Out of the loop

Thank you! This is "out of the loop" lemmy, I'm literally just asking questions because I am confused what is going on and what was supposed to happen.

On my primary election ballot for president in 2020 I remember it was organized such that I didn't vote for a candidate directly but voted for "Delegates to National Convention" for my Congressional district. There were 50 names on a list - 10 "pledged to support Biden", 10 "pledged to support Sanders", etc. - and I could vote for any of them, up to 10 in total. Could mix and match, whatever. Then the top 10 winners would travel to the party nomination convention and vote it out among themselves, including possibly voting for candidates other than who they pledged for.

Am I to understand that the way the general election and the electoral college function is different from that? Could someone clarify which of these scenarios is the real one?

Option 1

Democratic and Republican parties in Michigan each draft a list with 15 names for candidates to the Electoral College. The candidates sign their respective lists to acknowledge they are on it. The Michigan Board of Elections holds a general election. The Michigan governor sees which party won the popular vote, and puts the candidates from that party's list on a bus to DC. At the Electoral College building in DC, all electors from all states have a roll call and elect the President. This is just a formality since the result is known after general election day. The electors are expected to vote for the presidential candidate that their parties chose them for, but you could also have "faithless electors" who switch their vote. [this is what I thought happens]

Option 2

Like option 1, but too lazy to use the bus. The governor sees which party won the popular vote, takes that party's list, stamps it with the governor's stamp, and sends to to Vice President in Washington. On January 6, the VP reads the list out loud in Congress: "these 15 electors from Michigan vote to elect Biden". Somebody grabbed the other list and sent it to Washington too. When the VP holds two lists in his hands on January 6, he can claim he doesn't know which paper is the real one, and then do something undemocratic. There is literally no way to tell which piece of paper is the real one (other than already knowing the election results), but the guy who sent the second list committed felony interference with an official process.

Option 3

Like option 2, but with no lists prepared in advance. When the governor gets the election results report from the Board of Elections, she says "I drafted a piece of paper that says Michigan is electing Biden, but for bullshit electoral college reasons I need to put 15 names on it. Who wants to sign?" 15 random people, possibly from the governor's office, or Democratic party officials, come up and sign their names on it. The governor stamps the list and mails it to VP in Washington. Meanwhile some shady Trump lawyer writes a fake piece of paper that says "Michigan is electing Trump" and gets 15 random shady people, who have nothing to do with the governor or the board of elections, to sign it. The shady lawyer mails the list to VP as well. There is no way to tell which list is the real one, but all 15 people on the fake one + the lawyer are liable for felony interference.

I am asking this so specifically, because the defense that the fake electors are using is "we were just given a piece of paper to sign and we signed it". To me the electors would be liable only in Option 3, not in Option 2 where the lists are prepared legitimately in advance and used fraudulently only later. Whoever sent the fake list would be liable in either case, but it is unclear to me who that is exactly. And even in Option 3 it is unclear to me how the electors would know which paper is the real one to sign. "Sign this!" - "But it says Trump won, and I heard Biden won the popular vote..." - "No, Trump won. I heard it from the Board of Elections." - "And who are you?" - "I am a shady lawyer but I work for the governor, trust me. Now sign!" - "Oh ok...". If the only way to know that the paper you are signing is the legitimate one and to avoid possible future felony charges is to already know the election result, but the official election result is determined by that very paper, is that not a circular authentication loop?