DANE COUNTY, Wis. — An effort to fine those who tried to declare Donald Trump the winner of the 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin is playing out in Dane County Court.
Law Forward is a non-partisan, non-profit law firm that filed a lawsuitlast month seeking to fine the people who tried to declare Trump the winner $2,000. President Joe Biden won Wisconsin by more than 20,000 votes.
Once a candidate wins, the state's 10 electoral votes are cast by 10 electors.
"The legitimate, duly elected presidential electors met, they met in our Capitol in a live-streamed meeting, that was public, and cast Wisconsin's vote for Joe Biden," said Mel Barnes with Law Forward. "At the same time, these 10 fraudulent electors gathered elsewhere in the Capitol in secret and put together nearly identical-looking documents that they sent off to Congress purporting to cast Wisconsin's votes for a candidate that lost the election."
The lawsuit names 12 people, including Wisconsin Elections Commissioner Robert Spindell. Efforts to reach him for comment Thursday were unsuccessful.
Back in March, the WEC chose not to take punitive action against the 10.
The lawsuit states part of the goal of declaring Trump the winner was for former Vice President Mike Pence to choose those votes instead of Biden's on Jan. 6, 2021. That's when hundreds stormed the U.S. Capitol.
"This is about protecting democracy in Wisconsin, going forward and it's about the future of our state, because we know in America voters decide who wins elections," Barnes said. "And this is about protecting that core American value."
