CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A judge on Tuesday ordered Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman, two right-wing conspiracy theorists behind robocalls that sought to intimidate Black voters here out of casting mail-in ballots in the 2020 presidential election, to spend 500 hours registering voters in low-income neighborhoods in the Washington, D.C., area.
Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge John Sutula placed each on two years of probation, fined each $2,500 and ordered them to wear GPS ankle monitors with home confinement beginning at 8 p.m. each day for the first six months of their probation.
Sutula, 71, said that most of the civil rights advances in the United States have occurred in his lifetime. He compared the men’s effort to those who used violence to suppress southern Black voters in the 1960s.
“I think it’s a despicable thing that you guys have done,” he said.
Wohl, 24, and Burkman, 56, attended the hearing via Zoom along with their attorneys. When given the chance to address their charges in court for the first time since they were charged, each man was brief.
“I just really want to express my absolute regret and shame over all of this,” Wohl said.
Burkman did not share any thoughts of his own.
“I would just echo Mr. Wohl’s sentiment,” Burkman said. “I think the same.”
Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O’Malley said in a statement that the sentence was appropriate.
“These two individuals attempted to disrupt the foundation of our democracy,” O’Malley said.
The men each faced a maximum sentence of one year in prison after they pleaded guilty in September to a telecommunications fraud, a fifth-degree felony. The charge is connected to thousands of robocalls placed in Cleveland in the run-up to the 2020 election between then-President Donald Trump and the Democratic challenger, Joe Biden.
The robocalls came at a time when states across the country had expanded the use of mail-in voting as a protective measure during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The pair gained notoriety in recent years by throwing press conferences to levy phony sexual misconduct allegations against prominent Democrats and Republicans who are critical of former President Donald Trump. They are also charged in Michigan and are being sued by a civil rights organization in federal court in New York over the same robocalls.
Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor James Gutierrez told Sutula that more than 6,400 robocalls were placed to voters in Cleveland’s heavily Black East Side and the city of East Cleveland. Of those, more than 3,400 voters were contacted.
The calls warned that police, credit card companies and U.S. Centers for Disease for Control would use personal information from mail-in ballots to track down people with outstanding arrest warrants and credit card debt.
“All of that is false,” Gutierrez said. “There is not one kernel of truth into what they said in that recording.”
The robocalls were voiced by someone who called herself Tamika Taylor from a civil rights organization called The 1599 Project. Gutierrez said that Tamika was the name of the mother of Breonna Taylor, whose 2017 death at the hands of Louisville police sparked nationwide protests.
“Don’t be finessed into giving your private information to the man,” the call said.
Gutierrez said that data from the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections showed that voter turnout in Cleveland’s majority Black precincts was down in 2020 compared to 2016.
“This had some chilling effect,” Gutierrez told Sutula.
Gutierrez said that Wohl admitted to probation officers during a pre-sentencing investigation that the robocall scheme was “a political stunt meant for attention and profit.”
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation identified 12 people who received the calls who were willing to testify had the case gone to trial, Gutierrez said.
After the hearing, Gutierrez told reporters that the call amounted to voter intimidation and suppression.
“We’ve made convicted felons out of these two conspiracy theorists who did a political stunt that actually worked,” Gutierrez said.
When asked if he believed the public has seen the last of Wohl and Burkman
“In Cuyahoga County, yes,” Gutierrez said. “As far as everything else goes, no. But that’s just speculation.”