WASHINGTON (AP) — New Mexico’s top state elections official has spoken to federal prosecutors as part of the special counsel’s investigation into the 2020 election, a spokesman for the state said Friday. responsible.
The meeting with New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver took place within the past few months, according to spokesman Alex Curtas, who declined to comment further.
The Justice Department has spent months examining pressure campaigns by Trump associates to have battleground states won by Democrat Joe Biden overturn their election results. Special Counsel Jack Smith and his team have issued subpoenas to election officials in states challenged by Trump, seeking correspondence from Trump campaign associates and aides, and have also arranged interviews in recent months with state officials.
Communications with state officials are one part of a much larger investigation by Smith and his team into efforts to block the transfer of power from Trump to Biden. It’s unclear when Smith’s investigation into preparations for the Jan. 6, 2021, riot could end or if anyone could be charged.
A spokesperson for Smith declined to comment on Friday.
It’s unclear what questions Toulouse Oliver, a Democrat in her second term, was asked about the 2020 election in New Mexico.
After Biden won the state by nearly 11 percentage points, the Trump campaign briefly challenged the results in court before dropping the lawsuit. Republicans in the state submitted fake Electoral College certificates declaring Trump the winner — though the fake voters added a disclaimer that the certificates were submitted in case they were later recognized as duly elected and qualified voters.
Although Democrats control all elected offices statewide in New Mexico, with majorities in the Statehouse, false allegations of fraud and manipulation of voting machines in 2020 resonated in some politically conservative communities, including Otero County, where commissioners in June 2022 initially refused to certify the election. results.
Former Otero County Commissioner and Cowboys for Trump co-founder Couy Griffin was banned from holding public office last year for engaging in an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson have also spoken with officials in Smith’s office in recent months, according to their staff.
Kathy Boockvar, Pennsylvania state’s election officer in the 2020 election, said Friday she was not invited to an interview.
It was unclear at this time whether state officials overseeing the 2020 elections in Arizona, Nevada and Wisconsin – other states contested by Trump – had been interviewed. Claire Woodall-Vogg, the head of the Milwaukee Elections Commission, said in an email that she met with investigators virtually a month or two ago.
“I don’t know if I can divulge any details, so not much more to say,” she said.
Efforts by Trump and his allies to undo his loss in Georgia are also the subject of a separate investigation in Atlanta’s Fulton County, with local prosecutors saying they expect a ruling later this summer on the next steps. It was in a Jan. 2, 2021, phone call that Trump suggested Raffensperger could help “find” the votes needed to overturn Biden’s victory.
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Cassidy reported from Atlanta. Associated Press writer Morgan Lee in Santa Fe, New Mexico, contributed to this report.