Right-wing trolls Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman must help register low-income voters after being sentenced for carrying out a robocall scheme in 2020.
The duo, known best for fabricating salacious news stories, pled guilty in September to a felony telecommunications fraud charge after attempting to convince Black voters in Cleveland not to cast mail-in ballots during the 2020 presidential election.
The robocalls falsely claimed that everyone from the police to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control would use data from mail-in ballots to find those with arrest warrants and credit card debt.
In their hearing on Tuesday, the pair were ordered by Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge John Sutula to spend 500 hours registering voters in low-income neighborhoods throughout Washington, D.C. Wohl and Burkman were also fined $2,500, ordered to wear GPS ankle monitors, and confined to their homes after 8pm for the next six months.
“I think it’s a despicable thing that you guys have done,” Sutula said.
When given an opportunity to speak, Wohl stated that he regretted his involvement in the illegal robocall campaign.
“I just really want to express my absolute regret and shame over all of this,” Wohl said.
Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor James Gutierrez noted that more than 6,400 robocalls were made by the pair in the city’s “heavily Black East Side” as well as “the city of East Cleveland,” according to Cleveland.com.
Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O’Malley argued during the hearing that the “two individuals attempted to disrupt the foundation of our democracy.”
Wohl and Burkman are also on the receiving end of a potential $5 million fine from the FCC.
