What to know about the Trump ‘fake electors’ scheme

On Jan 27, 2022

The situation is far from self-explanatory. It involves arcane laws governing the presidential transition process and a behind-the-scenes effort by Trump’s allies to exploit weaknesses in the system so he could remain in office. This all played out more than a year ago, but it’s still extremely relevant, because both state and federal prosecutors are looking into the matter.

This was an attempt by Trump campaign officials, led by Trump’s then-attorney Rudy Giuliani, to subvert the Electoral College process. In plain English, this was an attempted coup of sorts.

Voters go to the polls in November, but that’s only the first step of a convoluted process to formally pick the next president and initiate the transfer of power. That’s the Electoral College.

What are electors, again?

The Electoral College is composed of 538 individual electors — people from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, who represent the popular vote in each state. When a candidate wins a state, their designated slate of electors gets to participate in the Electoral College process.

This group of electors meets in the statehouse at a designated date in December. They sign certificates, officially casting their vote for president. This is a ceremonial process, and the outcome is essentially a foregone conclusion. (In very rare cases, an elector goes “faithless,” by voting for someone other than the candidate who won the popular vote in their state.)

Trump allies tried to supplant President Joe Biden’s authentic electors with fake Republican electors in seven key states, who could’ve theoretically thrown the entire election to Trump.

Who organized this scheme?

CNN reported last week that the scheme was overseen by Trump campaign officials, led by Giuliani. This wasn’t something organic that just happened out of nowhere on the state level.

According to CNN’s reporting, there were multiple planning calls between Trump campaign officials and GOP state operatives, and Giuliani participated in at least one call. The Trump campaign lined up supporters to fill elector slots, secured meeting rooms for the fake electors to meet on December 14, 2020, and circulated drafts of fake certificates that they later signed.

What did the fake ‘electors’ do?

The pro-Trump group essentially pretended to do all the things that the real electors are required to do, as spelled out in the Constitution. But it was for show. It was a PR stunt. CNN previously reported that Trump allies hoped to gin up coverage on the right-wing OAN network.

The Trump backers met at statehouses, or nearby, and signed certificates that used similar language as the real certificates, proclaiming their votes for President and Vice President.

But these fake certificates served no legal purpose. Anyone can type out whatever they want in Microsoft Word, and make it look official with a signing ceremony. But that doesn’t make it real.

Why did Team Trump do this?

The fake electors in these states were pawns in a bigger plan — which Trump supported in public and private — to overturn the results of the 2020 election and steal a second term.

Their plan was to have then-Vice President Mike Pence throw out Biden’s authentic…

What to know about the Trump ‘fake electors’ scheme

What are electors, again?

Who organized this scheme?

What did the fake ‘electors’ do?

Why did Team Trump do this?

Get more stuff like this in your inbox

Get more stuff like this
in your inbox