New Mexico Republicans are rallying around their electors who submitted a certificate that sought to award the state’s five electoral votes to Donald Trump instead of President Joe Biden.
Officials say the matter is being “hyped up” by the media and there was nothing illegal or sinister about the act.
In a report by the Albuquerque Journal, the Republican Party of New Mexico said in a statement that the five New Mexico Republicans signed and submitted the certificate just in case “it might later be determined” they were the rightful electors.
The statement went on to say an “elector representative” spoke to the Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver on December 14, 2020, prior to the certificate being officially submitted.
The electors were not fake or fraudulent according to the statement, which was released by GOP spokesman Mike Curtis.
The electors were simply casting votes in the event the standing legal challenges prevailed and the outcome of the election was changed.
Alex Curtas, a spokesman for Toulouse Oliver said the only conversation the Secretary of State had with Republicans about electors was a text exchange with Anissa Ford-Tinnin, a former executive director of the state Republican party and one of the five electors that signed the certificate.
Ford-Tinnin asked if the GOP electors would be allowed into a meeting at the state capitol the day state electoral votes were awarded to Biden.
Toulouse Oliver told Ford-Tinnin that the group could not enter the building and that was the end of the conversation.
New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas said last month that his office is reviewing the case of submitting the faulty election certificate under state law, and had referred the matter to federal agencies as well.