the state capitol and attempted to cast electoral college ballots.

Three of the state’s rightful electors filed a civil suit against the group of 16 in January, requesting $25,000 in damages claiming they suffered humiliation and harassment due to the group’s fake elector scheme.

The scheme is separate from another investigation into attempts to break into voting machines in Michigan. A former GOP attorney general candidate, a state legislator and a prominent Trump campaign lawyer were charged this week in that case.

Nevada

FILE – Nevada State GOP Chairman Michael McDonald announces President Donald Trump before he speaks the Nevada Republican Party Convention at the Suncoast Hotel and Casino Saturday, June 23, 2018, in Las Vegas. New transcripts released on Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2022, by the House Jan. 6 committee reveals Donald Trump and his allies played a direct role in the Nevada Republican Party’s phony elector scheme in 2020. The transcripts show McDonald invoked his Fifth Amendment protection 275 times when he was interviewed in February. (AP Photo/L.E. Baskow, File)

In the Silver State, a half dozen Republicans met in Carson City, Nevada, to organize their own fake elector scheme after the 2020 election.Among them was state GOP chair Michael McDonald, the focus of federal investigators in Nevada.

McDonald’s phone was seized and searched by the FBI in 2022 and he and another elector testified to both the House Jan. 6 committee and for special counsel Jack Smith’s federal investigation.

Both McDonald and the second fake elector, Nevada Republican Party official Jim DeGraffenreid, were given “limited immunity” due to their testimony.

The Nevada scheme was allegedly headed by former state attorney general and GOP Senate candidate Adam Laxalt.

Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford (D)declined to pursue a criminal investigation of McDonald, Laxalt and others.

New Mexico

FILE – New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas talks during a news conference on Feb. 26, 2019, in Albuquerque, N.M. Balderas is asking that changes be made to rules proposed by the U.S. government as it processes damage claims from a historic wildfire sparked by forest managers. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan, File)

New Mexico was a last-minute addition to fake elector plans, Smith’s 45-page indictment alleges.Despite being a state that Biden won comfortably — by about 100,000 votes or nearly 10 percent — the state GOP sent its own electors to vote for Trump, citing pending litigation in other states.

The Republican’s five electors were turned away when they attempted to vote in the state capitol of Santa Fe, but they also signed paperwork asserting a false right to make electoral college votes.

Two of those five voters testified for the House Jan. 6 committee last year, and the New Mexico Secretary of State met with Smith’s investigation team last month.

An eventual suit from the Trump campaign contesting New Mexico’s results was purely a pretext for the elector’s scheme, Smith’s indictment alleges.

State Attorney General Hector Balderas (D) started an investigation into the group in January 2022, but like in Michigan, referred the case to federal prosecutors. There has been no public action in either a state or federal investigation since.

Pennsylvania

MANHEIM, PA – OCTOBER 29: Republican candidate for Pennsylvania Governor Doug Mastriano, (L) his wife Rebecca, and (R) Republican candidate for Lt. Governor Carrie DelRosso addresses the media after a rally at Spooky Nook Sports Complex on October 29, 2022 in Manheim, Pennsylvania. Mastriano faces Democratic challenger Josh Shapiro in the November election. (Photo by Mark Makela/Getty Images)

Fake electors in Pennsylvania include 20 Republicans who planned to contest the state’s results in the 2020 election. Among them were former Rep. Lou Barletta (R-Penn.) and the vice chair of the state GOP.

The point person for the group was state Sen. Doug Mastriano (R), who went on to be the Republican nominee for Governor in 2022, losing to Gov. Josh Shapiro (D).

But the Pennsylvania electors inserted a line into their signed vote document that makes them unique from other states. Their document reads that the votes would only be valid if they are recognized as “duly elected and qualified electors,” which they were not.

In 2022, Shapiro — then the state attorney general — citing that language, said the group’s actions were likely not criminal and that the state would not investigate them.

Wisconsin

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers speaks during the annual State of the State address Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)

Attempts to overturn election results in Wisconsin embroiled Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), whose staff allegedly assisted his state’s slate of fake electors. Johnson has declined any knowledge of the incident.

Ten Wisconsin Republicans signed documents claiming to be electors casting votes for Trump after the 2020 election.

The group drew the ire of Gov. Tony Evers (D) on Friday, who said he wants them prosecuted.

At a press conference Thursday, Attorney General Josh Kaul (D) said his office is tracking the federal investigation into Trump but has not said if the state is investigating the fake elector scheme itself.

Kaul said that the group should be held accountable for their actions and that “further developments” will come.

The fake electors also face a $2.4 million civil lawsuit set to go to trial in September 2024 over their actions.

TAGS 2020 ELECTION FRAUD ARIZONA DANA NESSEL DONALD TRUMP FAKE ELECTORS FAKE ELECTORS FANI WILLIS GEORGIA GEORGIA PROBE HECTOR BALDERAS JACK SMITH JOE BIDEN JOSH KAUL JOSH SHAPIRO LOU BARLETTA MICHAEL MCDONALD MICHIGAN MIKE PENCE NEVADA NEW MEXICO PENNSYLVANIA RON JOHNSON TONY EVERS TRUMP INDICTMENT WISCONSIN

https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2018/11/19/democratic-ag-midterm-climate-change/

Nearly lost in the sometimes breathless coverage of the massive Democratic gains in the House of Representatives and state legislatures was a political sea change in the recent midterm election: for the first time in years, Democrats gained control over the levers of environmental law in four critical states.

