Ex-professor spreading election fraud claims in small towns; 'It sounds authoritative if you don't know much'

David and Erin Clements and ousted Otero County Commissioner
Couy Griffin in New Mexico (Wash. Post photo by Paul Ratje)

A former college professor is staging a one-man misinformation campaign in rural America, speaking in small towns in many states to convince locals that the 2020 election was stolen. Some audiences are listening.

David Clements, 42, was an assistant professor teaching business law at New Mexico State University until he was fired last October for refusing to wear a mask in class, Annie Gowen reports for The Washington Post. He had been active in politics too, and had served "as a county Republican chair and as an unsuccessful Republican primary candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2014. Later, he served as the vice chair for legal affairs of the state’s Libertarian party." Clements increasingly embraced conspiracies about election fraud, alienating former friends and colleagues.

After his dismissal, "Clements, who has no formal training or background in election systems, spent months crisscrossing the back roads in his home state of New Mexico in a battered Buick, trying to persuade local leaders not to certify election results," Gowen reports. "His words had an impact: In June, officials in three New Mexico counties where he made his case either delayed or voted against certification of this year’s primary results, even though there was no credible evidence of problems with the vote." One, Otero County Commissioner Couy Griffin, was removed from office for his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

"Clements has taken his message nationwide, traveling to small towns in more than a dozen states, with a focus, he said, on places that are 'forgotten and abandoned and overlooked'," Gowen reports. "His crusade to prove that voting systems can’t be trusted has deepened fears among election experts, who say his meritless claims could give Trump allies more fodder to try to disrupt elections in November and beyond."

Gowen adds, "Clements is one among a tightknit circle of Trump supporters who travel the country as self-appointed election fraud evangelists. They embrace the instructions of leaders like former Trump adviser turned podcaster Stephen K. Bannon, who has urged election deniers to run for local races and sign up to be poll workers in what he calls his 'precinct-by-precinct' takeover strategy. Like others preaching the gospel of election fraud, Clements has attracted a large following online, where he mixes conspiracies with Christian nationalist and sometimes violent rhetoric. He has appeared on Fox News and on Bannon’s podcast. He’s dined with Trump and Mike Lindell, the chief executive of MyPillow and high-profile election fraud conspiracist."

Independent election security experts have examined Clements' claims and call the allegations baseless and misleading. Kevin Skoglund, president and chief technologist of the nonpartisan Citizens for Better Elections, told Gowen: "Their reports on election fraud are a jumble of conspiracy theories and full of errors. They are wrong about voting technology, election processes, certification, and legal requirements. . . . They even quote me and cite my work on voting systems with modems and internet connectivity, but I disagree with every conclusion they draw from my work."

Nevertheless, said Susan Greenhalgh, senior adviser on election security for the nonprofit Free Speech For People, audiences listen to Clements because "It sounds good and people believe it, because it sounds authoritative if you don’t know much."