Michigan election officials are bracing for a scenario in which some county canvassers go the way Wayne's did in 2020 and fail to immediately certify results.
Axios Detroit reports such efforts "could bring chaos that will stress courts and potentially undercut the legitimacy of elections and elected officials." Canvassers have historically played a largely perfunctory role, approving results and sending them on to statewide boards that render them official.
In June, a GOP-led county board in New Mexico initially refused to certify primary election results, before acquiescing to a court order to do so.
According to the Axios, a number of Michigan canvassers who pushed back against false claims that Joe Biden stole the 2020 election have been replaced by Republicans.
The Free Press reported last year that Robert Boyd, the 73-year-old Republican canvasser who replaced Monica Palmer in Wayne County "would not have certified the results of the 2020 presidential election and gave no assurance that he would certify the results of future contests."
