Amna Nawaz:
The FBI raid last month on a Georgia elections office, seizing more than 700 boxes of ballots, was fueled by an investigation into so-called deficiencies in the 2020 election. That is according to an unsealed FBI agent’s affidavit filed by the DOJ in federal court.
White House correspondent Liz Landers has been following the updates from this case and joins me now.
So, Liz, what more are we learning from that latest legal filing about the raid and why the federal government seized those election documents?
Liz Landers:
This 22-page affidavit that was unsealed this afternoon gives us a glimpse into what the federal government’s argument is here about why they conducted this raid a few weeks ago.
And they say that this is based on belief that there’s probable cause that there is violation of the retention and preservation of election records in Fulton County and also deprivation of a fair election, so the way that they conducted the election there, apparently was not fair. This is according to some of this document.
So the main FBI agent who wrote this affidavit has been at the agency for five years now. And he goes through some of the issues, some of the deficiencies that the government is saying occurred. He said that they did not have, the county did not have scanned images of all 528,000 ballots. They are making the allegation that some of the ballots were scanned multiple times, that the hand count did not match the actual count.
I would add that a hand count almost always is inaccurate because of human error, and that total votes were 17,000 votes fewer than the original count. Many of these claims have already been out in the public before. Some of these have been addressed by Fulton County and by the secretary of state’s office.
But this is the compilation in the affidavit, which was signed off by a magistrate judge there. And one other detail in here, the FBI says that this investigation originated with a referral that was sent by Kurt Olsen, who is a Trump-appointed director of election security and integrity now.
Amna Nawaz:
So they’re alleging Fulton County did something wrong here. What’s Fulton County saying about all this?
Liz Landers:
Well, Fulton County, the Board of Commissioners, has already sued the federal government at the end of last week to get these ballots back. They say that this was an improper raid and search.
I spoke earlier today with the Fulton County Board of Commissioners chairman, Robb PItts. We talked to him right as these documents were coming out. And he said that they, the Fulton County Board of Elections, complied with everything that the FBI was asking for. They turned over those 700 boxes worth of elections material, tabulator votes, the absentee ballots, all of the ballots, and the voter rolls.
Everything, they said that they complied with and turned over to the FBI. But he says that this is not just about Georgia. He says that this is a broader affront to voting and to elections in this country. Listen.
Robb Pitts, Chairman, Fulton County, Georgia, Board of Commissioners: I think it’s much, much bigger than Fulton County. The president has also mentioned 15 states that he has some concerns about. Georgia, I think, is probably at the top of that list for the reasons that I have stated, but the others need to be aware as well.
And that’s why I think, if they’re successful in doing whatever they plan to do here in Fulton County, Georgia, and in the state of Georgia, they’re simply going to go to other states and do exactly the same thing.
Liz Landers:
Pitts also said, Amna, that now that that material, all the elections material that was seized, has left their own premise, their own building, that he doesn’t know where that is now. And he said that he can’t verify some of the personal identifying information that’s in some of those documents, like in the voter rolls.
And just one more thing, Amna, that I want to underscore for our viewers is that this all happened at the direction, Tulsi Gabbard says, of the president. She was down there at that election office in Fulton County. Highly, highly unusual to see the director of national intelligence at an FBI operation like this.
Amna Nawaz:
I want to circle back to a name you mentioned, Kurt Olsen. As you mentioned, he’s a special government employee President Trump has now empowered to investigate the 2020 elections. Tell us more about Mr. Olsen and what we should know about his role.
Liz Landers:
If you have been following some of the January 6, this special committee that happened up on Capitol Hill a few years ago, and you have been following some of this election denier movement, you have maybe heard of Kurt Olsen before.
He’s an attorney. He has been involved in litigation fighting what he said was Joe Biden’s false win. So he has long denied the election results of 2020. He also represented Kari Lake when she was running for governor and then she did not accept the election results in Arizona.
And at the time, Olsen was sanctioned by an Arizona court for false statements that he made related to that case. He now is overseeing these investigations. The CIA confirmed to me today that the president has asked Mr. Olsen to look at intelligence related to the 2020 election, and the agency, the CIA, is ensuring that he has the access necessary to do his work.
Politico is reporting that he has access to sensitive intelligence. When I asked the White House about this earlier today about his work, what kind of sensitive intelligence he has access to, they said: “The president has the authority to provide access to classified material to individuals as he deems necessary. The entire Trump administration is working together to ensure the integrity of U.S. elections,” Amna.
Amna Nawaz:
White House correspondent Liz Landers, we know you’re going to continue to cover this story. Thank you.
Liz Landers:
Of course.
