After a seemingly uphill battle to prove that President-elect Joe Biden won the presidential race, the Michigan State Board of Canvassers voted to certify the results of the November 2020 election and confirmed that Biden’s win in the state was legitimate during the board’s meeting Monday afternoon.
Three members of the Michigan Board of State Canvassers voted to certify state election results; Republican Norm Shinkle abstained.
The vote is what was needed in several steps to finalize election results and cast the state’s 16 electoral votes for President-elect Joe Biden, the Detroit Free Press reported.
Biden earned approximately 154,000 more votes than President Donald Trump in the state. Although, Trump and supporters have claimed, without proof and from baseless theories, that Michigan’s election results were stolen or are otherwise not counted correctly.
State officials disagree.
“I commend the three members of the State Board of Canvassers who voted to follow the law and certify the 2020 election results today,” Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said during a press release. “The people of Michigan have spoken. President-elect Biden won the State of Michigan by more than 154,000 votes, and he will be our next president on January 20th. I also want to thank Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and the local clerks across Michigan who made sure this year’s election was free, fair, and secure, and the voters who turned out in record numbers to make their voices heard. Now, it’s time to put this election behind us and come together as a state to defeat our common enemy: COVID-19.”
Board member Julie Matuzak said during the meeting before the vote that she wants to improve the elections in the state where need be.
“I am mostly in favor of fixing and modernizing how we conduct elections in this state,” she said.
Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said in a press release on the Board of State Canvassers certification of the Nov. 3 election that “democracy has prevailed.”
“Today’s vote of the State Board of Canvassers to certify Michigan’s November election confirms the truth: the election was fair and secure, and the results accurately reflect the will of the voters,” she said adding that a “record breaking” 5.5 million Michigan citizens cast ballots in this election, more than ever before in this state’s history. “Their will is clear and unequivocal. Now we turn to the important work of implementing a statewide risk limiting audit and local procedural audits to affirm the integrity of the process and identify opportunities for improvement. And we will continue working with lawmakers at the state and federal level to strengthen our elections even further in the months ahead.
“Our democracy, like the election officials who administer it, is resilient. Today it and they survived an unprecedented attack on its integrity. There will no doubt be more similar attacks in the future, based in falsehoods and misinformation. But then, as now, we will be ready to respond as always with facts, data, and the truth.”
Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey said during the meeting public comment section that she wanted to remind people that the Detroit Department of Elections, the Detroit City Clerk position and other offices are non-partisan entities.
Winfrey added that the pollworkers were trained and they took shifts on Election Day so they would not be overworked and to minimize errors. She said, also mentioning pollworkers who worked at the TCF Center that was recently in the spotlight due to some Republican vote challengers there who felt that they were unfairly kept out of the voting process.
“My charge is to administer the election process, ensure voters know when Election Day is and to ensure they know where they go on and vote,” she said. “In doing such we’ve done everything to ensure that our process is open … transparent and that it is administered in the spirit of professionalism.”
To watch the meeting visit here.
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