He is still facing federal charges. For now, Griffin has halted the petition with an appeal to the state Supreme Court, which hasnt decided whether to intervene. "I was raised in the shadow of a great man," he said. That happened Tuesday in New Mexico when a state judge disqualified Otero County Commissioner Couy Griffin from holding public office. Officer: Im going to issue a citation for the seatbelt. She said in an online press conference that she feared, "a scenario where the tabulators would instantly become, you know, questionable, and we would have to completely take them out of serviceIt's just a really scary, unfortunate and nonsensical situation. Couy Griffin will be featured on Wikipedia . "I don't think there's any more productive way to spend tax dollars than to make sure our elections aren't compromised," he told an Otero County Commission meeting in January. And thats what we had.. As CPAC's 2023 edition kicks off, the man who greets the myriad right-wing activists and supporters descending on Maryland . He delved into politics too, serving as a county Republican chair and as an unsuccessful Republican primary candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2014. A Hubbard Broadcasting Company, said he never entered the Capitol building. Why? he asked. Nichols, and awarded a nearly $50,000 contract to audit about 24,000 votes to Echomail, which was among the companies who audited the 2020 vote in Maricopa County, AZ. Page provides news from near and far about our hero of. The effort sparked a voter intimidation inquiry by the House Oversight Committee. Here are 13 more things about Couy: New . Is it my county commissioners or these people sitting here who had lunch with Donald Trump and the MyPillow guy?, On June 17, the states deadline to certify election results, Clements drove several hundred miles in his old Buick, hoping to stop commissions across New Mexico from approving the votes. Holmes has grown so disheartened by the couples oft-repeated allegations that she has stopped coming to meetings unless asked for. Where I need peoples support is to show up and stand shoulder to shoulder in Alamogordo for this trial. Because I want to make sure our voices are accurately captured. I stand before you as someone who used to be an award-winning professor, an award-winning prosecutor who is unemployed, Clements said. The case went to federal district court where a judge dismissed Griffin's case where he tried to have the New Mexico Campaign Reporting Act declared unconstitutional. Do you regret anything that happened? Just this week, Griffins attorneys filed new motions on his behalf one demanding evidence and another claiming his charges are politically motivated. KOB-TV, LLC He takes things and extrapolates them to a place that comes completely out of thin air. The 249-page lawsuit alleges that Griffin can be removed as an Otero County commissioner for violating his oath of office because the 14th Amendment states that no officeholder sworn to uphold the Constitution shall have engaged in insurrection against the same, according to the suit. Hes also been suspended from Facebook and banished from Native American lands in his district as he contests charges of breaking into the Capitol grounds and disrupting Congress that could carry a one-year sentence. FILE - Otero County Commissioner Couy Griffin, the founder of Cowboys for Trump, takes in the view from his ranch in Tularosa, N.M., May 12, 2021. The second trial in the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot case is underway Monday, with New Mexico county commissioner, self-proclaimed cowboy and noted conspiracy theorist Couy Griffin appearing . In at least one case detailed in the affidavit, Griffin paid his ex-wife $350.00 from Cowboys for Trump LLC to cover his child support obligations. The election was stolen from me, and then you just walk away? Griffin, who was convicted of a federal misdemeanor in March for his involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, is representing himself in the lawsuit, which has attracted the interest of nationally known constitutional scholars and attorneys. Magda Jean-Louis and Alice Crites contributed to this report. Its been real hard.. The officers call Griffin over and the traffic stop gets ugly. Yet two independent election security experts who have examined the Clements work Susan Greenhalgh, senior adviser on election security for the nonprofit Free Speech For People, and Kevin Skoglund, president and chief technologist for the nonpartisan Citizens for Better Elections said the fraud charges are baseless and misleading. His wife divorced him. One recent still summer night in this tiny city on the Nebraska prairie, more than 60 people showed up at a senior citizens center to hear attorney David Clements warn of an epidemic of purported election fraud. Manage the news you want to see, read exclusive content and explore other subscriber benefits. "The reports that we've subsequently seen put out by these people have been riddled with falsehoods," she said. Gun safe storage bill inches closer to governor's desk Republicans express concern over high-profile measure Republicans express concern over high-profile measure during Fridays two-hour debate. He had hoped the president would address some problems with the forest near the town of Cloudcroft, which is at risk for fire. Now, Griffin is spearheading a legally dubious audit of the 2020 election in Otero County. Couy Griffin (via CREW legal filing) Leading First Amendment experts have weighed in on a lawsuit against a New Mexico man convicted in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, saying that he cannot use the First Amendment as a defense to the constitutional prohibition against insurrectionists holding public office. A New Mexico judge has removed a county commissioner from office and disqualified him from running for future office in response to his participation in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Hill riot . Toward the end of the meeting, Donna Swanson, a former presiding poll judge in Otero County who worked with Holmes for years, stepped up to speak. I can handle a lot. Griffin: You know the drugs right now are horrible, the property crime is horrible, and theres two of you guys riding around citing people for no seatbelts?Officer: So, wed probably be doing the drug stuff if you were wearing your seatbelt.Griffin: Oh, really? Im a child of the trailer park. "And it's cost me everything - from a marriage, to finances, to friends.". 