About
Michael Anton, a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute and a research fellow at Hillsdale College, helped spread the conspiracy theory that Democrats would steal the 2020 election. Prior to the 2016 election, he wrote a controversial essay called “The Flight 93 Election” urging voters to “seize control of the cockpit” and support Trump’s candidacy. He subsequently served as spokesperson for Trump’s National Security Council.
In 2010 Citigroup hired Anton to direct its communications and starting in 2015 he managed the BlackRock investment firm. In the early 2000s, he also worked as a speechwriter and press secretary for then-Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani and later for News Corp. owner Rupert Murdoch. In 2003 he pushed for the U.S. invasion of Iraq from his position as spokesperson for President Bush’s National Security Council.
The Big Lie
- In early September 2020, Anton wrote “The Coming Coup” for the Claremont Institute, claiming that Democrats were planning to steal the election and that pandemic-related voting measures would facilitate this.
- The day after the election, the Claremont Institute published Anton’s “Game-On for the Coup?” Although the election hadn’t yet been called, he used the phrase “Stop the Steal,” borrowed from a 2016 Roger Stone group.
- As The Bulwark reported, in the “Game On” essay Anton advocates for legal challenges, demonstrations and other tactics he cribbed from an alt-right site, Revolver.News.
- Anton continued to push the Big Lie in the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection.
- Anton has since called for the disbanding of the FBI, among other extreme, conspiracy-based proposals.