Wisconsin Attorney General charges three Trump allies with 'serious forgery' over fake voter scheme

Three allies of former President Donald Trump were charged with "serious forgery" in Wisconsin over the fake elector scheme in the 2020 general election.

According to the indictment, the three defendants were part of an effort to present a list of false voters and usurp the 2020 presidential election.

Electors are those people appointed to represent voters in presidential elections. The party of each state's winning candidate determines the political grouping of electors sent to the Electoral College. According to prosecutors, the false elector scheme was carried out to try to reverse the 2020 election results in favor of Trump.

The defendants are Kenneth Chesebro, a lawyer who helped organize the plot; Jim Troupis, former lawyer to former President Trump; and Michael Roman, a former Trump campaign official.

Wisconsin Fake Voter Plot by emmanuel.rondon on Scribd

They each face a single count of felony forgery, and all three are scheduled to appear in Dane County Circuit Court on September 19.

The punishment for each could range from six years in prison and up to $10,000 in fines.

According to the indictment, the defendants' idea was to deliver false Wisconsin election documents to an employee of a congressman who would later deliver said documents to then-Vice President Mike Pence on January 6, 2021.

With the indictment, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, a Democrat, joined state prosecutors from Michigan, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia who also filed charges against a group of the former president's allies for the same fake elector scheme.

"The criminal complaint in this case alleges that the defendants were part of a conspiracy to present a certificate of purported electoral votes from individuals who were not Wisconsin's duly appointed electors," prosecutor Kaul said in a statement. "The Wisconsin Department of Justice is committed to protecting the integrity of our electoral process."

As reported by CNN, one of the defendants, attorney Chesebro, was assisting with investigations in at least four swing states, including Wisconsin. However, his cooperation was not enough to avoid charges.

"The criminal complaint, however, suggests that Chesebro made false statements to investigators about his social media use, which may have influenced prosecutors to file charges against him despite his prior cooperation," the news network reported.

The accusation comes a year after ten fake Wisconsin electors acknowledged after a civil lawsuit their attempt to reverse Trump's defeat in 2020 and, in turn, gave legitimacy to President Joe Biden's victory.

These fake electors pledged in the legal agreement not to act as real electors in 2024 or any election in which Trump is on the ballot. Likewise, they also stated that they would not act as false voters in any future election.

According to the legal settlement, the ten electors claimed they were "used as part of an attempt to improperly overturn" the election results of the 2020 election.

"We hereby reaffirm that Joseph R. Biden, Jr. won the 2020 presidential election and that we were not the duly elected presidential electors for the State of Wisconsin for the 2020 presidential election," the statement read. "We oppose any attempt to undermine the public's faith in the ultimate results of the 2020 presidential election."

Chesebro and Troupis also signed the agreement following the civil suit.

At this time, Wisconsin state prosecutors have not charged the ten fake voters with any crime.