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As Michigan Charges Trump Electors With Felonies, Recall How Leftists Everywhere Urged 2016 Electors to Defect to Hillary


BY: JORDAN BOYD | JULY 19, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/07/19/as-michigan-charges-trump-electors-with-felonies-recall-how-leftists-everywhere-urged-2016-electors-to-defect-to-hillary/

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel

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If the last two election cycles have proven anything, it’s that Democrats hold an undeniable double standard when it comes to objecting to elections.

The radically different treatment Republicans receive when contesting poorly administered elections intensified this week when Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel charged 16 Republican electors in her state for participating in what she deemed a “false electors scheme.” Defendants, all 55 years or older, each face eight various conspiracy and forgery felony counts that carry a sentence of five to 14 years in prison each.

“The evidence will demonstrate there was no legal authority for the false electors to purport to act as ‘duly elected presidential electors’ and execute the false electoral documents,” Nessel, an avid anti-“election denier” activistsaid in a statement. “Every serious challenge to the election had been denied, dismissed, or otherwise rejected by the time the false electors convened.”

The corporate media hailed Nessel’s allegations as a “righteous prosecution” and “compelling.” History, however, shows the charges are nothing more than a political ploy to advance the left’s war on anyone who questions election results or seeks solutions to preserve election integrity. In fact, attacks on the Trump electors in Michigan, a state where election fraud was reported in both 2020 and 2022, come from the same party and its institutional allies that formally objected to every GOP presidential certification this century and shamelessly attempted to turn electors against their political enemy Trump in 2016.

Sanctimonious Scrambling

As soon as it was clear that Donald Trump, despite the deep state’s best efforts to hoax him out of the running, would become the 45th president of the United States, Democrats and their allies scrambled to influence electors to reject Americans’ wishes. Corporate media quickly rose to the top as the loudest voice calling for electoral disobedience. Articles demanding state electors “prevent an irresponsible demagogue from taking office” and overrule Americans to install Hillary Clinton as president popped up in the pages of The Atlantic, The Washington Post, the Daily BeastVox, and Time.

The New York Times even published an article from a Texas-based Republican elector explaining “Why I Will Not Cast My Electoral Vote for Donald Trump.”

“The Electoral College is essentially an undemocratic system that’s been jury-rigged to make it somewhat more democratic,” another Vox article asserted to reassure any skeptics.

These last-ditch attempts to keep Trump out of the White House were eagerly amplified by people like MSNBC’s Joy Reid and NYT’s Jonathan Weisman, in tweets collated by journalist Michael Tracey.

Propaganda press puppets such as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, WaPo’s EJ Dionne, and NYT’s Paul Krugman added their two cents about why electors should act on their open disdain for a Trump presidency on Twitter and on TV.

Jennifer Palmieri, the communications director for the Hillary Clinton 2016 presidential campaign who later bragged about her role in meddling with the 2016 election by spreading the Russia collusion hoax, also joined in on the dogpile.

Clinton’s top political adviser John Podesta urged a foreign intervention intelligence briefing for electors prior to their vote, hoping that news about Russia would fuel the campaign’s efforts to question the legitimacy of Trump’s victory.

Petitions calling on electors to “Make Hillary Clinton President” made their rounds on the internet. These were promoted by celebrities such as singer Pink and their sentiments echoed by movie star Mark Ruffalo.

Video ads of celebrities pleading and pressuring electors to “prevent an unfit candidate from becoming president” by voting against Trump also circulated.

“You have position, the authority, and the opportunity to go down in the books as an American hero who changed the course of history,” the activists claimed in one “Unite For America” campaign video.

When leftists’ partisan ploy to swindle electors didn’t work, they turned to congressional Democrats to object to Trump’s presidential certification. Multiple Democrats attempted to verbally object to the electoral votes from multiple states until then-Vice President Joe Biden was forced to quiet his colleagues’ ramblings about voting machines and Russia collusion to proceed with formally handing Trump the presidency. Even after that, prominent Democrats such as former President Jimmy Carter and failed Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton supported the theory that Trump was illegitimately elected. Polls showed 42 percent of Americans thought the same.

No Such Thing As ‘False Electors’

In her charges, Nessel repeatedly painted the Michigan defendants as “false elector” co-conspirators who participated in a “desperate effort” to “interfere with and overturn our free and fair election process, and along with it, the will of millions of Michigan voters.” Legally, however, there’s no such thing as “false electors.”

“There were contingent Republican electors named consistent with legal precedent to preserve the still ongoing legal challenges to the validity of Georgia’s certified vote,” my colleague Margot Cleveland explained in May when corporate media tried to smear Republican electors in the Peach State.

