Michigan attorney asks lawmakers to examine spending on his election machine tampering charges

Craig Mauger, The Detroit News on Mar 4, 2026

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LANSING, Mich. — Republican Matt DePerno, a Michigan lawyer who has been criminally charged with participating in an alleged scheme to illegally obtain voting machines, encouraged lawmakers Wednesday to "look into" state spending on the case against him.

During an unusual, 90-minute appearance before a state House subcommittee, DePerno of Kalamazoo told lawmakers the Legislature "must consider" whether the process used by Attorney General Dana Nessel on his criminal case "reflects neutral enforcement of the law." Also, DePerno, a former attorney general candidate, reminded subcommittee members they "control the purse strings."

"The (House) Oversight Committee should look into what she's spending on this case and decide whether that makes sense, or whether funds should be used in other areas for the state" DePerno told lawmakers. "I can't speak to that.

"I just want to raise it as an issue for you guys to look at."

DePerno said it wasn't clear to him how much had been spent on his case so far.

DePerno's appearance before the Subcommittee on Weaponization of State Government was atypical because the four criminal charges against him are still unresolved in district court. Usually, individuals facing felonies, like DePerno is, save their arguments for their attorneys to make in the courtroom.

Speaking to the subcommittee, DePerno contended Wednesday that Nessel, a Democrat, had improperly targeted him because he was running against her for attorney general in 2022. DePerno lost his November 2022 race against Nessel by about 8 percentage points, 45%-53%.

In August 2022, before that election, Nessel's office publicly sought the appointment of a special prosecutor to handle the investigation and the decision on charges involving DePerno and others because of the political conflict.

"When this investigation began, there was not a conflict of interest," said Danielle Hagaman-Clark, chief of the Attorney General's criminal trials and appeals division, in the 2022 petition for a special prosecutor. "However, during the course of the investigation, facts were developed that DePerno was one of the prime instigators of the conspiracy."

In the summer of 2023, the special prosecutor, Muskegon County Prosecutor DJ Hilson, announced charges, resulting from a grand jury, against DePerno, former state Rep. Daire Rendon and lawyer Stefanie Lambert.

The three supporters of former President Donald Trump, who lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden, allegedly participated in a conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to five voting machines that were transported to Oakland County for analysis by a group of so-called cybersecurity experts.

In October, preliminary examinations against DePerno and Rendon began in Oakland County. Those exams have not concluded. Lambert's charges are scheduled to go to trial in April.

Prosecutors have alleged that DePerno, Rendon and others were involved in a scheme to convince local clerks in Barry, Missaukee and Roscommon counties to hand over voting machines used in the 2020 election for private analysis in a bid to explore and bolster voting fraud claims.

DePerno rose to fame among Republicans for challenging the 2020 election results in northern Michigan's Antrim County, where human errors — not the technology itself — caused the initial tallies to be incorrect.

On Wednesday, state Rep. Angela Rigas, R-Caledonia, voiced support for DePerno, saying the subcommittee would work with him to "rein this in." But Rigas acknowledged getting information from Nessel's office might be difficult because the case is still pending.

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