Arizona charges 18 people in 2020 presidential election interference
The state of Arizona in the southwestern US has charged 18 people, including former Donald Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows and lawyer Rudy Giuliani, with interfering in the 2020 presidential election.
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Eighteen defendants who submitted a false document to Congress declaring that Trump had defeated Joe Biden in Arizona are Republicans, according to an indictment handed down by a grand jury and released Wednesday.
"I will not allow our democracy to be sabotaged," Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, said in a video released by her office. "This is serious stuff," she added.
The indictment alleges that 11 of the defendants who were appointed as Arizona's Republican electors met in Phoenix on December 14, 2020, to sign a certificate falsely stating that Trump had won the state.
A minute-long video of the signing ceremony was posted on social media at the time by the Arizona Republican Party. The document was later sent to Congress and the National Archives.
Biden, the current US president, won Arizona by more than 10,000 votes. Of the eight lawsuits unsuccessfully challenging Biden's victory in the state, one was filed by the 11 Republicans.
Days after their legal challenge was dismissed, the defendants signed the certificate declaring Trump the winner.
In December, six Republicans in Nevada were charged with forgery over a false electoral certificate in that western state.
Michigan's attorney general in July charged 16 alleged Republican electors with forgery and conspiracy to commit election fraud in the midwestern state.
Three false electors have also been indicted in Georgia, along with Trump, as part of an alleged scheme to unlawfully overturn the election results in the southeastern state.
In Wisconsin, 10 Republicans who falsely claimed to be electors have pleaded guilty in a civil case and admitted their actions were part of an effort to overturn Biden's victory in the midwestern state.
A US federal court in August also accused Trump and Republican allies of recruiting false electors in seven battleground states -- Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin -- to sign certificates falsely stating that he, not Biden, had won the election.
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