Stan Grot, a town clerk in Shelby Township, Michigan, was stripped of his authority to run elections after he was charged with acting as a 2020 fake elector for then-President Trump.
Grot is one of 16 Michiganders charged with crimes on Tuesday by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel “for their role in the alleged false electors scheme following the 2020 U.S. presidential election.”
The charges include forgery, uttering and publishing, election law forgery, and conspiracy to commit each of these crimes. Any one of these charges, all felonies, could mean up to a five- to 14-year prison sentence for anyone found guilty.
On Thursday the Michigan Bureau of Elections notified Grot, who has served as Shelby Township clerk since 2012, won’t be allowed to administer elections—one of a clerk’s primary duties—while charges are pending.
In a phone interview with the Associated Press, Grot declined to discuss the charges against him, but he did confirm “a request for me to recuse myself from elections until the issue of charges is resolved,” adding that he intends to abide by that request.
Shelby Township is a suburb of Detroit and with a population of roughly 80,000.
Clerks in Michigan are among numerous local clerks across the country facing legal consequences for alleged crimes related to the so-called “Big Lie”—that Trump won the 2020 presidential election, not President Biden.
For instance, a former clerk in Colorado, Tina Peters, is awaiting trial after allegedly attempting to breach voting system technology that’s used across the country, according to an indictment.
Further, Trump himself revealed this week that he received a target letter from the office of special counsel Jack Smith in the federal investigation into 2020 Election interference.
However, the DC grand jury in that case adjourned Thursday without issuing any possible indictments, and it was not expected to meet Friday.
