About
Kristina Karamo is a Michigan-based college professor, right-wing politician, activist, and pundit. In 2022, she ran for secretary of state in Michigan with Trump’s endorsement—and largely based her campaign on a call for more investigations of alleged election fraud—but lost by 14 points in November. Still, at the state’s Republican Party convention in February 2023, she won out over a field of 10 other far-right Republicans to be elected leader of the GOP in Michigan through 2025.
Karamo teaches public speaking at Wayne County Community College and has long served on the GOP’s state committee. She has served on Michigan’s Black Leadership Committee, hosts a podcast called Right on 14th, and has frequently appeared on right-wing talk shows like the Sean Hannity Show, Fox & Friends, and Lou Dobbs Tonight.
Karamo has espoused numerous fringe ideas, including that abortion is “child sacrifice,” public schools are “government indoctrination camps,” and teaching the theory of evolution is wrong.
January 6, 2021
- Karamo spread conspiracy theories that the violent attack on the Capitol was perpetrated by left-wing activists rather than Trump supporters. In an episode of her podcast, she said, “Based on the series of evidence and knowing how these situations work, how these anarchists operate, I believe this is completely Antifa posing as Trump supporters. I mean, anybody can buy a MAGA hat and put on a t-shirt and buy a Trump flag.”
- She also claimed that police officers who testified before Congress about being beaten and assaulted by Trump supporters were “actors and actresses.”
The Big Lie
- Karamo accused Democrats of having a “satanic agenda” in stealing the election from Trump and maintains that contrary to all evidence Trump won both Michigan and the 2020 election.
- Appearing on several Fox News shows, Karamo claimed that as a poll monitor she witnessed election fraud and mistakes as Michigan officials counted absentee ballots. Election officials surveyed by PolitiFact countered that Karamo misconstrued standard processes as nefarious acts.
- She also testified before the Michigan State Senate that sacks of ballots had been dropped off there in the middle of Election Night, which she cited as a clearly indicator of fraud.
- Without any evidence at all, Karamo claimed that Dominion Voting Machines equipment was “proven” to have illegally changed votes from Trump to Biden.
- Karamo is a member of the America First Secretary of State Coalition, a political group that promotes right-wing candidates for secretary of state across the U.S. willing to support Trump’s baseless claims of 2020 election fraud.
Election Audits
- As a candidate for secretary of state, Karamo made repeated calls for a “forensic audit” of the Michigan election results and visited Arizona election officials to learn more about how to apply their audit process in Michigan.