You can’t call them “fake” this time.
Six of the people facing criminal charges for their role in the 2020 Trump campaign’s so-called “fake electors” plot, will now actually be Michigan’s authentic GOP electors:
- Hank Choate of Cement City
- Amy Facchinello of Grand Blanc
- John Haggard of Charlevoix
- Timothy King of Ypsilanti
- Former GOP cochair Meshawn Maddock, of Milford
- Marian Sheridan of West Bloomfield
There’s “a certain irony, and a certain sense of satisfaction, and maybe a little vindication” that comes with this moment, said Dave Kallman, Choate’s attorney.
Four years after signing a certificate falsely claiming former President Donald Trump won Michigan in 2020, they’ll convene at the state Capitol next month to officially cast the state’s electoral votes for President-elect Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance.
But the election results won’t have an impact on the criminal case itself. Unlike people facing federal charges for their roles in the January 6 insurrection — who are reportedly hoping for a presidential pardon from Trump — the “fake electors” case is a state case. And presidents can only offer pardons in federal cases.
“The voters have spoken in a fair and free election, and President-elect Trump will soon take office,” said Mary Chartier, the attorney for Haggard. “This doesn’t have a direct impact on Mr. Haggard’s case.”
Attorneys for the defendants said they’re nonetheless hopeful that the Michigan judge who recently presided over their clients’ preliminary examinations, will throw out the case.
“The AG’s case was, and remains, a fantasy born out of political motives, which seem to have been soundly rejected by the American people on November 5, 2024,” said John Freeman, Sheridan’s attorney, in an email Thursday.
Four years earlier …
When Trump lost Michigan to President Joe Biden, these electors were part of a very different meeting on December 14, 2020, at the then-headquarters of the Michigan Republican party.
(Quick explainer: both parties nominate electors ahead of the election, one for each of the state’s electoral college votes. In 2020, Michigan had 16, but this year the state has 15. After the election, the winning candidate’s electors are then officially appointed by the governor, who signs a certificate of ascertainment of appointment of electors. Those electors then convene at the state Capitol in December to cast Michigan’s electoral votes for president and vice president of the United States.)
Attorneys for the Trump campaign gathered the 16 people who’d been nominated by the state GOP to be electors, and had them sign false statements claiming to be “duly elected and qualified electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America for the State of Michigan” casting their votes for Trump.
“That was a lie,” Attorney General Dana Nessel said when she announced the filing of criminal charges against the 16 electors last year. “They weren’t the duly elected and qualified electors, and each of the defendants knew it."
“After signing these fraudulent electoral documents, some of the False Electors attempted to enter the state capitol and deliver their fabricated electoral votes to the Senate floor but were turned away,” Nessel said at the time. “The false electoral documents were then conveyed to the United States Senate and the National Archives, with the intent that Vice President Pence would overturn the results of the election using the false electoral slate.”
All 16 pleaded not guilty, and one, James Renner, had charges against him dropped in exchange for cooperation.
Several defendants’ attorneys have argued their clients were misled by attorneys for the Trump campaign, and believed they were signing to be an “alternate slate” of electors in the event Trump’s team successfully contested the 2020 election results.
Of the original 16 GOP-nominated electors who gathered in 2020, six were renominated by the Michigan Republican party in 2024. Now, Trump’s victory will bring them back to Lansing on December 17, to elect him president.
It’s a moment that feels “like justification, I guess you could say,” Kallman said.
