As top Michigan Republicans reject election fraud, Trump die-hards keep up fight

Matthew DePerno. (Photo: Screengrab, Off the Record)

If you thought the Trump election-fraud folks had moved on, think again.

The opening line of a Washington Post story headlined "Tension grips Michigan as Trump’s election attacks continue to reverberate" paints a familiar picture:

As Michigan state Rep. Donna Lasinski got out of her car at the state Capitol in Lansing on a sunny morning last week, she was greeted by two people carrying what she described as assault rifles while protesters outside the building called for an audit of the 2020 election.

The story is from Wednesday, meaning those guys were out last week.

Calls for audits persist, The Post reports, even though state Republican leaders, following investigations, now reject accusations of widespread fraud.

Last week, a few hundred demonstrators carrying boxes of affidavits signed by thousands of people demanding a state ballot audit showed up at the Capitol. On Tuesday, a GOP legislator introduced a bill to start the audit process, although it so far does not have support among other lawmakers.
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The drumbeat for audits has been accompanied by increasingly violent and vitriolic threats against state and local officials. The escalating rhetoric has left legislators from both parties lamenting what happened to the state that was home to moderate political consensus builders such as President Gerald Ford, governor George Romney and the late representative John Dingell.

In addition to rifles, Trump supporters came armed with quotes:

“They are lying,” said Matthew DePerno, a lawyer who is spearheading the petition drive. A small crowd cheered as he denounced Michigan’s secretary of state as a “tyrant” and the state’s Democratic governor as “the Fuhrer” and claimed that county clerks — many of them Republicans — had engaged in racketeering and conspiracy.

“These people have committed crimes,” he said.

“Put them in shackles,” shouted a man in the crowd, to whoops and applause.