A Colorado Republican with perhaps the best odds of flipping a statehouse seat from blue to red appears to have become interested in politics as one of the core members of an election fraud conspiracy group.
The U.S. Election Integrity Plan [USEIP] was formed in the days following the 2020 presidential election, as Trump supporters who refused to believe the results found each other first online and then in person.
Among those early adopters of the election fraud conspiracy theory was Highlands Ranch resident Matt Burcham, who as one of USEIP’s “Core Team,” was intimately involved in the group’s activities. USEIP founder Ashe Epp added Burcham to the group’s online organizing platform, Basecamp, on Nov. 30, 2020, just two days after the site launched.
Some of his first work for the USEIP was sharing press releases from a group of far-right legislators, including then-Representatives Kevin Van Winkle and Dave Williams, promoting the Dominion Voting election fraud conspiracy theory and calling for an investigation.
The following week, after Republicans successfully initiated a hearing via the bipartisan Legislative Audit Committee, Burcham helped organize USEIP’s contribution:
“Van Winkle is calling for written statements from the public,” wrote Burcham. “These will be collected and printed prior to the meeting or everyone committee member. Please post your message HERE prior to 12 noon tomorrow (Monday) to be included.”
The Dec. 15 hearing lasted eight hours. Burcham attended and appeared on camera with podcaster Joe Hunt, who later said he was invited to livestream the event by USEIP, then still known by its original name, Colorado Election Integrity Project, or CEIP. During a break in the hearing, Hunt introduced Burcham as “being all about election integrity and taking the fight to those in charge.”
Burcham then shared his beliefs about Colorado’s elections, first saying that “military votes are wide open for fraud,” then calling for a ban on voting machines and mail-in ballots.
“Me personally, I’d like to say let’s forget the machines overall,” said Burcham. “Let’s go to all paper, right? Let’s go all in-person, on-paper. Let’s just go back old-fashioned and remove all those different things you can cheat with.”
Just over a week later, on Dec. 22, Burcham posted: “BE IN DC ON THE 6TH! WILL BE WILD! Many of us are going as a group. Join us!”
USEIP founder Ashe Epp, who along with Shawn Smith and Holly Kasun, is currently defending herself in a Denver courthouse against a voter intimidation lawsuit brought by the NAACP and League of Women Voters, responded, “Try and stop me!” Epp and Smith both participated in the Jan. 6 insurrection.
One month later, he posted video of far-right conspiracist Joe Oltmann speaking in Washington, D.C.’s Liberty Plaza the night before Jan. 6, describing in terms that appear to indicate he was recording it live and in person.
USEIP members regularly updated each other on their efforts by responding to a post titled “What will you be working on this week?” On Jan. 19, 2021, Burcham posted the following:
Matt Burcham, Core Team – Highlands Ranch Election Integrity-
Continued working on the vote totaling test. Recieved [sic] CORA estimate from Mesa, Douglas and Jeffco. Still waiting for Arapahoe and El Paso.
Researched further data sources for info we need in our fraud research project
Local involvement- Continued work to move into GOP local district captain position as a first step. Looking at Bonus member as well (Until another path shows itself, GOP seems like the necessary way to go)
Made some calls to learn more about the DougCo school board recall effort.
Also- Got a red dot optic and a 30 round mag.
According to Burcham’s post, USEIP appears to have been the catalyst for his political career, as he described working to become a local GOP leader as “a first step.”
The Colorado Times Recorder confirmed via its own open records request that Burcham indeed filed requests with multiple county clerks listed in his posts. Specifically, six days earlier he filed Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) requests for “scanned ballot images” from the Nov. 3, 2020, General Election, with the Mesa County and Jefferson County Clerks’ Offices.
Burcham remained active with USEIP well after Jan. 6, 2021. He helped organize insurrectionist attorney John Eastman’s virtual presentation to the group, adding the Mar. 9, 2021 event to the Basecamp platform and asking its members to share it “far and wide.” The presentation’s title, “We Are the Plan!” is a slogan that originated with the QAnon conspiracy theory.
This exchange with another USEIP Basecamp member shows that Burcham is “Matt B.”
Burcham is now the Republican candidate for House District 43, the statehouse seat that encompasses Highlands Ranch. Representative Bob Marshall, a centrist Democrat whose military background and independent streak helped him ride the 2022 blue wave all the way to a narrow win in this traditionally red region.
Burcham won a contentious and expensive primary against experienced Republican county commissioner Lora Thomas. His victory was notable in that he is one of the few GOP candidates to earn support from both ends of the Republican ideological spectrum. The state party, which now firmly occupies the far-right fringe of Colorado politics, endorsed him, as did the extremist Rocky Mountain Gun Owners. He also earned the support of establishment Republicans like former Governor Bill Owens, and Sean Tonner, whose PAC spent heavily on Burcham in his primary.
Owens, now a senior director with the Greenberg Traurig law firm, has remained involved with GOP politics since leaving office in 2007. He did not respond to an email request for comment asking if he was aware of Burcham’s election denialism and involvement with USEIP. This article will be updated with any response received.
Tonner, who runs a political consulting firm called the Fulcrum Group, is also working with Owens on a controversial water rights deal that would involve piping water from the San Luis Valley to Douglas County, including into HD43.
Burcham did not return phone and email requests for comment. This article will be updated with any response received.
