Pro-democracy groups that fear a similar scenario unfolding this year have spent months poring over past comments by newly appointed and returning canvassers to gauge their potential willingness to block certification.

I am almost a dozen County canvassers — all named Republicans — who have expressed at least some level of doubt about the accuracy of Michigan’s 2020 presidential election results, according to the Center for Media and Democracy, a nonprofit watchdog group based in Wisconsin.

Those canvassers are now in positions responsible for certifying the results of Michigan’s 2024 presidential election, and that has some observers nervous, including former U.S. Rep. Dave Trott.

“Some of the naysayers and those who believe the election was stolen in 2020 have had four years to plot and plan to contest the election if it doesn’t go their way,” said Trott, a Republican who has represented parts of metro Detroit in Congress from 2015 to 2019.

A partisan process

Wayne County — which is in Detroit and has the largest number of registered voters in the state — could once again be key to certifying the results of the November election.

There, GOP canvassers Robert Boyd and Katherine Riley openly expressed their doubts about the outcome of the 2020 election.

Boyd said before he believed the 2020 Michigan presidential election results “were inaccurate” because he was told “by people who knew what happened” in Wayne County.

Meanwhile, Riley led training sessions on election integrity on behalf of a nonprofit organization which pushed for “100% full forensic audits of fraudulent elections” and the subsequent decertification of those election results.

Neither responded to multiple requests for comment from Bridge Michigan.

Speaking last week as part of a nonpartisan panel on civics, Trott alluded to problems in the 2020 Wayne County Board of canvassers as a reason for his concern.

This time, Trott fears some canvassers in the county “will not only do it again,” but have had enough time “to learn how to do a better job of making trouble.”

Despite new laws designed to ease the election certification process, two canvassers in the Upper Peninsula considered blocking the results of the revoked local elections in May. They eventually voted to certify, but only after a top state election official warned them they could face misdemeanor charges.

In August, Kalamazoo County canvasser Robert Froman — who had argued the 2020 election was “most definitely” stolen from Trump — told The Detroit News he would refuse to certify this year’s results if he believed there was fraud.

The ACLU of Michigan responded by proactively sued Fromanwho shortly thereafter signed an affidavit agreeing to perform his legal duty as canvasser in certifying the results of the presidential election in Kalamazoo County.

Bridge tried to reach Froman last week, but was told by an employee in the Kalamazoo County Clerk’s office that Froman was no longer talking to reporters about the election.

At least three county staffers who questioned the 2020 results have since resigned from their positions to run for other offices, including Marvin Rubingh, who is running for a seat on the Banks Town Board.

“We want to trust the system but then check,” said Rubingh, a former member of Antrim Hawkers’ County Council.

The certification of this year’s results should have “nothing to do with who wins and who doesn’t,” he said, but rather “are the voters legitimate voters? Do the numbers add up? Are the elections being held correctly?”

Railings in place

County canvassers have a few basic duties. They review vote totals from all county precincts to ensure they are consistent, report those findings to the State Board of canvassers, and handle any recounts that may occur.

Although the new laws have not been tested before in a presidential contest, some observers predict they will effectively prevent canvassers from delaying the certification of the Nov. 5 election.

“It is their legal duty to provide these election results,” said Quentin Turner, executive director of the Michigan-based democracy watchdog group Common Cause. “If they don’t, if they fail to do that, then the state can actually take over the canvas of the election.”