Trump鈥檚 Fake Electors Eye 2024 Election Theft

Sep 20, 2024

Donald Trump and his campaign have that if he loses the presidential race this November, it means the election was stolen. It is as strong a hint as he can make that he intends to steal the election one way or another himself.

Ahead of the 2024 presidential election, there have been warnings of a repeat of the insurrection that Trump encouraged his supporters to enact on Jan. 6, 2021, when a violent mob breached the U.S. Capitol and attempted to stop Congressional certification of the 2020 election results.

But what about the fake electors who submitted falsified documents on Trump鈥檚 behalf to Congress for the 2020 election? It turns out they, and others like them, are just as great a threat to democracy as the Jan. 6 insurrectionists. An effort called by the Center for Media and Democracy sheds light on what the 2020 fake electors did鈥攁nd how a new crop of electors could do the same four years later. Arn H. Pearson, executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, spoke with 大象传媒 Senior Editor Sonali Kolhatkar on 大象传媒 Presents: Rising Up With Sonali about the dangers posed by the fake electors.

Sonali Kolhatkar joined 大象传媒 in summer 2021, building on a long and decorated career in broadcast and print journalism. She is an award-winning multimedia journalist, and host and creator of聽大象传媒 Presents: Rising Up with Sonali, a nationally syndicated television and radio program airing on Free Speech TV and dozens of independent and community radio stations. She is also Senior Correspondent with the Independent Media Institute鈥檚 Economy for All project where she writes a weekly column. She is the author of聽Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice聽(2023) and聽Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence聽(2005). Her forthcoming book is called聽Talking About Abolition聽(Seven Stories Press, 2025). Sonali is co-director of the nonprofit group, Afghan Women鈥檚 Mission which she helped to co-found in 2000. She has a Master鈥檚 in Astronomy from the University of Hawai鈥檌, and two undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. Sonali reflects on 鈥淢y Journey From Astrophysicist to Radio Host鈥� in her 2014聽聽of the same name.