(Bloomberg) -- A state Republican probe into the 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin concluded there was illegal voting and that President Joe Biden's win could be de-certified.
Michael Gableman, a former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice and special counsel hired by Republicans, filed an interim report Tuesday and said the legislature “ought to take a very hard look at the option of de-certification of the 2020 Wisconsin presidential election.”
“We have to have an election system in Wisconsin that is not only honest in fact, but also in appearance if our democracy is to survive,” Gableman told the Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections on Tuesday.
Given the legal challenges an attempt to overturn the presidential election would face, it's considered unlikely that the legislature would adopt Gableman's report.
Biden carried Wisconsin by less than 1% of the vote, or about 21,000 votes. There has been no credible evidence of significant voter fraud that would have changed the results of the election.
Ann Jacobs, Democratic chairwoman of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, said on Twitter that Gableman was presenting a “crazy conspiracy theory” and that de-certifying the election is “IMPOSSIBLE. NOT LEGAL.”
Republican Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke also said on Twitter that decertifying the election is “still not legal under Wisconsin law” and that the only way to remove a sitting president other than through impeachment of incapacity.
“Fools errand. Focus on the future,” he said.
State Democrats have criticized the investigation as a partisan effort meant to appease former President Donald Trump, who falsely said the election was stolen from him. Trump issued a statement on Tuesday saying “everyone who loves America should be closely following” Tuesday's hearing in Wisconsin with Gableman.
The recommendations in the interim report include eliminating the Wisconsin Elections Commission, which oversees state elections. Gableman said commissioners violated state law, including by allowing nursing home residents to cast ballots even though they weren't competent or eligible.
The report also recommends prohibiting outside funding and staff for running elections. Gableman said the $8.8 million in grants to five Democratic-leaning cities in Wisconsin in 2020 from the nonprofit Center for Tech and Civic Life -- backed by Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg -- amounted to illegal election bribery under state law by facilitating voting.
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