federal case

MADISON, Wis. — President Trump’s attorney for the 2020 campaign in Wisconsin and two former aides all pleaded not guilty Tuesday to felony forgery charges for their roles in a fake elector scheme designed to overturn Trump’s loss in the swing state.

Jim Troupis, a former judge who was Trump’s Wisconsin campaign attorney; Mike Roman, Trump’s director of election day operations in 2020; and Ken Chesebro, a former Trump legal advisor, all entered the pleas in Dane County Circuit Court.

Troupis, who lives in the Madison area, appeared in person. Roman and Chesebro appeared via Zoom.

The Wisconsin fake electors case is moving forward even as others in the battleground states of Michigan and Georgia have faltered. A special prosecutor last year dropped a federal case alleging Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Another case in Nevada is still alive.

The fake elector scheme, under which Republican electors in battleground states submitted documentation to Congress attesting that Trump had won their states even though he lost to President Biden, originated in Wisconsin.

Troupis, Chesebro and Roman argue that they committed no crime and were just trying to keep their options alive in case a court ruled that Trump had actually won the state.

But prosecutors allege that the three defendants defrauded the 10 Wisconsin Republican electors who cast their ballots for Trump in 2020.

Prosecutors contend that Troupis, Chesebro and Roman lied to the electors about how the certificate they signed would be used as part of a plan to submit paperwork to then-Vice President Mike Pence, falsely claiming that Trump had won the battleground state that year.

A majority of the electors told investigators that they did not believe their signatures on the elector certificate would be submitted to Congress without a court ruling, the complaint said. Also, a majority said they did not consent to having their signatures presented as if Trump had won without such a court ruling, the complaint said.

The arraignment on Tuesday came two years and two weeks after the first charges were brought against the three by Wisconsin Democratic Atty. Gen. Josh Kaul. Troupis, Chesebro and Roman face 11 felony forgery charges that are each punishable by up to six years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

Troupis and Roman both filed motions seeking to relocate the trial from Dane County, which includes Madison, to neighboring Jefferson County, saying negative publicity had tainted the potential jury pool.

Trump carried Jefferson County by 15 percentage points in 2020. He lost Dane County by nearly 53 points.

“This case is headed to trial,” wrote Troupis’ attorney, Joe Bugni, in Troupis’ motion. “No question. Neither side is going to blink. And when we get to trial, Troupis has the right to a fair and impartial jury.”

Troupis and Roman also argued that one of the 11 felony counts against them should be dropped because Trump issued a pardon for any federal crimes related to their work on the fake elector scheme. They argued that the state can’t prosecute them over the casting of electoral votes, which is a federal process, and therefore Trump’s pardon applies.

Trump also pardoned Chesebro.

The judge said Tuesday he would set a schedule to hear arguments on those motions.

The state charges against the Trump attorneys and aide are the only ones in Wisconsin. None of the electors have been charged. The 10 Wisconsin electors, Chesebro and Troupis all settled a lawsuit that was brought against them by Democrats seeking damages.

Bauer writes for the Associated Press.

MINNEAPOLIS — The man charged in the political assassinations of the top Democrat in the Minnesota House and her husband, as well as the nonfatal shootings of a state senator and his wife, pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday after prosecutors said they would not seek the death penalty.

Vance Boelter was charged with murdering Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark Hortman, and with shooting state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette Hoffman. Boelter came to their doors in the early hours of June 14, 2025, disguised as a police officer and driving a fake squad car.

The Hortmans’ golden retriever was so gravely injured that it had to be euthanized.

Boelter, 58, was captured near his home in rural Green Isle the day after the shootings following what prosecutors have called the largest search for a suspect in Minnesota history. He also faces state charges, which have been on hold pending the resolution of his federal case.

The U.S. attorney’s office in Minneapolis notified the court Wednesday that the Justice Department would not seek the death penalty against Boelter in accordance with a proposed plea agreement, and the court set the change-of-plea hearing for Thursday.

Minnesota abolished capital punishment in 1911 and has never had a federal death penalty case. Daniel Borgertpoepping, a spokesperson for the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, said the federal plea deal would not affect Boelter’s state charges.

While the Trump administration has pushed for greater use of capital punishment, there were questions about whether Boelter’s case would qualify for the death penalty under federal law.

Prosecutors have called the shootings political. When they announced the federal indictment in July, they released a rambling handwritten letter they say Boelter wrote to FBI Director Kash Patel in which he confessed to the attacks. However, the letter didn’t make clear why he targeted the Hortmans or the Hoffmans.

In some messages to media, Boelter referenced a vague and cryptic “investigation” he had been carrying out, sometimes suggesting it was about the COVID-19 vaccine.

Friends described Boelter as an evangelical Christian and occasional preacher and missionary, who held politically conservative views and had been struggling to find work.

John Hoffman said in a lawsuit filed against Boelter in April that his left arm and hand likely would never fully recover, and that he also had permanent injuries to his digestive and urinary systems.

Yvette Hoffman was left with permanent physical weakness, the lawsuit said, while their adult daughter, Hope Hoffman, who was there and called 911 but was not shot, suffered severe psychological trauma.