Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Pro-Trump Voter Suppression Fraudsters Just Pled Guilty–And Their Sentence Feels Like Poetic Justice

Pro-Trump Voter Suppression Fraudsters Just Pled Guilty–And Their Sentence Feels Like Poetic Justice
NBC News/YouTube

Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman must spend 500 hours registering voters after guilty plea.

Conservative conspiracy theorists and right-wing provocateurs Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl pleaded guilty to one felony count of telecommunications fraud. The two ran a series of robocalls with false messages targeting Black voters.

The pair hoped to suppress the Black vote in the 2020 general election.


Charges were brought against the pair by the Ohio Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office in October 2020. Wohl and Burkman's Project 1599 placed phone calls to select area codes across the United States targeting areas with large populations of BIPOC and Democrats.

The robocalls shared misinformation about mail-in voting.

Wohl and Burkman robocalled roughly 85,000 voters in Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and Ohio in the summer of 2020.

The recording of one call featured a woman saying:

“Mail-in voting sounds great, but did you know that if you vote by mail, your personal information will be part of a public database that will be used by police departments to track down old warrants, and be used by credit card companies to collect outstanding debt?"
"The CDC is even pushing to give preference for mail in voting to track people for mandatory vaccines.”

Calls also warned voters should not be:

“BS’d into giving [their] private information to the man.”

You can hear a recording of one of the calls here:

Example of false information being used to suppress voting in Detroityoutu.be

All claims made in the calls were all false.

Burkman and Wohl were initially charged with eight counts of telecommunications fraud and seven counts of bribery. Both defendants pleaded not guilty.

Wohl told CNN in August 2020:

"We’ve never done any robocalls."
"We are categorically uninvolved."

The pair then reached a plea agreement.

According to Cleveland.com, Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor James Gutierrez stated the defendants will pay the maximum fine of $2,500 each. The prosecution dismissed the 14 additional counts against the Wohl and Burkman.

On Tuesday, November 29, 2022, Ohio's Cuyahoga County Common Pleas court sentenced the pair to two years of probation, six months of monitoring with a GPS ankle bracelet, $2,500 each in fines and 500 hours of registering voters in Washington, D.C.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost issued the following statement:

"Voter intimidation won’t be tolerated in Ohio."
"My Robocall Enforcement Unit, along with BCI, assisted in the investigation and was able to partner with Prosecutor O’Malley to shut down these two people who were trying to commit voter intimidation.”

Not everyone agreed the punishment fit the crime.




A lawsuit was also filed against the pair by the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation in October 2020.

In addition to Ohio, prosecutors in Michigan, Illinois and Pennsylvania investigated the calls.

The New York Attorney General’s Office sought a fine of $2.75 million. The Federal Communications Commission suggested a fine of over $5.1 million.

More from News

Ashley Tisdale
@ashleytisdale/TikTok; Disney

Ashley Tisdale Hilariously Reveals How Her 'High School Musical'-Obsessed Toddler Lets People Know She's Sharpay's Daughter

For many Millennials and Gen Z'ers, the High School Musical films were appointment viewing, and the character of Sharpay played by Ashley Tisdale was one of the franchise's icons.

She was kind of the Cher Horowitz-meets-Regina George of her day, and with Tisdale's roster of other Disney hits like The Suite Life of Zack & Cody and Phineas and Ferb, she's basically Disney royalty.

Keep ReadingShow less
Seven-time Grammy winner and entertainer, Toni Braxton
Christopher Polk/Variety/Getty Images

Toni Braxton's Controversial Graduation Look

Toni Braxton celebrated her son’s graduation from Howard University in a risqué outfit that made fans and fashion critics blush.

The Grammy-winning R&B singer posted a video of her son, 22-year-old Diezel Ky Braxton-Lewis, as he emotionally received his degree in film from the HBCU’s prestigious Chadwick A. Boseman College of Fine Arts.

Keep ReadingShow less
Zendaya at the 2025 Met Gala; Law Roach with Entertainment Tonight; Anna Sawai at the 2025 Met Gala
Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images; @entertainmenttonight/TikTok; Taylor Hill/Getty Images

Stylist Reveals Zendaya's Sweet Gesture After She And 'Shogun' Star Accidentally Wore Matching Met Gala Looks

Every year, the Met Gala asks their guests to dress to a particular theme. For 2025, the theme was "Tailored for You," which inspired entertainers to show up in looks that best modeled their figures or in some way emulated their greatest inspiration.

Zendaya showed up in an eye-catching white suit with a fitted jacket, vest, and embellished, crystal buttons, and well-tailored pants. To top it all off, she wore a fabulous, floppy white hat. She was styled by Law Roach, her suit was designed by Louis Vuitton, and her inspiration was Diana Ross and Bianca Jagger.

Keep ReadingShow less
Hasan Piker
Gerardo Mora/Getty Images for Real Good Touring

Liberal Commentator Alarmingly Grilled By Customs Over His Views On Trump While Returning From France

Hasan Piker—progressive political commentator, YouTuber, and Twitch streamer—revealed he was detained by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents for almost two hours at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport on Sunday as he returned to the United States from France.

Piker—a U.S. citizen born to Turkish parents in New Brunswick, New Jersey—said the CBP agents' goal was to intimidate him as they questioned him about his opinions on MAGA Republican President Donald Trump, Houthi rebels, Hamas, his bans from Twitch, and Israel. Piker has routinely spoken about the genocide in Gaza, advocated for Palestinian rights, and criticized the Israeli government.

Keep ReadingShow less
HBO Just Announced Its Streaming App Is Going Back To A Familiar Name—And The Internet Can't Even
Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images

HBO Just Announced Its Streaming App Is Going Back To A Familiar Name—And The Internet Can't Even

Max is getting its “HBO” back, says Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD).

Starting this summer, the streaming service will once again be called HBO Max, a move the company announced as not just a name change, but also a strategy shift.

Keep ReadingShow less