Federal inquiry sought into fake electors
LANSING, Mich. — Michigan’s attorney general is asking federal prosecutors to open a criminal investigation into 16 Republicans who submitted false certificates stating they were the state’s presidential electors despite Democrat Joe Biden’s 154,000-vote victory there in 2020.
Atty. Gen. Dana Nessel disclosed Thursday that her office had been evaluating charges for nearly a year but decided to refer the matter to the U.S. attorney in western Michigan.
“Under state law, I think clearly you have forgery of a public record, which is a 14year offense, and election law forgery, which is a fiveyear offense,” she told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. But the Justice Department, she said, is best-suited to investigate and potentially prosecute.
The spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment Friday.
Nessel alleged a “coordinated effort” by Republican parties in several battleground states including Michigan to push so-called alternate slates of electors with fake documents.
“Obviously this is part of a much bigger conspiracy,” she said.
American Oversight, a watchdog group, obtained certificates last March that had been submitted by Republicans in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. New Mexico and Pennsylvania Republicans added a caveat saying they were submitting the certificates in case they were later recognized as duly elected, qualified electors.
On Jan. 8, 2021, the Office of the Federal Register — which coordinates certain functions of the electoral college between states and Congress — notified Michigan’s elections director and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s chief lawyer in an email that it had received unofficial, signed certificates from GOP electors who were not appointed by the Democratic governor.
The group includes Republican National Committeewoman Kathy Berden and Meshawn Maddock, cochair of the Michigan Republican Party.
The Michigan GOP had no immediate comment. The Associated Press left messages seeking comment from Berden and Maddock on Friday.
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson’s office last month gave the email to a U.S. House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.
When Michigan’s electors cast 16 votes for Biden in December 2020 after certification of his victory by 2.8 percentage points, a group that included some GOP state House members tried to enter the state Capitol with then-President Trump’s electoral college candidates. They were turned away by state police but claimed in the certificates that they met “in the State Capitol.”
The invalid certificates also were mailed to the U.S. Senate, Benson, and the federal court for western Michigan. Two Republicans did not sign the documents and were replaced.
In another swing state, Wisconsin, pending complaints allege that GOP electors committed fraud by submitting the false paperwork. Biden won Wisconsin by nearly 21,000 votes, a result that has withstood recounts, lawsuits and fraud investigations.
Complaints have been filed with the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission and the Milwaukee County district attorney, but neither has announced whether they are taking action in response. A complaint against attorney Andrew Hitt, who was chairman of the Wisconsin Republican Party at the time, has been filed with the agency that handles complaints against lawyers.
In Pennsylvania, Trump electors signed the documents in a Republican marketing consultant’s office, two blocks from the state Capitol. The state Republican Party said that the electors met at the request of the Trump campaign, and described it as a “conditional vote.”
Bernie Comfort, the campaign’s Pennsylvania chair, said the move was “procedural” in case the election was overturned. She claimed it was “in no way an effort to usurp or contest the will of the Pennsylvania voters,” though Trump and his allies were pressuring lawmakers and courts to do just that.