Michigan House Gives Oversight Committee Subpoena Powers in Election Probe

Michigan’s election process now has more subpoena powers for the House Committee, as Michigan lawmakers presided in a 58-51 vote Tuesday. This adds strength to House Resolution 342 with more subpoena powers as they investigate Michigan's 2020 primary and general elections. After the vote, subpoenas were issued to Livonia City Clerk Susan Nash, along with Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey requesting information.

According to House Oversight Chair Matt Hall, they are looking to review the plans and outlines used for absent counter voting in the Detroit and Livonia areas. They also would like to learn about worker training procedures, qualified voter information, and items such as surveillance footage and hard drives. They feel this is information they can use to provide our citizens with answers, so they can have trust in our system for future events.

Democrats were not happy about the extra subpoena powers, due to an unusual House Oversight hearing a couple weeks ago which allowed Rudy Giuliani, the President's attorney, to question his own witnesses, making a lot of unfounded claims about our state’s election process. He did not allow much time for our own lawmakers to ask questions.
Grand Rapids Rep. David LaGrand who serves on the oversight committee commented on the House floor that if he had a better sense of what the scope and goal of the inquiry is, he would have supported the resolution.

MLive reports:

LaGrand was critical of how the Giuliani hearing was handled, noting that as an attorney, he wanted to object to how Giuliani was questioning witnesses and couldn’t do so. He also wanted “significant assurance” that the committee isn’t coercing people who would otherwise be cooperative moving forward, and said the committee should have an evidentiary threshold for the inquiry, as many of the claims already presented to the committee have not been factual. “Allegations are not evidence,” he said. “I could allege that Amelia Earhart is buried under Tiger Stadium. That doesn’t mean that someone has to dig it up to see if I’m right or not.”

Here in Michigan certified results indicate that Trump lost the state by over 154,000 votes, and our Electors cast their vote for Joe Biden on Monday. This election is finally over, but questions will continue to be asked and hashed over for many months to come.

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