Georgia election cases take a sharp turn

The Election of 2020 saw the most important questions in Georgia, including the infamous Fulton County Suitcase Scandal. Perhaps because Fulton County saw the greatest questions, District Attorney Fani Willis, who won her own election on the same day, vowed to punish anyone who dared question the award of Georgia’s Electoral College delegation to Joe Biden. But now she herself has come under investigation. And so has Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who refused to investigate irregularities in that election when a citizen election integrity advocate pointed them out to him. This is the most serious instance yet of the hunters becoming the hunted.

Georgia case 1: Fani Willis

Recall that Fulton Co. D.A. Willis obtained indictments against President Donald Trump and 18 current and former associates. She alleged that their contest of the Election of 2020 was a racket, within the meaning of Georgia’s Racketeer-influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute. The essence of her case is that:

1. Trump lost,
2. Trump knew he had lost,
3. No dirty work took place at any crossroads,
4. Any allegation of such dirty work at the crossroads was and is a lie, and therefore
5. Trump and his allies conspired criminally to defraud the people of Georgia, who had spoken in favor of Biden.

In fact she asked for and got a Special Purpose Grand Jury (SPGJ) nearly two years ago for this very purpose.

Shortly after the indictment came down, Trump said he would release “irrefutable and overwhelming evidence” that fraud decided the Election of 2020. He didn’t do it then, on the advice of counsel. But on January 2, he abruptly changed his mind and released a 32-page report on irregularities in five States. The States are Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona.

Back in August, the House Judiciary Committee started investigating Willis, questioning the timing, the obvious partisanship, and the possible encroachment on federal interests that her case represents.

Willis on the hot seat

A week later, Michael Roman, one of the Trump Eighteen, filed an electrifying motion.

He alleged an improper – indeed romantic – relationship between Willis and the lawyer (Nathan J. Wade) she hired in November 2021 as a “special prosecutor” against Trump. But what made the case even more egregious was that Wade met with White House Counsel’s associates. He then billed the State for it. Roman’s motion seeks dismissal of the charges against him – and disqualification of Willis, Wade, and the entire Fulton D.A.’s office.

On Wednesday, Jim Hoft at The Gateway Pundit reported (citing The Wall Street Journal)that lawyers for Wade’s wife subpoenaed Willis to testify in their divorce case.

The game did not end there. Judge Scott McAfee, the trial judge in Georgia v. Trump et al. held a “motions hearing” on Friday (January 12). According to The Epoch Times, Judge McAfee scheduled a full hearing devoted to Roman’s motion in mid-February. Steve Sadow, attorney for Trump, asked for the “option” to “adopt” the motion at a later date. Mr. Sadow would do so if he developed evidence independent of Mr. Roman’s attorney, to support the allegations against Willis and Wade. The judge has allowed that option.

Jim Jordan expands his investigation to include Wade

More than that, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has clearly widened his investigation of Willis. Also on Friday, he sent a letter to Mr. Wade demanding documentation of Wade’s communications with the:

• Department of Justice and its employees, including Special Counsel Jack Smith, the:
• Executive Office of the President, including the White House Counsel’s Office, and the:
• House January 6 Committee.

Jordan also demanded all “notes, memoranda, documents, or other material in [Wade’s] possession” relating to the above. Furthermore, he demanded copies of Wade’s invoices, contracts, financial arrangements, and financial transactions with the Fulton Co. D.A.’s office.

The five-page letter is available at this link.

That letter includes the infamous Invoice 14, with line items referring to meetings with the White House and the January 6 Committee. What rankles with Jordan the most is that the January 6 Committee shared information with Wade and not House Judiciary. The letter gives Wade until Friday, January 26 to comply.

Georgia case 2: Brad Raffensperger, Secretary of State

Recall again the 32-page report Trump released on January 2. That report devotes seven pages to election irregularities in Georgia alone, including:

• 315,000 early votes cast without the Chief OOE and at least two colleagues signing them, as Georgia law requires.
• Failure of the Chief OOE or any of his colleagues to sign scanner-tabulator tapes.
• Incompleteness of those tapes, i.e., failure to include some of the ballots.
• Counting absentee ballots six months or more ahead of the election.

Furthermore, elections in Georgia have been problematic for years. A lawsuit filed from the left led to the first finding of vulnerability of the voting machines. These include scanner-tabulators and Ballot Marking Devices, the output of which is not even human-readable.

Brad Raffensperger is the long-serving Secretary of State in Georgia, elected independently of the Governor. The integrity and security of elections are his responsibility, as senior elections officer. (He also is currently a member ex officio of the State Board of Elections, though he has no vote.)

Investigation of Raffensperger

Yesterday, William Quinn of The Georgia Record reported that T. Matthew Mashburn, Acting Chairman of the Georgia Board of Elections, sent a letter to Rep. Jon Burns (R-Effingham), Speaker of the Georgia House, and Lt. Gov. Burt Jones (in his role as President of the Georgia Senate), asking whether the Board had jurisdiction to investigate Raffensperger for violations of election law. Apparently the Board has been receiving complaints about Raffensperger ever since the Election of 2020. Joseph Rossi, private citizen, testified before the Board of finding serious “errors” in 2020 election reporting. Those errors had to do with the conduct of Raffensperger’s office. Rossi then said that then Assistant Attorney General Charlene McGowan and several Board members tried to block his investigation. But Rossi got to Gov. Brian Kemp – and he seems to have thrown Raffensperger under the bus. He issued a written statement saying Rossi’s findings were factual.

In response to that letter, several Georgia Senators have introduced a bill (SB 358) to remove Raffensperger from the Election Board and confirm the Board’s authority to investigate Raffensperger.

This bill has twelve sponsors at time of review of this article.

At 3:44 p.m. EST yesterday, George Behizy dropped a three-post thread on this news:

Reaction to that thread is overwhelmingly positive. Most users feel the events vindicate their low opinion of Raffensperger, and their charge that he gave away the election.

Jim Hoft at The Gateway Pundit reported on this.

Analysis

This same Brad Raffensperger refused to testify under oath in the earlier case alleging civil-rights violations arising from insecurity of voting machines.

More to the point, these two cases reveal two things. First, Trump was right all along that Democrats – and Republicans In Name Only (RINOs) – defrauded him of victory. (And not him alone, but the American people.) Second, Georgia is a political cesspool. Brad Raffensperger, like Brian Kemp before him, seem to run selections, not elections, at least whenever they see fit. No one, up- or down-ticket, can be confident of having a fair shake in running for State-wide or Congressional office. Not in Georgia – not until someone makes some serious changes.

At a minimum, the Georgia House needs to bring Articles of Impeachment against Raffensperger. The various investigations already in train should yield more than sufficient evidence to convict him and remove him from office. Ideally, Acting Chairman Mashburn should then run an election to replace Raffensperger.

Other things that need to happen in Georgia:

1. Judge McAfee should deliver a directed verdict of acquittal in Georgia v. Trump et al.
2. Fani Willis rates removal from office and possible prosecution for the public-service equivalent of embezzlement.
3. All Georgia counties and other units should get rid of “The Machines” and vote on paper. They can run elections as the French run them – and that can be a fit example for all American elections.

These parallel investigations could be steps in that direction. But the people must press for it – hard.