In four formerly reliably Republican states—Michigan, Colorado, Wisconsin and Nevada—GOP attorneys general were ousted by Democratic challengers.It is a development, observers say, that represents a stunning defeat for the oil and gas industry, which poured millions of dollars into those campaigns. And it could alter the landscape for several high-profile cases that seek to hold the industry accountable for the ravages of climate change.

“Democratic AGs now hold 27 offices,” said Lizzie Ulmer, communications director for the Democratic Attorneys General Association. “That puts us in the majority.”

The Democrats’ gains on Nov. 6 give them precisely the slim majority the Republicans used to hold. Among the ousted were some staunch supporters of the fossil fuel industry.

The question is whether this new coalition of Democratic attorneys general will act en masse, launching investigations and filing suits as a coordinated bloc, as their Republican predecessors did.

Throughout most of the Obama administration, the GOP attorneys general formed a united front. They challenged the Democratic administration on a host of issues, from health care to critical environmental issues like the Clean Power Plan, which sought to leverage market forces to cut carbon emissions, and the Waters of United States rule that gives federal regulators a larger role in regulating tributaries to major navigable waterways, which previously had been beyond federal reach.

“They were very coordinated in their efforts to be a bloc and to be obstructionist during the Obama administration,” Ulmer said. As Texas Gov. Greg Abbott once described his former job as the state’s attorney general: “I go into the office, I sue the federal government and I go home.”

Even when they were in the minority, however, Democratic attorneys general have been active, especially since the beginning of the Trump administration. They have, either separately or as a team, sued the administration 38 times, with some, like California’s recently re-elected Xavier Becerra, proving particularly litigious. Becerra was involved in 24 of those cases and has won 14 of them.

Those lawsuits are likely to continue, and the new crop of Democratic attorney generals could bolster their ranks and file a few more of their own.

That’s particularly likely in a place like Michigan, where Democrat Dana Nessel easily defeated Tom Leonard, the heir apparent to Republican Bill Schuette, who unsuccessfully ran for governor. Under Schuette, Michigan was among the most ferocious states in its support of the oil and gas industry, filing an amicus brief, for example, backing Exxon against a landmark lawsuit filed by New York State alleging that the company defrauded investors by hiding the risks of climate change. In the brief, Schuette declared climate change to be “unsettled science.”

Many expect Michigan will do an about-face, said Lisa Wozniak, executive director for the Michigan League of Conservation Voters. In a state that is still coping with the fallout from the catastrophic lead contamination of Flint’s water supply, Nessel ran on an aggressive environmental platform. A cornerstone of her campaign was a pledge to use the full force of the office to decommission the 65-year-old Enbridge 5 pipeline, which carries tar sands oil from Canada under the environmentally sensitive Straits of Mackinac connecting Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. “It’s been deemed one of the most serious threats to the Great Lakes and our drinking water,” Wozniak said, “but I’d also say that it’s intimately linked to climate since it is carrying tar sands.”

A larger questions is whether Nessel would consider joining New York and Rhode Island in their liability suits against the industry. “I know she cares deeply about energy policy and climate change,” Wozniak said. “And while she has not specifically said that she’s going to be joining those cases I would not be surprised if she did.” Nessel declined to comment for this story.:{

In neighboring Wisconsin, Josh Kaul unseated another of Exxon’s chief allies, Republican Brad Schimel. That gave the party dominance in the upper Midwest because in Minnesota, Rep. Keith Ellison will replace fellow Democrat Lori Swanson and Illinois also replaced its incumbent with another Democrat, Kwame Raoul. :{

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}:The oil and gas industry also lost an ally in Nevada, where outgoing Republican Attorney General Adam Laxalt had emerged as a key foe of New York’s lawsuit against Exxon. Nevada voters rejected both Laxalt’s bid for governor and elected Aaron Ford, a Democrat, over Laxalt’s hand-picked successor, Wes Duncan.

Democrats also picked up a seat in the gas-rich state of Colorado, where Democrat Phil Weiser defeated Republican George Brauchler. Weiser has not made clear how aggressively he intends to pursue climate-related cases and investigations. Weiser’s office did not immediately respond to a request for an interview, but in the past, the University of Colorado Law School professor has expressed skepticism about the suits filed against oil and gas producers. Three Colorado communities, including the City and County of Boulder, have filed liability suits against Exxon and Suncor.:{

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}:And it remains unclear whether the ever-litigious Becerra, who in the two years since he succeeded Kamala Harris as California’s AG, will join lawsuits against Exxon and other oil producers. He has remained noncommittal on that topic, so it remains to be seen whether that changes now that he has a mandate from the voters.

What is clear is that the new class of attorneys general is taking office at a time when their colleagues have already begun the spade work on some novel approaches to holding fossil fuel producers accountable for the effects of climate change.

In addition to the New York suit, which relies on a 1921 anti-fraud act aimed at curbing Wall Street excesses, and a suit by Rhode Island, which uses its anti-nuisance laws to hold 14 oil and gas companies liable for pollution, Massachusetts is using consumer protection laws to argue that the industry’s failure to alert the public to the long-term risks of its products amounted to false and unfair advertising.

“One thing that’s really interesting in working with Democratic attorneys general across the country is that every office is a little bit different in how it’s structured, what powers they’ve been given, what their budgets are, what sort of authority they have,” Ulmer said. “When it comes to issue-specific questions, it truly is going to depend on the state.

“But I can tell you a number of these candidates have talked about the importance of climate change, protecting the environment, protecting natural resources, making sure that the citizens of their states have clean water and really clean air and protecting the future during their campaigns. We know that’s something they’re going to continue…once they’re fully transitioned into office.”