Talk:Trump fake electors plot

expand state details under "Events in individual states"

The state details under this page's section for "Events in individual states" are pretty paltry. Now that more details have been published in the indictments for The State of Georgia v. Donald J. Trump, et al. and for Michigan prosecution of fake electors, I suggest expanding that section to illustrate the plot's highly coordinated planning by Trump's Chief of Staff and by the 2020 campaign. Both state indictments detail general findings in the January 6th Committee's Final Report and the Special Counsel's indictment. rootsmusic (talk) 05:07, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

The Georgia and Michigan subsections are already summaries of the descriptions in those two articles. The other states definitely need expansion though. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 04:51, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Need to add Nevada v. Michael James McDonald, James Walter DeGraffenreid III, Jesse Reed Law, Durward James Hindle III, Shawn Michael Meehan and Eileen A. Rice. rootsmusic (talk) 03:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Is this article violation of NPOV? Are not a vast number of persons who claim that the issue is Election Fraud?

Is this article an NPOV violation? Do not a huge number of persons believe that the election of Biden in 2020 was the result of voting fraud? Is there not evidence of fraud, as in Fulton County with GOP watchers shut out as if counting would stop, but then Democrats stayed & did "counting", like pulling a trunk out from under a table? Is it correct as someone claims "WP:Fringe"? Are there not videos of ballot-box stuffing in the night? How can it be fringe when CNN reported: "https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/03/politics/cnn-poll-republicans-think-2020-election-illegitimate/index.html --- All told, 69% of Republicans and Republican-leaners say Biden’s win was not legitimate, up from 63% earlier this year and through last fall, ...." Is that fringe? (AltheaCase (talk) 21:41, 1 November 2023 (UTC))

There is no evidence of fraud. There are no videos of "ballot box stuffing in the night". Yes, believing that there was fraud in spite of the lack of any evidence is FRINGE. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:48, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Do you utterly discount the mule videos of D'Sousa as impossible? (AltheaCase (talk) 21:54, 1 November 2023 (UTC))

Not me, Reuters does. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:55, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

it really is amazing how many believe the election was stolen, especially since they continue to cite examples of alleged fraud that have been decisively refuted for years. it's sorta like ... a cult, you know? soibangla (talk) 21:56, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

I consider it group polarization and confirmation bias. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:59, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

It's mass delusion largely caused by poor sources, Fox News's pushing of what it knew were lies, and believing Trump's lies. The MAGA cult is impervious to evidence. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:56, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

Fake Electors Plot, or legitimate rump electors submission?

Did not the so-called fake electors believe that Trump in fact won for their electorship, and they in fact were the true electors? Didn't something much like this happen in Hawaii not so many years ago, & did not the rump electors end up being accepted? Does not the US Code state that the President of the Senate shall open all PURPORTED elector envelopes? So is it possible that these rump electors honestly purported to be the true electors? And did they have the freedom of speech right to say so in writing to the President of the Senate? Is there not yet a day of reckoning to occur when these issues reach the SCOTUS? Is not the principle to assume good faith? Does it make sense to criminalize a political claim that "we wuz robbed" as after a sporting event? Didn't Hillary say the same when she lost? (AltheaCase (talk) 21:47, 1 November 2023 (UTC))

WP:AGF refers to Wikipedia activity. It is why I am calmly replying here rather than reverting these talk page posts. Whether or not the fake electors believe Trump won or not, they did not go through the proper channels of becoming certified electors, as laid out in indictments. I have no idea what you're talking about in Hawaii, you'll have to provide some sources. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:51, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Most of your questions aren't aimed at Wikipedia editors.

Did not the so-called fake electors believe that Trump in fact won for their electorship, and they in fact were the true electors?

No, the fake electors knew they were not the real electors. See Michigan prosecution of fake electors, where the fake electors tried to pose as real ones and were denied entry into the state Capitol. The people who organized the plot even called them fake. Feoffer (talk) 10:15, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

In reply to the question "Do you utterly discount the mule videos of D'Sousa as impossible?", we can answer, "D'Sousa and his conspiracist 2000 Mules film have been soundly debunked. He cannot be trusted. He produces political propaganda and pseudohistory. He and his books and other products lack credibility." -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:15, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

The article likely incorrectly states the intent of the "scheme" and without citing any sources.

"The intent of the scheme was to pass the fraudulent certificates to then-vice president Mike Pence in the hope he would count them, rather than the authentic certificates, and thus overturn Joe Biden's victory." This does not appear to be correct. While the "intent" of the scheme has not clearly been established, several sources including the Eastman Memo, the Chesebro emails, and statements by multiple people involved including the alternative slates of electors contradict the statement above.

