Continuing Election Misinformation and Denialism

Beyond the election dis- and mis-information at the core of Republicans on the House Administration Committee’s legislative priorities like the “Big Lie Bills”—SAVE Act and ACE Act—the majority’s Members have echoed even the most far-fetched election denialism at the heart of MAGA and Project 2025 extremism. 

Chairman Bryan Steil: At a hearing just months ago, Steil refused to outright answer the simplest of questions regarding the free and fair 2020 election that was settled nearly four years ago:

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.): One final question. Do you believe that Donald Trump lost the last election?

Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.): I’m pretty sure we’re all aware of President Biden’s the president United States?

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.): Well, that’s that’s not the answer to the question. The answer is whether you think Donald Trump lost and the fact that it is so difficult for my Republican friends to even admit that he lost because you’re afraid you’ll offend him or some of the more extreme supporters, and that you bring people like one of the architects of project 2025 to come and testify in favor of your ability to have Stephen Miller at a press conference. Boy, this stuff is this stuff is not good.

 

Hearing Witnesses: Given Chairman Steil’s courting of election denialists, it’s no surprise he continues to call witnesses with similar extreme views. Just look at who he invited to testify for the Committee’s September 11th hearing on the 2024 election:

• West Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner
  • Warner participated in a “Stop the Steal” rally in Charleston, WV in December 2020; 
  • supported a lawsuit challenging the 2020 election results and then blamed the January 6th insurrection on the Supreme Court for refusing to consider the lawsuit challenging states’ electors; 
  • and attended an election denialism conference featuring numerous Project 2025 architects.  

• Florida Secretary of State Cory Byrd: 
  • Byrd has refused to say Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election; 
  • defended an omnibus voter suppression bill;
  • defended his wife saying January 6 insurrectionists were “peacefully protest[ing]”; 
  • and, also attended an election denialism conference featuring numerous Project 2025 architects.

• Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose: 
  • LaRose is a 2020 election skeptic who has since noticeably dialed up his rhetoric on election fraud and catered to election-denying extremists by creating a sham election “integrity” unit; 
  • and pulling Ohio out of a national voter database integrity program that he had just a month earlier praised as a “great benefit.”