Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin was left flabbergasted when asked to back up his wild claim that Democrats used fake electors in the 2020 election.
Johnson shared the unsubstantiated claim in an interview with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Monday evening. Collins asked the Republican senator if Bob Spindell, who acted as a fake elector in favor of Donald Trump during the 2020 election, should be suspended from his role on the Wisconsin Election Commission.
Spindell was one of 10 Wisconsin Republicans who posed as fake electors in the 2020 election and agreed last week to settle a civil lawsuit acknowledging that President Joe Biden won that election—three years later. Spindell and the nine other fake electors agreed not to serve in next year’s election or any other election that Trump runs in—but Spindell has still not been removed from the state’s election commission.
Johnson, for his part, still thinks Spindell and his allies did nothing wrong.
“These folks did nothing different than what many Democrats have done in many states,” Johnson said on CNN. “It has happened repeatedly.”
The senator told Collins to “just check the books” for instances of fake Democrat electors but deflected when Collins asked, “Which books?”
Amid calls by Democrats in Wisconsin for a fake Trump elector to resign from the state’s elections commission, Sen. Ron Johnson claims Democrats have done the same thing but is unable to say which ones. pic.twitter.com/4NCccqkBV6
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) December 12, 2023
Johnson is right that fake elector schemes have been found across the country—but they were all backing Trump. In addition to Wisconsin, Nevada, Michigan, and Georgia have all charged fake electors in their states. There is yet another investigation into a similar scheme in Arizona. Meanwhile, Trump faces separate charges in Georgia for the whole plot.