It was a raid as shocking as it was extraordinary: Last month, the FBI entered the main election operations center of Fulton County, Georgia, and seized records — including ballots — from the 2020 presidential vote.
In response, Fulton County officials sued the federal government to get them back.
Now, court filings unsealed by a judge shed new light on the county’s fears about how the raid could undermine voter confidence and fuel false narratives about American elections.
In the emergency motion, Robb Pitts, chair of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, alleged that the FBI showed “callous disregard” for numerous constitutional rights and intentionally encroached upon the First Amendment by carrying out the raid “in a manner seemingly designed to intimidate” voters.
“Knowing that the federal government can physically seize and rummage through election records, long after the election has been certified, will predictably chill voter participation and undermine voters’ confidence in the security and secrecy of their ballots,” he argued.
The release of the complaint also sets the stage for an even bigger revelation Tuesday.
U.S. District Judge J.P. Boulee has ordered the Department of Justice (DOJ) to publicly reveal by then the arguments federal prosecutors made in persuading a magistrate judge to approve the search warrant against the election facility.
The judge said unsealing that affidavit was critical “given the importance of the public’s access to judicial proceedings.” The affidavit could reveal important information about the basis on which DOJ is claiming it has probable cause to believe a crime was committed.
Indeed, Pitts argued it’s highly unlikely that prosecutors adequately established probable cause, which is required to secure a warrant.
“Given the lengthy history of widely debunked voter fraud theories, there is little reason to have confidence that the affidavit establishes probable cause,” he said.
In an unusual move, the DOJ did not oppose the unsealing of the search warrant affidavit. Typically, the department fights vigorously to keep affidavits sealed to protect the integrity of ongoing investigations, sources and methods.
For now, the precise focus of the FBI’s probe into Fulton County remains unclear, but it appears to stem from Trump’s conspiracy theory-fueled crusade to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which he lost.
Fulton County, Georgia’s most populous county and the core of the metro Atlanta region, has long been a leading target of Trump’s election denialism. He has long called for criminal charges to be brought against those he believes wronged him in the election — in particular, election officials in Fulton County.
New revelations
Legal experts and local officials have broadly questioned the legality of the FBI’s raid on Fulton County’s election hub.
They note that the statute of limitations for the crimes the FBI appears to be investigating ran out years ago. And multiple investigations by state and federal officials also found no evidence of fraud in Fulton County, or the country generally, that would have altered the outcome of the 2020 election.
The Trump administration also set off alarm bells by dispatching Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard to attend the search. Her presence itself was likely meant to intimidate voters, board of commissioners chair Pitts argued.
“The First Amendment protects the right to vote free from intimidation,” he wrote. “The seizure of all 2020 election records in a highly public and intimidating show of federal force, with the conspicuous onsite presence of the Director of National Intelligence and the Deputy Director of the FBI, directly threatens that interest.”
The newly unsealed filings offer several new revelations about the raid and the seized materials.
Over the course of around nine hours, the FBI seized approximately 700 boxes containing 2020 election records, a senior Fulton County election official said in a court declaration.
The official also noted that Gabbard and several officials from D.C. appeared only in the final hour of the search. These people were in “civilian clothing without visible law enforcement markings.”
Beyond original copies of ballots, the materials seized by the FBI also included numbered lists of voters, tally sheets, voting machine proof sheets, absentee ballots and envelopes used during the election.
County officials have publicly warned that the records’ current whereabouts are unknown and that they are concerned about materials potentially being tampered with or illegally copied.
According to Pitts, such highly personal data could likely be used to “identify who voted for which candidate.”
Circumventing the law
At the time of the raid, the records were being held under seal by the clerk of the Fulton County Superior Court in accordance with Georgia law. The FBI took them anyway.
The DOJ had previously sought the records through a demand from Attorney General Pam Bondi and then through a lawsuit by Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon against the Fulton County Superior Court clerk. In response to each attempt, the clerk informed the DOJ that the materials were under seal and could not be produced absent a court order.
In the new filings, Fulton County officials said the FBI intentionally circumvented pending civil judicial proceedings to obtain the records on behalf of the DOJ.
“Instead of allowing these civil matters to be fully adjudicated, Respondent’s use of the criminal warrant process to take immediate possession of the same records that are the subject of these lawsuits has the effect of circumventing civil judicial proceedings,” Pitts said. “This use of criminal process to bypass the limitations and costs of civil discovery should not be permitted by the Court.”