The Justice Department is seeking the names and contact information of election workers in Fulton County, Georgia, who worked during the 2020 presidential election, according to legal filings.
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The Justice Department filed a subpoena in April to try to force the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections to release the names, addresses and contact information for 2020 election staff members and volunteers. The grand jury subpoena was made public on Monday as the Fulton County board urged a judge to quash it. The New York Times was first to report on the subpoena.
NBC News has reached out to the Justice Department for comment.
The subpoena marks an expanded effort by the Justice Department to investigate the 2020 election, which has continued to be a focus of President Donald Trump’s since his loss there.
Reached for comment, Fulton County Chairman Robb Pitts said that “the federal government once again is attempting to misuse criminal process.”
“This is yet another act of outrageous federal overreach designed to intimidate and to chill participation in elections,” Pitts said in a statement. “This harassment should not be allowed, so we have asked the Court to act. I will always stand up for our elections workers and for the truth.”
In Monday’s motion to quash the grand jury subpoena, the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections said that the subpoena came out of the Justice Department’s “latest effort to target and harass the President’s perceived political enemies — this time election officials, poll workers, and volunteers in Fulton County whom Donald Trump continues to disparage as he perpetuates his false claim that they ‘stole’ the 2020 election.”
The board’s motion called the grand jury subpoena “unprecedented and harassing,” saying that it would impact thousands of election workers and volunteers. The filing also laid out a slew of reasons why the board wanted the judge to throw out the subpoena.
“Its purpose is to target, harass, and punish the President’s perceived political opponents; it is grossly overbroad and untethered to any reasonable need; it cannot yield any evidence that could result in a criminal prosecution (because, among other things, the statutes of limitations have expired for any purported 2020 election crimes); it burdens the First Amendment rights of election workers and will chill their participation in elections’ and it unreasonably interferes with Georgia’s sovereign authority to administer elections,” the filing said.
Trump has repeatedly falsely claimed that he won the 2020 presidential election, including in Georgia, which Joe Biden won. In the aftermath of that election, Trump pleaded with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in a phone call to “find 11,780 votes” to overturn Biden’s win.
Fulton County was also the center of the election interference case in Georgia against Trump and his co-defendants. He denied any wrongdoing; the case was dropped after District Attorney Fani Willis was disqualified over conflict of interest allegations and the prosecutor who took over the investigation tossed the charges.
Earlier this year, the FBI executed a search warrant at a Fulton County elections hub, prompting criticism from Democrats. The county sued the Justice Department in February, challenging the legality of the search warrant and demanding the return of records seized by the federal government.
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