1 talking about this. Should Griffin be found guilty of the charge, he could be punished by a fine of up to $1,000 or by up to a year imprisonment, court records state. My mom worked at Kmart and Lowes, my dad bagged groceries, he said. Speak up a little.Officer: I said I am going to issue a citation for a seatbelt. The ruling comes after lawyers for Griffin's ex-wife, Kourtnie, filed an emergency motion in May to modify their custody and visitation agreement. This could either be the final nail in my coffin or this could be a true day of reckoning. I do worry about potential violence toward election officials, in particular around the upcoming general election, she said. Clements, 42, was a popular tenure-track assistant professor teaching law in the business school of New Mexico State University on Jan. 6, 2021, when a mob loyal to Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol. FILE - Otero County, New Mexico Commissioner Couy Griffin speaks to reporters as he arrives at federal court in Washington, June 17, 2022. Thats what we need, Clements told an audience at a New Mexico church in February. Holmes said this is baseless and runs the risk of eroding trust in democratic systems. The donut shop has announced it has closed its South Valley and Northeast Heights locations. He looked back and saw his wife and children standing in the window watching him, weeping. Published: January 6, 2022 - 1:40 PM. Griffin plans to ride the charges out to trial, claiming theres more than meets the eye. Clements came down from the mountain filled with zeal and sitting down in his garage armed with nothing more than a laptop and a crappy microphone soon began posting about alleged election fraud on YouTube. Still, the audit rumbles on, and could yet have widespread implications. Griffin is presumed innocent until proven guilty. Clementss allegations extend to voting machines made by multiple companies, including Dominion Voting Systems, which are used in New Mexico and have been the target of false claims by Trump supporters. 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Be safe.Griffin: Id be embarrassed if I was you guys.Officer: Alright. Couy Griffin was wanted on an arrest warrant after storming the barricades of the Capitol Jan. 6, said authorities. Brittany Costello: A number of people are facing charges, including you. Griffin said David Clements knows what hes talking about and that he is the kind of expert Griffin wants to explain complicated voting systems to him, rather than the election officials in his own county. Clementss strategy is to target his message locally: to county commissioners and clerks, jobs that are lower profile but that wield an outsize role in administering Americas decentralized election system. He said the only good Democrat was a dead Democrat. The language, known as the disqualification clause, is part of a Civil War-era constitutional amendment intended to bar former Confederates from holding state or federal offices. 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. Ramie Harper, a 67-year-old former bull rider from Fruitland, took a break from making custom hats to join the caravan. NELIGH, Neb. KRQE NEWS 13 - Breaking News, Albuquerque News, New Mexico News, Weather, and Videos. The lawsuit against Griffin was filed in March by Marco White and Leslie Lakind, both Santa Fe County residents, along with Mark Mitchell of Los Alamos County. Griffin's term as county commissioner is up this year, and he has said he will not run again. A jury will consider this week whether the support group . "There's no absolutely no reason for this," she said. Griffin went to court over the seatbelt ticket where he was ordered to pay the $81 fine. Mr. Griffin has opted to be defended by a public defender for this case with home court advantage. Kourtnie served in the US military and is a war Veteran. The first-term county commissioner forged a group of rodeo acquaintances in 2019 into a promotional Cowboys for Trump posse to spread his conservative message about gun rights, immigration controls and abortion restrictions. While he did face criticism, including from fellow Republicans, in the aftermath of the events at the Capitol, Griffin survived an effort to recall him from his position, when a petition did not garner enough signatures. Those claims are rooted in a 2020 election night error by the clerk in a Michigan county that resulted in the heavily Republican area briefly reporting that Biden had beaten Trump there. "Never have. A New Mexico judge on Tuesday removed Otero County commissioner Couy Griffin by invoking the 14th Amendment's prohibition on those who engaged in insurrection from serving in office. Yeah. Couy Griffin Wife, Children Griffin is currently single, he was previously married to his girlfriend Kourtnie A Gates, but they were divorced in 2019. And yet he remains determined. He was a rodeo cowboy at Disneyland Paris and a pastor at the Cowboy Church in Alamogordo. Griffin, who was once thanked by Trump for saying The only good Democrat is a dead Democrat and who was convicted of a misdemeanor for entering a restricted area during the Capitol riot, has long alleged the 2020 presidential election was stolen. Griffin, the only dissenter, called his vote in from Washington, where he had just been sentenced to 14 days in jail time served for his role in the Capitol attack. But she "did not take her minor child to war with her" as Couy Griffin is doing by taking their son to President Donald Trump campaign events during a pandemic, the attorneys said. "You know, here I am still in a county that still has a great fire threat," Griffin said. The folksy origin story might have helped his successful 2018 run for county commissioner but once in office Griffin amplified violence and bigotry. I come to you as someone who had a future. He has made baldly racist and violent statements. I think that, if that would have been the case, then I would have been charged with that in the United States federal court where this case should be..