JUDGE RULES SINCERE FRAUD ISN'T REALLY FRAUD
Nevada court finds you can't forge a document you truly, deeply believed was already real.
A Las Vegas judge dismissed forgery charges against six Republicans who signed a certificate declaring themselves Nevada's 2020 electors, ruling that prosecutors failed to prove the men knew the document was fake, largely because the men have insisted, under oath and otherwise, that they still don't. Legal scholars are calling it a landmark clarification: forgery requires a guilty mind, and a mind that sincerely appoints itself to the Electoral College is, by definition, too pure to counterfeit anything. The dismissed filing reportedly still bears a notary stamp so enthusiastic it smudged 'electors' into 'elections,' which defense counsel described as 'aspirational penmanship, not fraud.'
"This is a victory for people who notarize their feelings," said defense attorney Chip Ostrander, fresh off the win. "My clients didn't forge a certificate. They manifested one. Paperwork follows conviction — moral, not criminal. If Nevada wants to prosecute belief, it should talk to a bishop, not a judge." Ostrander added that the ruling is 'a win for anyone who's ever really, really wanted something to be true and then notarized it,' a category he estimated includes most of the DMV.
Nevada's attorney general has vowed to appeal, and aides say she's been practicing saying 'fake electors' slower and louder in front of a mirror, on the theory that clarity alone might succeed where evidence apparently could not. Legal analysts note the appeal faces the same core problem as the original case: it is very hard to prove someone forged a document when the document's entire defense is that the forger meant it with his whole heart. 'At some point,' one election-law professor sighed, 'the law has to decide whether paperwork means anything, or whether it's just a very official-looking diary entry.'