A similar elector swap to those in Michigan and Georgia happened in Hawaii in 1960. As Cleveland pointed out, it received praise instead of scrutiny because Democrats and their preferred candidate came out on top.

After Richard Nixon was initially declared the victor in Hawaii in 1960, both Nixon’s and John F. Kennedy’s electors decided to meet and “cast their votes for President and Vice President, and certified their own meeting and votes.” The three Hawaii electors, all Democrats, cast their votes for Kennedy.

When state circuit court Judge Ronald Jamieson eventually ruled Kennedy the winner of the presidency, Cleveland said he “stressed the importance of the Democrat electors having met on Dec. 19, as prescribed by the Electoral Count Act, to cast their ballots in favor of Kennedy.”

“That step allowed the Hawaii governor to then certify Kennedy as the winner of Hawaii’s three electoral votes and, in turn, Congress to count Hawaii’s electoral votes in favor of Kennedy,” she continued.

The stark difference between how Democrats and Republicans are treated on the elector issue merely confirms Americans’ worst fears about the nation’s two-tiered system of justice. More Democrats denied that former President Donald Trump won the 2016 election than the people who claimed President Joe Biden wasn’t legitimately elected in 2020 — but it’s Republicans who face jail time for expressing concern.

If you’re a loyal leftist partisan harping on voting machines and Russian “hacking,” objecting to every GOP victory, and demanding electors vote against the will of the people, you’re a hero and protector of democracy. If you do the same to the benefit of a Republican candidate, you’ve fomented a “coup attempt” and betrayed the soul of the nation.

At a time when the justice system is weaponized against Trump and his followers, that’s a damning double standard that not even the most corrupt, partisan actors can ignore.


Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

The Left’s 2020 ‘Fake Electors’ Narrative Is Fake News


BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND | MAY 15, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/05/15/the-lefts-2020-fake-electors-narrative-is-fake-news/

JFK and Richard Nixon in 1960

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Headlines recently proclaimed that eight of Trump’s “fake” electors accepted immunity deals. Of course, in reporting the news, the corporate outlets all missed the real story — that the electors’ testimony failed to incriminate anyone, including Trump, and that the county prosecutors engaged in massive misconduct. Equally appalling, however, was the corrupt media’s continued peddling of the “fake electors” narrative. 

There were no “fake” electors. There were contingent Republican electors named consistent with legal precedent to preserve the still ongoing legal challenges to the validity of Georgia’s certified vote. 

Nor was appointing an alternative slate of electors some cockamamie plan devised by Trump lawyers. On the contrary, Trump’s election lawyers and the contingent electors followed the precise approach Democrats successfully used when the date Congress established for certifying an election came before the legal challenges John F. Kennedy had brought in Hawaii were decided. And that approach allowed Kennedy to be certified the winner of Hawaii’s three electoral votes on Jan. 6, 1961, even though the Aloha State had originally certified Richard Nixon the victor.

The Hawaii scenario in 1960 mirrors in every material respect the facts on the ground in Georgia on Dec. 14, 2020 — the date both the Democrat and Republican presidential electors met and cast their 16 electoral votes for Joe Biden and Donald Trump respectively. 

Here’s What Happened in Hawaii Six-0 

Election day in 1960 fell on Nov. 8 and pitted Kennedy, a Democrat, against Republican Richard Nixon. The outcome remained unknown for some time, with a total of 93 electoral votes from eight different states undecided in the days following the election. Hawaii was one of those states. 

By Dec. 9 of that year, Kennedy had accumulated enough electoral votes to win the White House, but Hawaii’s winner was still in question. While the presidency did not depend on Hawaii’s three electoral votes, Democrats there had challenged the initial returns that gave Nixon a 141-vote edge, or 0.08 percent margin of victory.

Based on the original count in favor of Nixon, the acting governor of Hawaii, Republican James Kealoha, certified the Republican electors on Nov. 28, 1960. On Dec. 13, over the objections of the state attorney general, state circuit court Judge Ronald Jamieson ordered a recount. Then, on Dec. 19, both the Nixon and Kennedy electors met, “cast their votes for President and Vice President, and certified their own meeting and votes.” 

In casting their electoral ballots for Kennedy, the three Hawaiian Democrats certified they were the “duly and legally qualified and appointed” electors for president and vice president for the state of Hawaii and that they had been “certified (as such) by the Executive.” The Hawaii electors further attested: “We hereby certify that the lists of all the votes of the state of Hawaii given for President, and of all the votes given for Vice President, are contained herein.”

