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By Ryan Teague Beckwith
(Bloomberg) — Candidates for key posts in battleground states who support former President Donald Trump’s unfounded claims of election fraud in 2020 were racking up defeats as the races were called.
Nationally, more than 225 candidates for governor, secretary of state, attorney general and US Congress on the ballot Tuesday were election deniers.
But the most closely watched races were for key positions in the swing states of Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin that would put the winners in a position to oversee the 2024 election.
Some election deniers will be headed to the US Senate, including Ted Budd in North Carolina, JD Vance in Ohio and Markwayne Mullin in Oklahoma. But New Hampshire Senate candidate Don Bolduc lost to incumbent Democratic Senator Maggie Hassan.
Kristina Karamo defeated in Michigan
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson defeated election denier Kristina Karamo Tuesday, winning a second term to oversee voting in the presidential battleground state.
Benson beat the conservative commentator with 55% of the vote compared to 42% for Karamo, with most of the votes counted. That followed a barrage of third-party ads that attacked Karamo for her baseless claims about the 2020 election and remarks in which she said abortion was “child sacrifice” and that casual sex could lead to “demonic possession.”
In Michigan, 59% of voters backed a ballot measure that was almost a line-by-line rebuke of Trump’s attacks on elections: adding a nine-day early voting period, requiring state-funded ballot drop boxes, making it harder to dispute certification of results, and allowing local elections officials to accept charitable donations like those given out by Meta Platforms Inc. CEO Mark Zuckerberg in 2020.
Matthew DePerno defeated in Michigan
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel won a second term Tuesday, defeating a Republican election denier who is currently under investigation in a case involving tampering with voting machines.
Nessel defeated attorney Matthew DePerno with 53% of the vote compared to DePerno’s 45% with most of the votes counted after a race that centered on Trump’s baseless claims of widespread voter fraud in the battleground state.
A special prosecutor is investigating whether DePerno participated in a plan to improperly access voting equipment in several areas as part of an attempt to prove conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.
DePerno conceded the loss on Twitter.
Audrey Trujillo defeated in New Mexico
New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver defeated election denier Audrey Trujillo to win a second full term in office.
The Democratic incumbent won 54.5% to 42.7% with 97.8% of the results counted, according to the Associated Press.
Truillo initially refused to concede but later changed course and was set to contact Toulouse Oliver’s campaign shortly, according to her campaign manager.
Trujillo had falsely claimed that Trump won New Mexico, which he lost by more than 10 percentage points, and shared conspiracy theories, including that President Joe Biden has been replaced by a clone or body double and that the “deep state” creates school shootings in order to pass gun control measures.
Kim Crockett defeated in Minnesota
Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon defeated election denier Kim Crockett to win a third term Tuesday, in a closely watched race to be the state’s top elections official.
The Democratic incumbent beat Crockett, 55% to 45%, with most of votes counted, according to the AP.
A former state representative, Simon won re-election as secretary of state in 2018 by nearly 9 percentage points, but he faced an unexpectedly competitive race against Crockett, who called the 2020 election “rigged” and “illegitimate.”
During the Republican state convention, Crockett’s campaign aired a video that showed Simon, who is Jewish, being controlled with puppet strings by Soros Fund Management chairman George Soros, a frequent target of antisemitic conspiracy theories.
The Minnesota secretary of state race was a top target for Democratic-aligned groups that spent $46 million in an effort to stop election deniers from taking offices with power over upcoming elections.
Tim Michels defeated in Wisconsin
Democratic Governor Tony Evers won a second term Tuesday, defeating a Republican who questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 election in the battleground state.
With almost all the votes counted, Evers beat construction company co-owner Tim Michels 51% to 48%, according to race calls by ABC and NBC.
A first-time candidate, Michels won a crowded Republican primary and was endorsed by Trump, who said Michels would help “end the well-documented fraud in our elections.”
Michels said that if elected he would consider a bill to decertify the 2020 election, a move backed by some election deniers that has no basis in state or federal law.
Tudor Dixon defeated in Michigan
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer defeated election denier Tudor Dixon Tuesday, winning a second term in the presidential battleground state.
Whitmer beat the conservative commentator after a campaign in which Dixon repeatedly cast doubt on the legitimacy of Biden’s win in the 2020 election. With two-thirds of the votes counted, Whitmer was ahead 52% to 47%, according to ABC and NBC.
After the 2020 vote, Dixon spread Trump’s baseless claims of widespread fraud, even tweeting in response to him that “leftists” had planned to “steal an election” and saying that “their voter fraud” was “sloppy and obvious.”
During debates in the Republican primary this year, she said that she believed Trump actually won the election and that voting was not fair, but as she closed in on the nomination, she backed slightly away, saying that she didn’t know who won but that “a lot of folks” in the state were concerned.
J.R. Majewski defeated in Ohio House Race
US Representative Marcy Kaptur defeated an election denier who was outside the Capitol on Jan. 6 in a closely watched race in Ohio.
The longest-serving woman currently in Congress, Kaptur beat J.R. Majewski, 56% to 43% with most of the votes counted, after a barrage of ads featuring footage of the attack on the Capitol.
Majewski first gained attention after using 120 gallons of chalk paint to turn his lawn into a massive “Trump 2020” banner, which he later modified to “Trump 2Q2Q” in an apparent reference to the QAnon conspiracy theory.
He attended Trump’s Jan. 6 rally near the White House and then made his way to the steps of the Capitol but has said that he did not break through any police barriers or commit any crimes.
Doug Mastriano defeated as Pennsylvania Governor
Democrat Josh Shapiro defeated Republican Doug Mastriano in the governor’s race after a sustained ad campaign that targeted the Republican for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
In a controversial move, Shapiro spent some of his sizable campaign war chest to elevate the cash-strapped Mastriano in a crowded Republican primary, hoping his extreme positions on elections and abortion would make him easier to beat.
Shapiro won handily with more than 55% of the vote, according to the Associated Press. Mastriano was outside the US Capitol during the Jan. 6 insurrection and worked as a state senator to try to overturn Trump’s loss to Biden.
At an election night event, Mastriano did not immediately concede, but suggested he would when the count was completed.
“It is a constitutional republic that we have, and the people get the last word,” he said. “And what the people of Pennsylvania say, we’ll of course respect that,” he said.
–With assistance from Jennah Haque and Jennifer Kay.
Read also:
- US midterm election takeaways: Missing Republican wave, Trump’s bad night, DeSantis’ win
- Author admits to his nine pages of lies that got Donald Trump elected
- Joe Biden’s US: How it will change global currents of power, what it means for Africa
