One of the lawyers working with Sidney Powell to make rambling allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election is a Lakewood man who ran for office three times as a Democrat.
Lakewood attorney Howard Kleinhendler ran on the Democratic organization line in runs for Congress and State Assembly in five New Jersey counties.
Now he’s a Donald Trump supporter and he’s making a last-resort effort to help Trump remain in the White House.
On Wednesday, Kleinhendler asked the U.S. Supreme Court to merge voter fraud cases in Michigan, Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin in a bid to seat Republican electors in states where Joe Biden has been certified as the winner.
He wants the top court to hear the cases before Congress meets on January 5 so 73 electors now in Biden’s column could be added to Trump.
Kleinhendler’s client is Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) and Trump electors in Arizona.
“I don’t know Howard Kleinhendler. I only know that he is part of the Kraken legal team that peddled false conspiracies in court,” tweeted Marc Elias, a top election lawyer. “But if I did know him, I would tell him that even if his cases weren’t nuts, sending this letter to the US Supreme Court is not a path to success.”
His three runs for office in New Jersey were largely unsuccessful.
In 2010, Kleinhendler ran against Rep. Christopher Smith (R-Hamilton) in New Jersey’s 4th district in 2010. Democratic county organizations in Mercer, Monmouth and Ocean counties backed his campaign and he was unopposed in the Democratic primary.
Smith beat Kleinhendler in a massive 69%-28% landslide. Smith carried Lakewood, Kleinhendler’s hometown, with 77% of the vote.
Democrats backed Kleinhendler again when he sought a State Assembly seat in 2011.
Running in the 30th legislative district, Kleinhendler finished more than 10,000 votes behind the Republican incumbents, Sean Kean (R-Wall) and David Rible (R-Wall).
In 2014, Kleinhendler wanted to challenge freshman Rep. Jon Runyan (R-Moorestown) in the 3rd district. Democrats went with Aimee Belgard, a Burlington County freeholder who defeated him in the primary by an 84%-12% margin.
As a candidate that year, Kleinhendler pitched an agenda to improve Obamacare, provide amnesty to undocumented workers, and end corporate welfare.
“Political leaders in backroom deals shouldn’t choose our next congressperson,” he said at the time, three years after running on the organization line.
Kleinhendler has since found himself with some legal problems of his own. He’s fighting a series of malpractice claims.
One former client, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, alleges that Kleinhendler tricked him into selling property directly to him and others in 2017.
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August 9, 2018 -
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