WASHINGTON — When a local Republican official in Georgia filed a lawsuit this year declaring that election boards did not have a duty to certify results, the lawyer she turned to was part of the legal team who worked on former President Donald Trump’s behalf there in 2020.
Atlanta-based attorney Alex Kaufman, whose name appears on the lawsuit, was a silent listener on the infamous January 2021 call in which Trump pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to have reversed his loss there. He was also part of the legal team that tried to submit an alternative slate of electors in the state.
Kaufman’s involvement in this year’s lawsuit filed by Julie Adams, a member of the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections, shows how even as the Republican National Committee is waging a more disciplined legal effort than in 2020, reminders remain of the chaos of four years ago as Trump sought to hold on to power.
Several of those lawyers involved in the effort to overturn the 2020 election faced legal consequences for their actions, including disbarment and criminal charges, in what was viewed as an effort to deter similar actions in the future.
The RNC was not involved in the most recent Georgia lawsuit. It has been working with some high-powered outside law firms, filing more than 100 of its own lawsuits, and has secured some victories, including on the rules used in some states for counting absentee ballots and other election procedures.
“What we saw in 2020 was very responsive, maybe a little improvisational, and less of a structured plan,” said Sophia Lin Lakin, an election lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union, describing her frequent Republican opponents. “What we are seeing now is a strategic effort.”
A source close to the Trump campaign said that in 2020, a consent decree limiting Republican “ballot security” activities had hampered their ability to build a comprehensive program in time for the election, as they were still getting their footing.
The 2020 campaign may have also suffered from a lack of imagination about how big the turnout would be and what Democrats were doing in the courts to expand the vote, a Trump campaign adviser said. “They were caught flat-footed,” the person added.
But while this time around there is no Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman or Sidney Powell — three of the lawyers who actively sought to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 victory and faced criminal charges as a result — there are still some repeat players like Kaufman involved in litigation around the country.
In fact, the latest Georgia challenge, which failed, was linked to Cleta Mitchell, a key 2020 player who was also on Trump’s call with Raffensperger.
Kaufman did not respond to messages seeking comment about his role in 2020. Mitchell said in an email that the RNC and the Trump campaign are “much better situated this year than four years ago, for the simple reason that they are not waiting until after the election to start thinking about these issues.”
Neither Kaufman nor Mitchell were indicted in Georgia as part of the investigation into the election scheme that ensnared Giuliani, Eastman and Powell, as well as Trump himself. The grand jury did, however, recommend that they both be indicted. Powell is one of four people, also including attorneys Jenna Ellis and Kenneth Chesebro, who have pleaded guilty in the Georgia case.
Mitchell in her email reiterated her belief that there was a “solid case” about election irregularities in Georgia four years ago that was not properly adjudicated.
Other familiar names from 2020 election lawsuits have been spotted this year too.
One lawsuit in Pennsylvania filed by Republican members of Congress that questions the validity of overseas votes was brought by two lawyers involved in 2020 election challenges. One is Karen DiSalvo, who after the 2020 election helped force an audit in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania. The other is Erick Kaardal, who filed a lawsuit in 2020 trying to prevent Biden’s win from being certified. It was quickly dismissed.
Another 2020 veteran is Kurt Olsen, who in August filed a lawsuit in Georgia on behalf of the DeKalb County Republican Party questioning the certification of Dominion voting machines. In 2020, he played a role in a long-shot effort led by Texas to file a lawsuit directly at the Supreme Court seeking to overturn election results in key swing states won by Biden. The effort failed.
Separately, Bruce Castor and Michael van der Veen, who represented Trump at his second impeachment trial, over his bid to overturn the 2020 election results, have filed suits questioning the integrity of the election process in various states on behalf of a conservative group called United Sovereign Americans.
These lawyers are mostly working independently of the RNC and the Trump campaign, but not exclusively. Kaufman, for example, filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Fulton County Republican Party and the RNC pushing for more Republican poll workers to be hired.
