CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) – Some Republican officials in West Virginia are already pushing campaigns for governor in 2024. But first, they need to figure out what happened in 2020.
Years after Joe Biden was declared the winner of the presidency, Secretary of State Mac Warner and Attorney General Patrick Morrisey say they remain concerned that the Democrat’s victory was not legitimate. They persist in these views despite repeated investigations, audits and court cases that concluded there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud or improper counting that could have changed the results.
Warner, who runs elections in West Virginia, toed the line for more than two years before going on a talk show this week to say he “can now say firmly” that he believes the election was rigged. .
“This election was thrown, it was stolen, and we must not rest easy,” he told Talk Radio WRNR in the state’s Eastern Panhandle.
Claims that the presidential election was stolen have been a staple of some Republicans since Biden was named Trump’s winner in November 2020. Trump himself has flouted such accusations, though he has recently changed his complaints somewhat of specific disputes over swing voting procedures. states He has recently accepted broader claims that tech companies, the media and federal intelligence officials colluded to cover up incriminating information found on the laptop of Biden’s only surviving son, Hunter.
It’s those allegations that Warner says he finds credible, prompting strong denials from social media executives and federal law enforcement that they were pressured by Democrats to suppress the story. In an interview this week, Warner called the alleged actions “treasonous” and said they should be examined more thoroughly before the next election.
But even in West Virginia, where every county voted to elect Trump in two presidential elections, some voters see recurring concerns about 2020 as nothing more than GOP control.
“No matter who the Republican is in the field, they’re all going to say 2020 was fake,” said Trevor Southerly, a 20-year-old community college student from Moorefield. “It’s a political move, and they have to make the move or they’re going to lose.”
Southerly said what draws him to Morrisey is his support for school choice programs and the growth of West Virginia’s energy production workforce.
The Republican Party, Southerly said, has focused too much on “national issues” and talking points instead of what matters to people at the local level, especially in West Virginia, which consistently ranks among the highest in the nation for to poverty and overdose death rates. and among the lowest for life expectancy and educational attainment.
He believes Morrisey has better plans to address these issues.
Serving as attorney general since 2013, a year before the state Legislature flipped from a Democratic majority to a Republican majority for the first time in decades, has given Morrisey a chance to lean into his self-described role as “conservative fighter” of the state. He has championed laws passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature on school choice, transgender participation in sports and abortion.
Before that, he joined a lawsuit to nullify the 2020 election that was thrown out by the conservative-dominated US Supreme Court.
In an interview this week, Morrisey repeated past claims about “significant irregularities” in the 2020 election. He declined to say definitively whether he believes Biden’s victory was fraudulent.
“He’s the president of the United States. We know that’s what’s going on now,” Morrisey said.
After West Virginia was the last in the country to certify a 2020 presidential winner, US Army veteran Warner said he supported the state’s involvement in the legal effort to challenge the results.
Warner also made an appearance at a “March for Trump” rally in Charleston after the election, where he appeared to hold a “Stop the Steal” sign.
Warner was one of the first GOP election officials to choose to withdraw from the Electronic Registration Information Center, a nonpartisan group with a track record of fighting voter fraud. Trump has characterized it as a “terrible” system that “‘pumps the rolls’ of Democrats and does nothing to clean them up.”
But Warner never said publicly before this week that he believes the election was stolen, saying that view has crystallized in his mind as new information has come out.
But even voters who agree say other issues are more important.
Ken Drum, who leads the GOP in Harrison County, said he doesn’t believe Biden has legitimately won the race, but his main concern is finding a candidate who will keep nearly all abortions illegal in the state and protect gun rights. To him, that’s Morrisey.
Dee Truman, a welder’s helper in Roane County, said she trusts Warner because her family has lived in West Virginia for six generations and understands why coal should be preserved and the state’s pipelines up and running they are important to workers like her.
She said she has concerns about national election security after 2020, but has been impressed by Warner’s work to remove hundreds of thousands of people from voting rolls who she said were ineligible to vote. Those efforts make her feel that West Virginia is “probably one of the safest states” when it comes to election security.
Lori and Tim Smith are registered independents and run a Marshall County business that helps people make homes and businesses accessible to people with disabilities. Lori, 54, said the changes Warner made as secretary of state had saved them hours of paperwork.
Warner also started a pilot project that allowed military and foreign nationals to use a mobile voting app. That mattered to Tim, an Army veteran who had experienced challenges voting when he was deployed.
“He wants people to vote legitimately and rightly and eliminate any kind of deception, in all honesty,” Lori said. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting to make the system more efficient and fairer.”
——
The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to improve its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about the AP democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
