NEW: Pennsylvania is teeming with election denial officials

New data brings the number of county election officials who believe election lies to more than 100.

Note: Things are going to get crazy around here in the next week, so I hope you’re ready to read and understand. I spoke about Georgia election madness on the Guardian’s Today In Focus podcast, which you can listen to here. I have a big story coming at Mother Jones on the takeover of Georgia’s elections by a small but mighty network of election deniers. That’s coming this week as well, plus a few other things that are in the works. In this critical time, I sure would appreciate your support in the form of a paid subscription or a one-time contribution. I’m an independent journalist and one of the only people tracking the issue of local election denial officials, which is the subject of today’s post and accompanying story at Rolling Stone. If you can spare as little as $5 a month, you’ll get access to all my exclusive reporting as well as audio versions of these stories. You can also drop a few bucks in our Doom Coffee Fund if that’s more your thing. Anyway, on to the chaos…

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On Sept. 11, 2020, Kevin Lescavage posted a meme that showed the Twin Towers following the terrorist attack that day above pictures of U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib. “Times Have Changed,” read the caption. 

Lescavage is one of seven Republicans on the Luzerne County Council. Six of the councilors are election deniers, new research from the Center for Media and Democracy shows. Luzerne County is an important county in a very important state — Pennsylvania — that may decide next week’s election. The county is teeming with election deniers, I reported today at Rolling Stone.

Among them is Alyssa Fusaro, a member of the Luzerne County election board. In 2022, Fusaro was investigated by county officials for allegedly harassing two Latina election workers, calling one of them a “spic.” Fusaro, who has said she has a son of Hispanic descent, refuted the allegations and the matter has been swept aside by Republicans on the county council. Like Fusaro, six of those officials support Donald Trump’s lies about elections. 

Fusaro is one of 33 election deniers who have some power over elections throughout Pennsylvania. Those officials are among more than 100 others throughout the country who both have power over elections and believe Trump’s election lies. Since 2020 they have refused to certify results 30 times in eight states based on bogus claims of fraud. Now, these officials and more — these are just the ones I’ve been able to find in the last four years’ worth of research — could cause chaos next week as results start rolling in.

Election experts have said there is little threat from local officials like Fusaro refusing to certify results — in these instances in the past, election denial officials have been outvoted by their peers and certification has gone through. But if officials vote in the majority to refuse to certify results, it’s an open question as to how those situations will be handled. In Pennsylvania, Secretary of State Al Schmidt, a Republican, has said he’ll immediately file writs of mandamus to compel election officials to certify. Elsewhere, like in Arizona, election officials who’ve refused to certify results have been charged with crimes. In some places, secretaries of state may simply override certification refusals and include those counties’ results in statewide tallies.

But there is a small chance that certification refusals could hold up statewide certification, making governors miss a federal deadline of Dec. 11 to provide those results so the Electoral College can do its job on Dec. 17. More importantly, in my view, widespread certification refusals will be weaponized by Trump and Republicans as evidence of fraud. These instances could then be used by congressional Republicans to object to results in certain states in an attempt to stop federal certification of a win by Vice President Kamala Harris. 

So, we can add these 33 officials in Pennsylvania to the list of folks to keep on eye for their role in what looks to be a very robust and widespread effort to overturn the election in favor of Trump. All politics is local, as the old adage goes. And in this election year, all election subversion is local, too. That’s at least where it starts. How it will end on Jan. 6 depends on individual Republicans’ actual commitment to democracy.

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