For example, according to the Eastman memos, the "intent" was to have former VP Pence declare that discrepancies invalidate the votes from the states in question such that the votes would not be counted at all. In other words, the intent was not to replace authentic certificates with fraudulent ones, but rather to demonstrate a discrepancy in order to cause the votes from those states to be thrown out entirely. Signers of the alternative slates confirmed this intent. The reason this is important is because it may make the difference between illegal fraudulent activity and legal albeit ineffective activity. As such, it will likely play a significant role in defense strategies in the related criminal proceedings. 160.2.168.216 (talk) 04:39, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

That's not what the reliable sources say, which is what we go by. If you have a problem with the assertions in the article that are based on reliably-cited sources, then the onus is on you to find reliable sources that back up what you claimed above. Incidentally, many of the currently-cited sources directly contradict what you were trying to assert. And in subsequent court cases, many of the sources you mentioned (which would not meet the standard for inclusion here) have been directly contradicted by the evidence that has come forward and the witnesses that have given open testimony in Congress and in the court system. But again, if you have reliable sources that contradict any assertions in this article, by all means, present them. Your commment about the sources you cited used speculative language, while the cited sources use assertive language, based on actual evidence and not on speculative language or suppositions. So you'll have to do better than that if you want anything changed in this article. Thanks. User:Jgstokes (talk)—We can disagree without becoming disagreeable. 05:19, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

thank you for your thoughtful comments and I encourage you to provide reliable sources to support them soibangla (talk) 05:19, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

One Comment

Going to start this by expressing my love and appreciation for Wikipedia. I use it daily, for everything from a starting point for work related research tasks, to recreational learning about various historic or current topics. On everything from Napoleonic battles to particle physics. For context, this account was created in 2007, and I've been using Wikipedia since 2001.

Today I saw a ten minute news segment which touched on the "fake elector scheme," which I vaguely remember from the news cycle when it happened (which I was really into at the time -- I very closely followed the election on a day-to-day basis like many people) So, I hop on wikipedia to read about it in order to refresh my memory and maintain an informed opinion about reality.

To be 100% honest, this article reads like a propaganda piece for a particular narrative. Thank God for the talk page where I can get both sides of the issue.

This is clearly a polarizing subject with very strong opposing opinions, as the country is deeply divided on the fundamental question of whether Trump committed an insurrection with the help of rogue Republican state legislatures, or Biden committed a coup with the help of the Democrat party aligned intel agencies. I've never seen anything like this in life.

There was a time when Wikipedia was a neutral information repository, citing dispassionate news and textual sources, because in 2001 you could find sources that had not yet become overly politicized. There was a time when news desks for major networks lost money, on purpose, because the point of the news wasn't to make money -- it was for prestige. The money making arm of the corporation that owned the media company would fund the news desk, the news desk would win awards that fed back, or basically itself be an advertisement for the respectability of the network. The Internet changed this and the news suddenly was given a different role in the information ecosystem.

Today, everything has basically become yellow journalism, because the new business model in the social media age is everybody preaching to their niche choir setting up the other side with the greatest possible strawman to burn down. Or it has some other ideological agenda conditional to its funding. Following politics has always been a premier American pastime, so most of our lives have presently been roped into the daily cycle of confirmation bias, including quite sadly my beloved Wikpedia.

On this specific topic, the reality is the USA method for selecting the president is deliberately byzantine. I remember following Bush v Gore when it happened, and the legal conclusion of that affair was states have the right to send whatever electors they want, as long as the state follows its own constitution. And this fits with the design of the country at its founding to be a union of states. A state doesn't even need to have an public election, its own legislature could just decide who that state should vote for in the electoral college (which is what the electors are for). And this is exactly how it worked, until gradually states shifted to the current method, with the last holdout South Carolina stopped appointing electors in 1864. And ultimately, why Bush became president. If states have the right to appoint electors as they wish, then the outcome of the presidential election in a given state isn't actually material, unless it happens to be under state law. Hence, the outcome of the Bush v Gore, was that Florida had to follow its own election laws and nothing more. This is just facts.

So in a nutshell Trump lawyers apparently decided to mount a challenge by convincing legislatures in states which they thought (or claim they thought) election fraud happened to somehow appoint or send electors contrary the resultant outcome. And then, somehow force those states to either investigate the fraud, or simply appoint the electors (which again is how things worked in at least one state until 1864). It's not quite clear from the outside exactly what they were doing or their endgame, but it's something along these lines. Basically, lawyers either using or abusing the law, depending on who you ask.

