This weekend, some news outlets and social media users alike pointed out that a document included in a lawsuit filed by Sidney Powell to challenge the election results referenced a county that doesn’t exist.
The highlighted county was Edison County, Michigan. On top of claims that the county doesn’t exist, some people said it wasn’t similar in name to any county in Michigan and others claimed that there isn’t an Edison County anywhere in the United States.
THE QUESTION
Did one of the lawsuits challenging election results reference irregularities in a county that doesn’t exist?
THE ANSWER
Yes. And it’s true there’s no Edison County anywhere in the United States.
WHAT WE FOUND
The document Edison County was mentioned in was the declaration of Dr. Navid Keshavarz-Nia in one of Sidney Powell’s lawsuits. She previously worked with the Trump campaign on election lawsuits but has since been released by their campaign and has continued challenging the election results independently.
Edison County, Michigan is mentioned on page seven. The declaration says “Vice President Biden received more than 100% of the votes at 5:59 PM EST on November 4, 2020 and again he received 99.61% of the votes at 2:23 PM EST on November 5, 2020. These distributions are cause for concern and indicate fraud.” Edison County is the only specific county mentioned in the declaration.
However, a list of Michigan’s counties shows that there is no Edison County. In fact, there are only two counties in Michigan that start with E -- Eaton and Emmet. There are only three counties in Michigan that end in -SON -- Mason, Dickinson and Jackson.
The 2011 Census confirms there are no counties anywhere in the United States named Edison. There are about 10 counties nationwide that begin with the letter E.
Michigan also has no villages, townships or cities named Edison. Michigan’s government maintains a full list of every such municipality in the state.
So it’s true that an election lawsuit references a county that doesn’t exist. And it’s not obvious what real county or place, if there even was one, the declaration was supposed to reference.
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