Trump is a co-conspirator in Michigan's 2020 false electors plot, state investigator says. Meanwhile, Arizona announces its own indictments

Some of the defense lawyers have argued that their clients didn't understand what they were signing when they gathered in Michigan GOP headquarters on Dec. 14, 2020. They've also contended that it was Trump campaign advisers who orchestrated the false certificate.

During a hearing in February, Kahla Crino, an assistant attorney general, described the effort to submit false certificates claiming Trump won the 2020 presidential election as a "multistate criminal conspiracy that was absolutely linked" to Trump's campaign.

Internal Trump campaign emails obtained by investigators and previously reviewed by The Detroit News showed Trump's campaign staff helped coordinate the Republicans' meeting on Dec. 14, 2020, when the electors signed the certificate.

Later, someone submitted the false certificate to the U.S. Senate and the National Archives. That's despite the fact that Biden won Michigan's 16 electoral votes and his victory had been certified by the Board of State Canvassers.

Trump and his campaign have previously criticized allegations that he acted improperly after the 2020 presidential election.

"Trump was carrying out his duty as president to investigate the rigged and stolen 2020 presidential election," Steven Cheung, Trump's campaign spokesperson, said in a statement on Jan. 4.

Trump is already facing charges linked to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election at the federal level, brought by special counsel Jack Smith, and in Georgia, brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.

Defense lawyers called no witnesses as part of the initial round of preliminary examinations for the Michigan electors. Four of the other elector defendants are Meshawn Maddock of Milford, a former Michigan GOP co-chair; John Haggard of Charlevoix; Amy Facchinello of Grand Blanc; and Mari-Ann Henry of Brighton.

George Donnini, who's representing elector Kathy Berden of Snover, said he believes defense attorneys did everything they could to argue that the certificate was contingent on "something happening between Dec. 14, 2020, and Jan. 6, 2021," the day Congress convened to certify the results.

"The fact that it didn't ultimately happen didn't matter," Donnini said. "It could have happened. Something could have happened. And that's what's significant."

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