Matthew DePerno, a far-right Michigan lawyer, is running for state attorney general. He won the GOP primary with the tailwind of Trump’s endorsement; and as you know, Trump doesn’t endorse anyone unless they endorse his election lies.
Of course DePerno (photo below) shouldn’t be elected; not because he’s a Republican or Trump supporter, but because someone who believes conspiracy theories shouldn’t be wielding state prosecutorial authority. (He’s threatened to prosecute his opponent.)
Also, he’s under criminal investigation in connection with unauthorized voting machine breaches in several counties, including Antrim County, a rural county of 23,431 people in northern Michigan (see map here).
So let’s look at what happened in Antrim County. Of those 23,431 people, 15,972 voted in the 2020 election. Looks like nearly the entire adult population turned out to vote, and maybe some of the cows, too. (Just kidding.*)
(* I probably shouldn’t kid about stuff like this. In today’s political climate, it might grow legs.)
In 2020, Trump got 9,748 (61.03%) of those votes, Biden got 5,960 (37.32%), and the rest went to the Libertarian candidate or “other.”
Now let’s compare that with 2016: Out of 13,582 total votes, Trump got 8,469 (62.35%), Clinton got 4,448 (32.75%), and Libertarian, Green Party, and “other” candidates got 4.99% (compared to 1.65% in 2020).
Looking at these numbers, it’s really not that hard to conclude third-party candidates sucked more votes away from Clinton than Trump in 2016, perhaps because she angered Bernie supporters, and many of those voters came back to Biden in 2020.
I also see Biden, on paper, took about 1% of Trump’s 2016 voters away from him, although these quite likely are different people. Actually, Trump got more votes in 2020 than 2016 in Antrim County, so this is probably just population growth and/or turnout slightly favoring the Democrats in that county. No big deal.
So, Trump 61.03% in 2020 vs. 62.35% in 2016, and his Democratic opponent 37.32% in 2020 vs. 32.75% in 2016, with the third-party vote dropping to 1.65% in 2020 from 5% in 2016.
Man, I just don’t see ghosts hiding inside the voting machines. There’s absolutely NOTHING SUSPICIOUS about the 2020 numbers. I just see no reason to believe that all of Trump’s votes weren’t counted, or that Biden’s total was padded.
So how to explain DePerno’s paranoia? Certainly, not with logic. I think the best way to explain it is by thinking of the Republican Party as some sort of satanic cult whose adherents leave their brains at home when they go to Trump’s seances.