Did it cross the line to be illegal? Does it rise to the level of fraud? Or, conversely, is it a legitimate constitutional check-and-balance on election fraud (whether or not you think it happened in this case, and whatever your feelings are about the current or previous president). These are questions for courts and constitutional scholars, not for talking heads on the media, decided by who has the most reach and can shout their opinions the loudest. And, sadly, the endless parade of people calling themselves constitutional lawyers and the like on those programs are just as bad. This needs to be decided by the US Supreme Court, or Congress.

The problem is, we are so politicized as a country, everyone wants to decide it in the court of public opinion, which is the court of talking points and political narratives. And even more unfortunately, Wikipedia and this page in particular seem to be roped into that arena, so when people like me hear the term "fake Trump electors" they come to this page and get one side of the story. That is how you manufacture consensus, as a propaganda tool.

Somewhat ironically, the language and wording of this page is so over-the-top biased and skewed to one side, it ends up being self-defeating. Because neutral people like me who come here just to learn about a thing they heard can see it for what it is. That is how I ended up on this talk page.

To be clear, I'm not blaming anyone or suggesting bad faith, since everyone has biases they aren't aware of, especially in this age, where nearly everything we read and hear has an agenda. So just writing out my honest opinion and reaction to the article as presented. Do with it as you wish.

Take care everyone! Lasati (talk) 23:04, 28 December 2023 (UTC)lasati

thanks for your thoughtful comments

Wikipedia is not a court, and thank goodness it's not Facebook. The encyclopedia relies on reliable secondary sources, and this article includes plenty of 'em. I hope you don't make a long statement and vanish, because I'd prefer you cite some specific examples to illustrate what you mean. soibangla (talk) 23:20, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

If someone is coming here to see if Biden committed a coup with the help of the Democrat party aligned intel agencies, they aren't going to be happy with our article and we shouldn't be trying to make them happy. – Muboshgu (talk) 02:59, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Bingo! -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:01, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Lasati, it's all well and good to be well-informed by knowing both sides of the story, but in this case one must choose, because one side is lying and the other side is telling the truth. We do not choose a false balance here. At Wikipedia we use reliable sources, and they all back the version described in this article. They describe the facts and the attempts to steal the election from its rightful winner. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:01, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Valjean, any claim that one side is lying and the other side is telling the truth is just partisan bias. It is never the case that one side is totally perfect and the other side is fully imperfect. Claiming this is mere propaganda and far from the truth.

Similarly, the term 'reliable sources' is itself propaganda. The people whose political views are dominant at Wikipedia have chosen to blindly trust sources that regularly makes mistakes and that have certain biases. When the 'quality newspapers' published the falsehood that it was proven that Covid could not have come from a lab and then suddenly chose to amend their articles when Biden said that it was a possibility, their articles simply couldn't have been reliable before and after the change. One of these must have been false. After all, they didn't react to a sudden major scientific revelation or such. They reacted to a social change within their ingroup, where the idea suddenly became acceptable after Biden endorsed it.

Frankly, I see your comment as (weak) evidence in favor of Lasati's claim, especially as you claim on your user page that: "my fingerprints are still in our most important and fundamental policies and guidelines." When a person who comes across as being very partisan makes such a claim, I see it as a red flag that those policies may be quite partisan as well. Aapjes (talk) 12:11, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

Aapjes, which 'quality newspapers' published the falsehood that it was proven that Covid could not have come from a lab? soibangla (talk) 15:47, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

The Washington Post for one. As you can see in their redaction, they admit themselves that they told falsehoods. Here is the original if you want to read the falsehoods.

Wikipedia itself claims that WaPo is a "newspaper of record."

The New York Times did something similar. They dismiss the consideration of the possibility of a lab outbreak as a fringe theory and argue that even considering the theory as possible is a conspiracy theory, which logically means that they claim that is extremely likely to be false, in their opinion.

However, the NYT is prone to stealth editing, to conceal the evidence of their mistakes. They typically do not even publish a note of correction. So the current article on their site is far different. Aapjes (talk) 18:27, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Alternate elector certificates

Shouldn't some of these be labeled "fake elector certificates"? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:21, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Shouldn't the title mention them? They are just as much a part of the "fake" as the electors. Trump fake electors and certificates plot. Just something to think about. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:21, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

As a title, I think "fake electors" is succinct and clear. The article should mention the certificates in depth. – Muboshgu (talk) 03:00, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

That is certainly an option. By dropping "plot" we remove the ambiguity. The article can go in-depth about the plot. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:03, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

I thought "plot" in the title emphasized the lack of convictions (yet) and not jumping the gun on that. – Muboshgu (talk) 05:17, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

