A recently released report from Georgia senators studying the Nov. 3 election found evidence of illegal activity carried out by workers at State Farm Arena.
“The events at the State Farm Arena are particularly disturbing because they demonstrated intent on the part of election workers to exclude the public from viewing the counting of ballots, an intentional disregard for the law. The number of votes that could have been counted in that length of time was sufficient to change the results of the presidential election and the senatorial contests,” the report from the state Senate’s Election Law Study Subcommittee reads.
“Furthermore, there appears to be coordinated illegal activities by election workers themselves who purposely placed fraudulent ballots into the final election totals.”
Workers counted mail-in ballots at the arena. According to surveillance footage and witness testimony from Election Day, workers stopped counting ballots around 10:30 p.m. but resumed after observers and media left.
A spokesman for Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger didn’t respond to a request for comment. Gabriel Sterling, an official who works out of the office, has acknowledged there was an 82-minute period that night when no monitor was present, but the office blamed media and observers for leaving after the announcement that counting was stopping for the night.
The Georgia Election Law Study Subcommittee is part of the Senate Judiciary Committee. According to Subcommittee Chairman William Ligon, a Republican, the report hasn’t been formally approved by either the subcommittee or the committee.
Requests for comment sent to the five members of the subcommittee weren’t immediately returned.
In the report, legislators note that scores of witnesses and experts testified about irregularities and fraud allegations during a public hearing earlier this month.
In summary, legislators wrote, the general election “was chaotic and any reported results must be viewed as untrustworthy.”
Lawmakers heard evidence about proper chain of custody protocols being violated, about fraudulent ballots likely being introduced into the pool of ballots being counted, about pristine ballots whose origin looked suspicious, and about unsecured ballots.
“A great deal of testimony supported evidence of a coordinated effort to prevent a transparent process of observing the counting of ballots during the absentee ballot opening period and on election night. Witnesses testified to hostility to Republican poll workers during the recount—directional signage was unavailable, doors were locked, and Republican poll watchers were sent home early or given menial assignments,” the report states.
“Monitors throughout the state were often kept at an unreasonably long distance—some social distancing was understandable, but monitors were blocked from having the visual ability to see what was written on the ballots or to have any meaningful way to check the counting or to double-check that what was counted was actually assigned to the right candidate.”
Two of the poll observers who testified were later terminated by Fulton County. Raffensperger has called for them to be rehired; Fulton County hasn’t responded to requests for comment.
Among the recommendations outlined in the report are that unqualified voters should be purged from voter rolls; violations for state law should be be prosecuted; forensic audits of ballots and machines should be carried out; and the state legislature should consider moving to choose the slate of electors.
Ligon led a push to convene a special session of the legislature to consider taking back the power to appoint electors, but that effort didn’t garner the required support. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, can also call a special session, but has thus far refused to do so.