The House committee investigating the Capitol riot is now formally further pursuing the matter of the falsified electoral votes for Trump that were assembled across seven states after the last election. The panel has issued 14 subpoenas tied to the issue, demanding information from two individuals involved in the efforts within each and every state. Essentially, the plot involved groups of Republicans signing off on claims that they were, in fact, the legitimate members of the electoral college for their home states, even though Biden was victorious in each of these locales. Documentation of the false claims was then sent to federal authorities as a way to further prop up Trump’s challenges to the election outcome.
The Select Committee has issued subpoenas to 14 individuals who participated as purported “alternate electors” for former President Trump.
The committee is seeking information from individuals who met and submitted purported Electoral-College certificates in seven states. pic.twitter.com/XAgQS8a8NF
— January 6th Committee (@January6thCmte) January 28, 2022
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the chairperson of the riot investigation committee, commented as follows regarding the subpoenas:
‘The Select Committee is seeking information about attempts in multiple states to overturn the results of the 2020 election, including the planning and coordination of efforts to send false slates of electors to the National Archives. We believe the individuals we have subpoenaed today have information about how these so-called alternate electors met and who was behind that scheme. We encourage them to cooperate with the Select Committee’s investigation to get answers about January 6th for the American people and help ensure nothing like that day ever happens again.’
The so-called alternate electors from those states then transmitted the purported Electoral-College certificates to Congress, which multiple people advising former President Trump or his campaign used to justify delaying or blocking the certification of the election on January 6.
— January 6th Committee (@January6thCmte) January 28, 2022
Individuals directly associated with former President Trump have been documented to have apparently been connected to the fake electoral vote plot. Michigan Republican Party co-chair Meshawn Maddock recently stated, in reference to the fake electoral vote plot in her state, that “the Trump campaign asked us to do that,” and Boris Epshteyn, a former Trump campaign adviser, explicitly acknowledged in a television interview that he was part of the initiative to assemble the fake electoral votes. As he put it, he was “part of the process to make sure there were alternate electors for when, as we hoped, the challenges to the seated electors would be heard, and would be successful.”
Lots of renewed attention to the so-called "alternate" pro-Trump elector slates.
I think it's important to point out that the conservatives who backed this plan at the time didn't make the same "just in case" justification we're hearing today.https://t.co/sEfwaM8e5G pic.twitter.com/HFKuknnmLJ
— Christian Vanderbrouk (@UrbanAchievr) January 21, 2022
Once the presidential election outcome was conclusively determined, there was never any legitimate evidence that it could be legitimately changed, and most of the documents, as prepared, didn’t even include the tepid excuse that Epshteyn offered. Instead, they mostly unequivocally stated — falsely — that Trump won the state under consideration. At the federal level, a plan was circulated from Trump lawyer John Eastman that called for then-VP Mike Pence to reject Biden’s wins from certain states because of the alternative slates of electoral votes. So, there’s more to this ordeal than a simple procedural gesture — it appears to have been a substantive part of the ex-president’s targeting of the election.
“Source: The Trump campaign lined up supporters to fill elector slots, secured meeting rooms in statehouses for the fake electors to meet on December 14, 2020, and circulated drafts of fake certificates that were ultimately sent to the National Archives”
— Angry Staffer (@Angry_Staffer) January 21, 2022