It is indeed a plot, and a secret one at that. IIRC, Bannon was the first to give a clue that something was being planned in the background and to prepare for a violent day. To avoid any ambiguity, we could try Trump's plot to use fake electors. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:06, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

"The plot to use their own electors"

What exactly is this section? It looks like a jumbling of news reports about J6 committee findings of various people, from Mike Lee to Trump jr. texting/emailing Meadows or others about their own ideas about how to do fake electors. There doesn't seem to be a coherent "plot" from this content as the title would suggest. There is also little indication that these suggestions were incorporated into the actual Chesebro-implemented plan (I moved a section about his memos down to "planning", where it seemed more appropriate). Example from Huffington Post article cited for Roger Stone's mention: MSNBC’s Ari Melber notes it’s not clear what Stone did next or whether this message was actually given to Trump and used by his team.

The news reporting seems to be largely in the vein of "Did you know notable name X texted Meadows/others about fake electors?", which should probably be summarized somewhere with Multiple Republican politicians and conservative activists, such as Scott Perry, Mike Lee, Donald Trump Jr., and Ginni Thomas contacted Mark Meadows and other Republican officials to suggest utilizing false electors. As it reads now, it seems like a clear example of why WP:NOTNEWS exists. KiharaNoukan (talk) 02:20, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I might prefer "Development of the plot," but otherwise I'm fine with the text as it is, though things can always be tweaked soibangla (talk) 02:29, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Feel free to make the heading more descriptive of the actual content, and if the content is jumbled, then improve it and use an appropriate heading. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:38, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Done, I refocused most of the content around early efforts to contact Meadows, since that is the most prominent connecting factor. Roger Stone was removed, since the cited source itself says there is no indication his dictation was relevant to the eventual plot. Retained Ginni Thomas and renamed it to "Early proposals to use fake electors" KiharaNoukan (talk) 04:28, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

@Soibangla

What details were so important to retain? Trump Jr. is just WP:OVERQUOTE with no analysis of any significance behind his words. Andy Biggs' passage is also similarly unnotable on its own, unless Meadows' saying "I love it" is really all that important. As mentioned earlier, the cited Roger Stone portion is from a huffpo article that notes no indication of whether his dictation actually was even sent to anyone. I kept Mike Lee being the source of the idea of fake electors, and the earliest msg from potentially Rick Perry, since those are significant for their prominence. KiharaNoukan (talk) 04:39, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The plot was in harmony with Trump's refusal to ever leave office

I placed that summary of content in the body into the lead at the end of the first paragraph, but I think it's important enough as a motivational prehistory to the whole plot that it belongs at the very beginning. Can we work out a nice wording that does that? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:42, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The claim that he privately refused to leave office has not been substantiated with evidence. The claim is made by a single former tabloid reporter in her book she is selling. It has not been corroborated by others, and is based on anonymous hearsay of what supposedly occured in a closed meeting.

In fact the linked article factually quotes Trump stating the direct opposite as follows: "On November 26, 2020, he was asked by a reporter whether he would leave the White House if the Electoral College voted for Biden. “Certainly I will, and you know that,” Trump said in response"

Language indicating that this is an unsubstantiated claim should be added instead of presenting the alleged conversation as a statement of certain fact. Bringjustthefactsplease (talk) 21:19, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I have to agree actually per BLP and the high burden of proof needed that this sentence doesn't belong. Maggie Haberman is alleging that Trump made comments of that sort to aides, and we can include that if it's properly attributed. But, I don't know that we can say he definitively planned to never leave office based on this alone. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:33, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Let's examine this before trashing it because Bringjustthefactsplease's allegations above are simply ignoring some facts presented in the body of the article. BTW, Muboshgu, I do agree with attribution. This has long been my motto: "When in doubt, use attribution." Feel free to improve this.

The information is documentation provided by Maggie Haberman, a top-notch reporter, not a gossip monger, and anything but a "tabloid reporter". It is largely backed by the testimony of Trump's own people (Jenna Ellis, Kenneth Chesebro, Sidney Powell) and Georgia bail bondsman Scott Hall. This is not hearsay, and even if it was, we document what the RS say, proven or not. "Substantiated with evidence" is not a requirement at Wikipedia. "Substantiated with reliable sources" is our requirement. As for Trump, BLP's WP:Public figure applies, which is a lower burden than for private persons. (That's why I used three RS.) Also, when putting Trump's denials up against what nearly anyone else says, you can usually count on him lying and the others telling the truth. That's the case 95% of the time. So some informed skepticism should always be applied to his denials.

