(NewsNation) — Dozens of local election officials in America’s key battleground states believe former President Donald Trump‘s stolen election conspiracies and could threaten democracy this November, independent journalist Justin Glawe told “NewsNation Prime.”
Glawe, creator of the American Doom newsletter, penned his findings in a recent Rolling Stone exclusive titled: “These Swing State Election Officials Are Pro-Trump Election Deniers.”
The piece rounded up almost 70 pro-Trump authorities across the U.S., including county election board officials from Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Nevada.
The entire list is composed of officials who have either already refused to certify results or have expressed belief in election conspiracy theories on social media.
“I should note that this isn’t really coming directly from the Trump campaign,” Glawe clarified. “This is what I kind of think of as a decentralized network of pro-Trump Republicans who are also local election officials.”
Glawe explained that the election certification process is “ministerial,” meaning it’s “not really up to the discretion of these election officials.” But that won’t stop them from trying.
“I think that if there are mass refusals to certify, they’ll sort of get struck down in court relatively quickly,” Glawe said. “But I think the larger point is that those refusals to certify could really do some pretty significant damage to the public’s trust in elections, and that, I think, is the larger danger.”
Most of the believers are in appointed, not elected, positions, a fact Glawe hopes America’s voters can monitor in the future.
“I think the best thing that people can do is pay attention to what their county election boards are doing, and who is staffing those boards, and whether or not some of these election deniers are on their boards,” he said.
President Joe Biden echoed these fears in his first cable interview since exiting the 2024 presidential race.
During the CBS sit-down, Biden said he’s unconfident there will be a peaceful transfer of power in November if Trump loses again, citing what the GOP candidate is “doing with local election districts where they count the votes.”
