Last month, the DOJ left officials across the state of Michigan in a state of bewilderment. 

Civil Division chief Harmeet Dhillon demanded the clerk of Wayne County, where Detroit is located, provide records from the 2024 election, saying the DOJ intended to investigate supposed fraud from that election in the state. 

The reason for the letter didn’t surprise local and state officials. This is Trump II, after all: the FBI has executed search warrants at the Fulton County, Georgia elections hub and has obtained the results of a crackpot Arizona audit into the 2020 election results in Maricopa County. Other FBI agents are reportedly investigating the 2020 election in Wisconsin. 

But what left Michigan officials surprised and bemused was that Dhillon had made a very basic mistake: she sent the letter to the wrong office. In Michigan, cities and townships run elections, not county clerks. 

READ MORE