Georgia. Last year, Brad Raffensperger, Republican Secretary of State for Georgia, helped stop Trump’s attempts to reverse the outcome. Georgia state lawmakers have since weakened his powers and a Trump-backed candidate is running to replace Raffensperger next year. Republicans also passed a law that gives a commission they control the power to remove local election officials.
Michigan. Kristina Karamo, a Trump-endorsed candidate who repeated the lie that the 2020 election was fraudulent, is running for secretary of state, the office that oversees the election. (Republican candidates are running on similar posts in Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas and elsewhere, according to ABC News.)
Pennsylvania. Republicans are trying to modify the state constitution to make the secretary of state an elected position, rather than a governor-appointed position. Pennsylvania is also one of the states where Trump allies — like Stephen Lindemuth, who attended the Jan. 6 rally that turned into an attack on Congress — have won local races to oversee the election.
Wisconsin. Senator Ron Johnson urges the Republican-controlled Legislature to take full control of federal elections. That could remove the governor, currently a Democrat, from the process and weaken the state’s bipartisan Elections Commission.
And after?
The new anti-democratic movement may yet fail. This year, for example, Republican lawmakers in seven states proposed bills that would have given partisan officials the direct ability to change election results. No bill has been adopted.
Arguably the most important figures on this issue are Republican officials and voters who believe in democracy and are uncomfortable with the use of raw political power to overturn an election result.
Miles Taylor, a former Trump administration official, helped start the Renew America movement, which backs candidates — from either party — who run against Trump-backed Republicans. He is active in congressional races but lacks the resources to enter the state contests that often determine election procedures, Taylor told The Times.