Meanwhile, Christina Bobb, who was criminally charged in Arizona for her alleged role in seeking to subvert Biden’s 2020 win there, is an RNC employee. She has pleaded not guilty.
One Republican election lawyer said the RNC’s “election integrity unit,” in which lawyer Gineen Bresso is a key player, has performed well so far, noting that it is important to focus only on the cases the unit has filed and not those filed by outside groups.
He pointed to lawsuits in Michigan, for example, including one where a state court struck down the state’s guidance on verifying signatures on absentee ballots.
“You have a robust litigation effort,” the lawyer said.
The RNC and Trump campaign have focused what they call their election integrity effort on 18 states including the key swing states. A central component of the plan is training poll watchers and workers who can liaise with lawyers to identify potential legal issues.
“This will help deliver a fair, accurate, secure, and transparent election for the American people,” Gates McGavick, a senior adviser to Michael Whatley, the RNC chairman and veteran election lawyer, said in a statement.
The Republicans have recruited over 220,000 poll watchers and poll workers and about 5,000 volunteer lawyers ready to deploy through early voting and Election Day, a source close to the Trump campaign said, describing the operation as a parallel arm to the campaign’s political and get-out-the-vote program, which is working to drive voter turnout. It is a priority for Trump, the source said.
Rick Hasen, an expert on election law at the UCLA School of Law and an NBC News contributor, said the RNC has been “much more on offense this time” but that its record in court so far is mixed, with some of its lawsuits aimed more at political messaging than the law.
In the last few days, the RNC lost a case in Michigan questioning how the state manages voter rolls and other cases in Michigan and North Carolina seeking to restrict overseas voting.
It has also touted victories in recent weeks in those same battlegrounds.
The RNC is working with lawyers around the country, with the firms Consovoy McCarthy, Jones Day and the Dhillon Law Group among the key players, according to an NBC News analysis of reports filed with the Federal Election Commission that disclose legal and compliance spending. In August alone, the firms were paid $300,000, $731,000 and $415,000 respectively.
Consovoy McCarthy has in recent years become an influential conservative firm that has worked on culture war issues, including the successful attempt to end affirmative action in college admissions, and has represented Trump himself.
Among the cases the firm is involved in is one arising in Mississippi in which the RNC is seeking to upend normal practices in many states by requiring that absentee ballots received after Election Day be discarded even if they were sent before the deadline. That case is currently on appeal at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals with a ruling due at any time. However, the case is unlikely to affect this year’s election.
Jones Day, where Trump’s former White House counsel Don McGahn is a senior figure, was involved in an RNC case in Pennsylvania unsuccessfully challenging state rules for resolving issues with defective mail-in ballots.
The Dhillon firm is led by Harmeet Dhillon, a Trump ally who recently took up an important role on the ground in Arizona after a local attorney stepped down. Another of the firm’s lawyers, David Warrington, is the Trump campaign’s top lawyer.
An RNC lawsuit in Michigan challenging voter registration procedures is one of the cases the firm has worked on.
Representatives from all three firms did not respond to messages seeking comment on their legal work.
Even if they wanted to, the RNC and campaign do not have control over lawsuits filed by outside groups or individuals, just as in 2020 when some of the more outlandish claims were brought by lawyers with no official connection to the national party apparatus.
“I don’t know if they can control some of the outside lawyers,” said another Republican lawyer involved in election litigation. “You would have to put your head in a paper bag to not know what happened to some of those lawyers after 2020.”
Marc Elias, the go-to election lawyer for Democrats, including the Harris campaign, declined to comment on the Republican legal team. But he has previously said that he expects them to be “more competent” than in 2020.
But the ACLU’s Lakin said competent attorneys might be better at dressing up flimsy claims in a way that can promote a false narrative about election fraud that could ultimately lead to a repeat of the violent scenes at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“It’s a recipe for very troubling actions in the future,” she added.
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