After the Democratic ticket won the 2020 presidential election, Republicans in seven states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — hatched what became known as the “fake electors” scheme. The consequences of the sham continue to reverberate.
As regular readers know, as part of the gambit, GOP operatives created forged election materials, pretending to be “duly elected and qualified electors,” and sent the documents to the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Archivist, as if the fraudulent materials were legitimate. They were not legitimate.
In terms of accountability, there have been several developments of late. In Michigan and Georgia, for example, prosecutors have already filed criminal charges against some of the fake electors, while in Wisconsin, the Republicans who pretended to be real electors agreed to a court settlement in a civil case.
This afternoon, the list grew a little longer. The Nevada Independent reported:
A Nevada grand jury has indicted the six Republicans — including the chair of the Nevada Republican Party — who falsely pledged Nevada’s electoral votes to Donald Trump following the 2020 election despite President Joe Biden’s victory in the state. … In a press release, [the office of Aaron Ford, Nevada’s Democratic state attorney general] said all six individuals had been indicted on two felony charges — offering a false instrument for filing and uttering a forged instrument by submitting fraudulent documents to state and federal officials.
“When the efforts to undermine faith in our democracy began after the 2020 election, I made it clear that I would do everything in my power to defend the institutions of our nation and our state,” Ford said in a statement. “We cannot allow attacks on democracy to go unchallenged. Today’s indictments are the product of a long and thorough investigation, and as we pursue this prosecution, I am confident that our judicial system will see justice done.”
The developments were not entirely unexpected. Three weeks ago, NBC News reported that the state attorney general’s office had “opened an investigation into the state’s false electors — despite previous comments that such a move was unlikely.”
The same day, Politico reported that state investigators had “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.”
The larger list might yet grow: CNN reported four weeks ago that Kris Mayes, Arizona’s Democratic state attorney general of Arizona, told CNN that her office is overseeing a “robust” investigation into her state’s fake electors, adding that she’d been in contact with investigators in the Justice Department, as well as in Georgia and Michigan. “We’re going to make sure that we do it on our timetable, applying the resources that it requires to make sure that justice is done, for not only Arizonans, but for the entire country,” Mayes added. What’s more, New Mexico’s state attorney general’s office also confirmed last week that it, too, is investigating its GOP fake electors from 2020. Watch this space.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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