The Michigan sheriff who defended a right-wing militia group’s effort to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer filed a lawsuit alleging voter fraud in the presidential election.
Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf’s lawsuit alleges, without evidence that “multifaceted schemes and artifices … resulted in the unlawful counting, or manufacturing, of hundreds of thousands of illegal, ineligible, duplicate or purely fictitious ballots in the state of Michigan,” according to the Detroit Free Press.
Advertisement
It seeks to block directions outlined in a memo from Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson to local clerks instructing them to delete electronic poll book software and associated files from the Nov. 3 vote “unless a petition for recount has been filed and the recount has not been completed, a post-election audit is planned but has not yet been completed, or the deletion of the data has been stayed by an order of the court or the Secretary of State.” According to the Detroit Free Press, that is standard procedure after an election to remind clerks to remove voters’ personal information from their machines to protect sensitive information.Â
“Immediate intervention in the form of injunctive relief is necessary to prevent the loss of election data and evidence needed to determine voter intent, any systematic fraud, and any criminal activity and/or civil liability,” Leaf’s lawsuit states.
Advertisement
His other concerns were centered around conspiracy theories on writing instruments that were already debunked.
The state’s Attorney General Dana Nessel dismissed Leaf’s lawsuit on Monday, writing, “The only thing missing from this post-election circus was a lawsuit from Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf. Until now, of course. Because 2020 is still happening.”
Advertisement
Leaf faced calls resign in October after he suggested that the domestic terrorists’ plot to kidnap Gov. Whitmer could be seen as citizen’s arrest.
“A lot of people are angry with the governor and they want her arrested,” Leaf said. “So were they trying to arrest, or was it a kidnap attempt? Because you can still, in Michigan, if it’s a felony, you can make a felony arrest.”
