A lawyer for Ward 2 Councilmember Jack Evans says that almost half of the signatures on petitions submitted to trigger an election that could recall him from office are either fraudulent or forged, and is asking the D.C. Board of Elections to toss out all the petitions.

In a filing with the elections board on the Friday after Thanksgiving, Evans’ attorney Don Dinan said that 2,387 of the 5,508 signatures submitted earlier this month by proponents of the effort to recall Evans from office should be invalidated because they are “inherently and irretrievably corrupted.” In the filing, Dinan says that many of the signatures appear forged, and in specific cases there are names on the petition of people who told Evans they did not sign.

If those signatures were tossed out, it would leave the recall effort with fewer than the required number—4,949—needed from Ward 2 voters to trigger a special election where voters would be asked whether Evans should be able to remain in office or not.

Evans is fighting on multiple fronts to stay in office after revelations that he violated the council’s ethics rules by taking official actions on behalf of developers and businesses that were his paying clients, both when he worked at an outside law firm and also when he set up his own consulting firm. He has already faced an official reprimand from his colleagues, has been stripped of a committee chairmanship and been fined $20,000 by the Board of Ethics and Government Accountability.

But a council committee looking into the accusations against Evans could vote to expel him from the office he has held for almost three decades, or his own constituents could recall him—essentially, a vote to un-elect him. No councilmember has ever faced a recall vote; calling one requires collecting signatures from 10 percent of their constituents.

Adam Eidinger, the leader of the effort to recall Evans from office, rejects Dinan’s claims that a majority of the signatures submitted were forged or fraudulent.

“The facts are that the Committee to Hold Jack Evans Accountable collected 5,588 signatures of people who think they are registered in Ward 2, and by doing so demonstrated overwhelming support to have a recall election of Jack Evans,” he said in a text message. “We will review his challenge and continue to fight for the recall which is needed to restore trust in the D.C. Council.”

Eidinger and other volunteers say they have been going through the signatures that Evans has challenged and are trying to validate them. In a tweet on Monday morning, the group contended that most of Evans’ challenges are easily rebuttable.

But even if Evans is successful in getting a small number of signatures tossed out, it would likely doom the recall effort. The elections board will now review Eidinger’s petitions and Evans’ challenges, and will then determine how many signatures are valid—and whether that reaches the 2,949-threshold to trigger the recall election.

Collecting signatures is a necessary step to get a candidate or an initiative on the ballot in D.C., and it’s often where many fall short. Last year, a business-friendly challenger to At-large Councilmember Elissa Silverman was denied a spot on the ballot after a review of her signatures found significant cases of forgery and fraud. And in one of the city’s most famous cases, then-mayor Anthony Williams was tossed off the ballot in 2002 after revelations of massive fraud on his nominating petitions—though he eventually won re-election as a write-in candidate.

Beyond the recall, the Council’s ad hoc committee that’s investigating Evans is set to meet on Tuesday. While Evans was initially asked to appear to answer questions from his colleagues, last week he announced that he would not do so. Instead, the committee will consider whether to pursue further investigations.

“The Committee will also consider which specific violations it believes Mr. Evans committed and recommendations to the Council for disciplinary action,” said an announcement from Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh, the committee’s chair.

This story has been updated with the number of necessary signatures to trigger a special election.