Cleta Mitchell’s group paid a lot of money to a prominent election denier in the Trump administration. ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­    ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­  

Wednesday, August 5

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By Matt Cohen · Senior Reporter

Election deniers helping election deniers: Tax filings show the anti-voting attorney Cleta Mitchell paid a ton of money to Heather Honey — a far-right “election integrity” activist working in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

 

Also in this week’s Eye On The Right: Scott Presler is trying to take credit for Pennsylvania’s routine voter roll maintenance, dispatches from the twilight zone, and our latest quote of the week.

 

Thanks for reading.

In today’s edition:

    ➤ The financial ties of Cleta Mitchell’s vast anti-voting network

     

    ➤ Anti-voting activist Scott Presler spreads noncitizen disinformation in Pennsylvania

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    Election denier Cleta Mitchell granted DHS elections official Heather Honey a lot of money

    Mitchell, who played a key role in President Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia, remains close to the president. Her group, the Election Integrity Network (EIN), also continues to push anti-voting policies at both the state and local level. But her Foundation for Accountability, Integrity & Research in Elections Fund (FAIR) also is quietly funding anti-voting groups across the country through grants.

     

    One of the largest recipients of FAIR grants is Honey — an election conspiracy theorist who was hired last year by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for its election integrity division.

    • Mitchell’s group granted just over $72,000 last fiscal year to Verity Vote, LLC, a company run by Honey, according to recent tax filings. The filings said FAIR paid Honey’s group for consulting and research services. In 2024, FAIR gave Honey’s group $121,284.

    • Honey and Mitchell have a long track record of working together to undermine election security and spread false claims of voter fraud. Honey founded the anti-voting Pennsylvania Fair Elections group, which is part of Mitchell’s EIN.

    • Trump himself cited Honey’s false claims about fraud in Pennsylvania in his Jan. 6, 2021 speech just before rioters ransacked the U.S. Capitol.

    • Despite this, DHS appointed her in August 2025 to the new position of deputy assistant secretary for elections integrity in the department’s Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans.

    • Mitchell’s FAIR fund tripled its grant spending last year, compared to 2024, on election conspiracy and denial groups such as EIN and the Article III Foundation – which alone was given $1.8 million. Those two groups used the money to run deceptive ads ahead of the 2024 election, some of them targeting Spanish-speaking populations.

    ➤ More on the money spent to fund the election denier movement

    Quote of the week

    “Facts don’t care about feelings. Data doesn’t lie.”
    — Mike Lindell

    Mike Lindell — a noted conspiracy theorist who a judge ruled lied about the 2020 election with false claims about voting machines — introduced his new mini-documentary about voting machines being rigged.

    Check out our members-only section of the website and explore premium newsletters from Marc and the Democracy Docket team.

    EXPLORE PREMIUM CONTENT

    Anti-voting activist Scott Presler takes credit for Pennsylvania’s routine voter roll maintenance 

    If you happened to log on to social media Monday, you might have caught prominent MAGA figures and election deniers gloating about Pennsylvania’s latest voter registration numbers. Newly released data by the Pennsylvania Department of State showed that Republicans have made huge gains and significantly narrowed the gap in active voter registrations, with Democrats leading in statewide registrations by just 25,811 — significantly less than the 200,000-plus lead the party had in 2024.

     

    It’s not totally surprising — the GOP has been making gains in the state for years. And it’s not uncommon to see Democratic voter registration numbers drop when state election chiefs do routine voter roll maintenance and purge inactive or ineligible voters.

     

    But when I saw the reaction to the latest Pennsylvania data on X, something caught my attention. One guy is taking all the credit: Anti-voting activist Scott Presler. Except, hilariously, he had absolutely nothing to do with it.

    • “I’M IN TEARS. I’M SCREAMING,” Presler said Monday. “The Pennsylvania Department of State just conducted one of its biggest purges ever. Democrats lost TENS of thousands of voters. It’s happening — it’s actually happening. Our work to clean the voter rolls is actually working.”

    • Over the past couple of weeks, Presler said he’s been reviewing lists of people disqualified from jury duty throughout Pennsylvania and comparing them with counties’ voter rolls to identify potential noncitizens who are registered to vote. Since noncitizens are disqualified from jury duty, Presler and other anti-voting activists think they can identify noncitizens falsely registered to vote by comparing county disqualified juror lists with voter rolls.

    • The problem is people are disqualified from serving on juries for a whole host of reasons, and non-juror lists made available for public inspection don’t include personal information — making them an unreliable source for identifying noncitizens on the voter roll. But facts don’t stop Presler!

    • “There is not enough information used [in non-juror lists] to accurately match each individual with the voter file,” Geoff Morrow, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of State, told a local news outlet about Presler’s efforts. “All evidence has shown that noncitizen voting is extremely rare across the country, including in Pennsylvania,” he added.

    ➤ What happened in Pennsylvania?

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      Notes from the Twilight Zone

      • The anti-voting group Unite4Freedom crashed out after U.S. District Judge Colleen Lawless dismissed the DOJ’s voter roll case in Illinois: “Yes, her last name is ‘Lawless’ – you can’t make this up.” Reminder: DOJ is now 0-20 in its voter roll grab.

      • Nightmare rotation: Tina Peters, Clay Parikh and other prominent election deniers gathered in D.C. recently, where they claim to have spoken with members of the Trump administration about the need for one-day elections, no mail voting, and paper ballots.

      • MAGA is collectively losing their minds that the Senate is going into recess without passing the SAVE America Act.
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