Now let's start by looking at the content:

LEAD:

The plot was in harmony with Trump's refusal to ever leave office.

BODY:

Trump's refusal to ever leave office

The fake electors plot was in harmony with Trump's refusal to ever leave office and the White House after he lost the election. Maggie Haberman has described how Trump initially recognized he had lost the election, but then expressed he would "never" leave:

"Trump seemed to recognize he had lost to Biden. He asked advisers to tell him what had gone wrong. He comforted one adviser, saying, 'We did our best.' Trump told junior press aides, 'I thought we had it,' seemingly almost embarrassed by the outcome, according to Haberman."

Then his attitude seemed to change:

"I'm just not going to leave," Trump told one aide, according to Haberman. "We're never leaving," Trump told another. "How can you leave when you won an election?"... He was even overheard asking the chair of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, "Why should I leave if they stole it from me?"

This was confirmed by the testimony of Jenna Ellis in the Georgia election racketeering prosecution. In December 2020, after Trump lost the election, while he was standing in a hallway near the Blue Room of the White House, Dan Scavino told Ellis that Trump would refuse to leave office. Ellis recalled: "And he said to me, you know, in a kind of excited tone, 'Well, we don't care, and we're not going to leave.'" "The boss is not going to leave under any circumstances. We are just going to stay in power."

So now we see that it's multiple RS, not just Haberman (who would be enough), and this is also based on video and testimony evidence. Bringjustthefactsplease, you need to be more careful here, and be more skeptical of Trump. When you see "Trump stating the direct opposite", your first reaction should be to disbelieve him. Fact-check the matter with RS, because Trump is never a RS. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:42, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I neglected to check the text in the body. I wonder though, with imprecise language, was it really a refusal to "ever" leave office, or was it just a refusal to leave office on Jan 20 2021? "The boss is not going to leave under any circumstances. We are just going to stay in power." doesn't read to me as him thinking he's president-for-life, but who really knows. – Muboshgu (talk) 01:25, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, with him one can never be sure, and that's a tactic of his. He says things. He wants to be president for life, the Constitution be damned. That's what I get out of that. He said it as a wish. He'd love to do it but knows he can't get away with it...yet. For us, the question of whether he really meant it is irrelevant. We document that he said it. End of story. If reelected, he will succeed in doing it. No one, not even in the military/police/national guard/CIA/FBI will be left to stop him as everyone in leadership will be some loyalist he put there, and the GOP congresscritters will help him. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:17, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

References

Electoral College rules

@Soibangla Regarding this diff where you deleted the entire section on Electoral College procedure in Background.

This entire article focuses on people alleged to have crafted a plot to circumvent and exploit the Electoral College procedure. It makes multiple references to minutia of Electoral College procedure, such as certificates of ascertainment, the Electoral Count Act, the deadlines of certification, the differences between authentic and alternate certificates, the vice president's role in counting certificates, the delivery of electoral ballots, exploiting contingent elections by lowering electoral count thresholds, etc. This entire controversy stems from how the electoral college process in American works.

It would be clearly useful to have a section that lays the relevant procedure out in a coherent manner so that readers can understand what the proper procedure is, how it contrasted with the fake electors scheme, and what elements were exploited to develop it. RS have made such explainers themselves when covering various portions of Trump's fake electors scheme, giving background context on the relevant electoral college procedure that it relates to. I'm struggling to comprehend the standard you are using to determine that this is not useful for the article, but that it is necessary to include lengthy content on news reports of people who may or may not be connected to the actual plan making comments and communications of undetermined notability. KiharaNoukan (talk) 09:48, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

No it would not be useful to have that bloat in the article. An encyclopedia is not a 5th-grader's civics textbook. Zaathras (talk) 11:55, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm more than open to suggestions for edits on what to prune to include. The idea that there should be no explainers, at least on certificates of ascertainment and related EC processes, sounds ridiculous. This is the English encyclopedia, not the Americans only encyclopedia, and the electoral processes here are found nowhere else in the world and are not intuitive on their own. KiharaNoukan (talk) 17:36, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The first two paragraphs of the deleted section contain the most directly relevant background (although the second paragraph contains unnecessary details about certificates of ascertainment), and parts of the third are also relevant for explaining certification. Helpful Raccoon (talk) 02:55, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

@Soibangla The Background section should refer to United States Electoral College#Procedure. rootsmusic (talk) 02:12, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

plot

I've never liked the term plot. can we change it to scheme? soibangla (talk) 04:17, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

soibangla Already being discussed above. rootsmusic (talk) 01:05, 26 April 2024 (UTC)