Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state in Georgia and a candidate for governor, received a \u201cmanifesto\u201d deemed to be a \u201ccredible threat on his life\u201d on Monday, the day before a suspicious object disrupted a campaign event in Macon, campaign officials said.<\/p>\n
The four-page, handwritten document included a photograph of Mr. Raffensperger with the word \u201cBoom\u201d written across his forehead, campaign officials said. It was \u201cmultipage,\u201d and \u201cit was obviously targeting the secretary of state,\u201d Ryan Mahoney, a campaign spokesman, told The New York Times.<\/p>\n
Mr. Raffensperger has been the subject of hundreds of threats since the 2020 presidential election, when he bucked President Trump\u2019s efforts to reverse his defeat.<\/p>\n
The letter was mailed to the sheriff\u2019s office in Clay County, Miss., which notified the F.B.I., officials with Mr. Raffensperger\u2019s state office and his campaign said. Other agencies notified included the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, the Georgia State Patrol and the Department of Homeland Security, Mr. Mahoney said. Officials also beefed up security for Mr. Raffensperger and his family.<\/p>\n
It remained unknown if the suspicious object found at the campaign event in Macon was related to the manifesto, Mr. Mahoney said, or if officials knew the identity of the writer of the letter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe person has not been found yet who issued the threat yesterday,\u201d Mr. Mahoney said. \u201cWe\u2019re still trying to find that person, obviously trying to see if there\u2019s a connection point between the bomb threat\u201d and \u201cthe manifesto that was sent yesterday against Brad.\u201d<\/p>\n
The incident occurred at the Middle Georgia Regional Airport in Macon, where Mr. Raffensperger had stopped as part of a daylong campaign swing across the state in his bid for the Republican nomination for governor. The primary is May 19.<\/p>\n
Mr. Raffensperger\u2019s campaign said law enforcement teams were deployed to all of his stops Tuesday as a result of the letter. In Macon, that included a team of dogs, which found a suspicious object inside a vending machine, leading to the evacuation of the airport.<\/p>\n
The local sheriff\u2019s office said the incident was called into its 911 center at 8:21 a.m., prompting the dispatch of a bomb unit to the airport. The object turned out not to be a bomb, officials said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter the thorough sweep of the airport, and further investigation, no hazardous devices were detected,\u201d the sheriff\u2019s office said in a news release.<\/p>\n
Mr. Raffensperger chose to continue the fly-around, which was scheduled to conclude at the Atlanta airport on Tuesday afternoon.<\/p>\n
In a stop at the Savannah airport, with as many law enforcement officials and reporters as attendees looking on, the candidate spoke for about 10 minutes and addressed the incident only in response to a reporter\u2019s question.<\/p>\n
Asked if the incident strengthened his resolve to continue campaigning, he replied: \u201cTake a look at the last several years. My resolve is already pretty strong.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr. Raffensperger, who has been the secretary of state in Georgia since 2019, rose to prominence after the 2020 presidential election, when he rebuffed pressure from Mr. Trump on a phone call during which the president pressed him to \u201cfind\u201d enough votes to reverse Joseph R. Biden Jr.\u2019s narrow victory in the state.<\/p>\n
Ever since, Mr. Raffensperger has faced a relentless campaign of harassment and death threats<\/a> against himself, his staff and his family. His family was forced to relocate temporarily after the 2020 election amid threats, when members of a far-right militia group were spotted outside his house<\/a>. Months later, Mr. Raffensperger\u2019s wife was still receiving death threats.<\/p>\n