Two of the three Democrat electors were retired federal judges, William Heen and Delbert Metzger, and Heen personally mailed the Democrat electoral votes to Congress on Dec. 20. In fact, the envelope containing the certificates, further attested: “We hereby certify that the lists of all the votes of the state of Hawaii given for president … are contained herein.”

Ten days later, on Dec. 30, 1960, Judge Jamieson held that Kennedy had won the election. In so holding, Jamieson stressed the importance of the Democrat electors having met on Dec. 19, as prescribed by the Electoral Count Act, to cast their ballots in favor of Kennedy. That step allowed the Hawaii governor to then certify Kennedy as the winner of Hawaii’s three electoral votes and, in turn, Congress to count Hawaii’s electoral votes in favor of Kennedy.

The Peach State Repeat

The Georgia situation in 2020 mirrored the events of 60 years ago in Hawaii. 

Election day in 2020 fell on Nov. 3, although by then many ballots had already been cast, given the adoption of mass mail-in and early voting. Trump held a lead in Georgia until the morning of Friday, Nov. 6, when Biden overtook the incumbent. With the margin remaining tight, on Nov. 11, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced a statewide audit. 

Following the audit, Biden remained in the lead by approximately 12,000 votes, leading Raffensperger to certify the election results on Friday, Nov. 20, 2020. Republic Gov. Brian Kemp signed the certification the same day. Then on Nov. 21, Trump requested a recount, as allowed under Georgia law given the closeness of the count.

On Dec. 4, 2020, then-President Trump and Republican elector David Shafer filed suit in a Fulton County state court against Raffensperger, arguing tens of thousands of votes counted in the presidential election had been cast in violation of Georgia law. While Trump’s lawsuit was still pending, on Dec. 7, 2020, based on the recount, Raffensperger recertified Biden as the winner of Georgia’s 16 electoral votes by a margin of 11,779. 

Trump and Shafer’s Fulton County lawsuit contesting the election results remained pending on Dec. 14, 2020, the date the presidential electors were required by federal law to meet. Thus, while the Democrat electors met and cast their ballots for Joe Biden, the Republican electors met separately and cast their 16 votes for Trump. 

At that time, Shafer made clear the Trump electors had met and cast their votes to ensure Trump’s legal battle in court remained viable. Nonetheless, following Biden’s election, Fulton County Prosecutor Fani Willis targeted the Republican electors as part of her criminal special purpose grand jury investigation.

While the grand jury has since issued a report and been disbanded, Willis agreed to grant immunity to eight of the electors, likely to push them to implicate the other electors. However, their lawyer confirmed in a court filing that none of the electors implicated anyone in criminal activity. 

Since then, Shafer’s attorneys, Holly Pierson and Craig Gillen, wrote Willis a detailed letter reviewing the Hawaii precedent. The attorneys noted they had made three prior written requests to meet “to discuss the factual and legal issues” relevant to Shafer’s role as a contingent Trump elector but had “not yet received any response to those requests.” 

The 11-page, single-spaced letter then proceeded to detail both the Hawaii precedent for Shafer’s actions following the 2020 election and the legal advice the Republican elector received that “he and the other contingent presidential electors should meet at the state capitol building on December 14, 2020, and perform the duties of a presidential elector to preserve potential remedies in the event Trump et al. v. Raffensperger, et al. was successful.” 

In addition to detailing the Hawaii precedent from 1960, Shafer’s lawyers highlighted the fact that in contesting the 2000 election, lawyers for then-Democrat presidential candidate Al Gore cited that very precedent to support his position that two elector slates could be appointed. In fact, Democrat Rep. Patsy Mink of Hawaii suggested the 2000 Florida electoral dispute be resolved based on that Hawaii precedent too. And three Supreme Court justices in Bush v. Gore cited the Hawaii precedent as a basis for allowing the Florida recount to proceed. 

As the letter and Hawaii precedent make clear, Shafer and the other Trump electors not only did nothing wrong, but they acted prudentially to ensure that if the state court lawsuit resolved in the president’s favor, Georgia’s electoral votes would be properly counted on Jan. 6, 2020.

Here we see one of the only differences between Trump’s legal challenge and Kennedy’s: The Hawaii state court promptly resolved the merits of Kennedy’s legal challenge, while in violation of the Georgia Election Code that requires lawsuits contesting elections to be heard within 20 days, the Fulton County court delayed assigning a judge to hear Trump’s election dispute and then delayed the first scheduled hearing until Jan. 8, 2021 — two days after Congress certified Biden the winner of the 2020 election. 

Now you know the rest of the story. There were no fake electors. The question now is whether Willis will charge Shafer and others with fake crimes.


Margot Cleveland is The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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