Jim Troupis, lawyer charged in fake elector scheme, rails against case

“There isn’t a single morning or a single night since early in 2021 that I have not worried about this case, that I have not thought about it,” Troupis, a former Dane County circuit judge, told conservative radio host Vicki McKenna on WISN-AM Tuesday afternoon. “They’re coming after me and every member of my family. They’re coming after my law license. They’re coming after my bankers.” 

Charged alongside Troupis is  Kenneth Chesebro, a Wisconsin native and alleged lead architect of the 2020 elector scheme, and Mike Roman, a former Trump aide who allegedly delivered Wisconsin’s slate of false elector paperwork to a Pennsylvania congressman’s staffer in order to get them to Vice President Mike Pence on Jan. 6, 2021. The three face 11 felony charges, brought by Attorney General Josh Kaul’s office, alleging forgery to defraud the Republican electors who cast their ballots for Trump in 2020, even though Joe Biden won the state.

Defense for the civil case cost “well more than half a million dollars,” Troupis said on WISN, adding he had to get a lawyer from Kansas City. “If you don’t think they were trying to bankrupt me, you don’t understand what’s going on.”

Troupis encouraged people to show up at the Dane County Courthouse Thursday morning when the defendants are scheduled to appear. He said the fellow judges he served with are “good judges” and “honest people” who are “put in a very difficult political problem.”

“It’s not laughable to me, because I can go to jail for six years. And I don’t doubt they would love to do that, to make me that poster child,” Troupis said.

Each of the 11 charges leveled against the three carries the same maximum penalty of six years in prison, in addition to a $10,000 fine. Kaul’s office added 10 charges to the initial single count against each defendant on Tuesday.

According to the complaint, most of the electors said they did not consent to having their signatures presented as if Trump had won the state without a court ruling saying so. The complaint also describes how Chesebro, Troupis and Roman allegedly created a fake document that said Trump won Wisconsin’s 10 Electoral College votes and then attempted to deliver it to then-Vice President Mike Pence for certification.

More: What to know about the new fake elector charges in Wisconsin against Trump associates

Biden beat Trump by about 21,000 votes in Wisconsin. Trump sought recounts in Dane and Milwaukee counties, which confirmed Biden’s win. Trump sued and the state Supreme Court upheld the results on a 4-3 vote on Dec. 14, 2020. Troupis represented the Trump campaign in the case.

Less than an hour later, Democrats met in the state Capitol to cast the state’s 10 electoral votes for Biden.

At the same time, the Republican fake electors gathered in another part of the Capitol to fill out paperwork claiming Trump had won. They submitted their filings to Congress, the National Archives, a federal judge and then-Wisconsin Secretary of State Doug La Follette. Chesebro was in the room during the meeting.

At the time, the fake electors said they held the meeting only to ensure the state’s electoral votes were cast for Trump if a court later determined he was the true winner of the state. 

The 10 electors have not been charged criminally related to the fake documents. Last year, the group settled a lawsuit filed by the real Biden electors against them over their role in the scheme. As a part of the settlement, the false electors acknowledged their actions were used in an attempt to overturn an election.

Andrew Hitt discusses the ‘fake elector’ scheme with ’60 Minutes’

Andrew Hitt, the former chairman of the Republican Party of Wisconsin, spoke with Anderson Cooper of “60 Minutes” about the fake elector scheme he took part in following Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.

Courtesy of ’60 Minutes’