Georgia election official systematically debunks ‘fantastical’ election fraud claims by Trump and accuses the President and his of ‘intentionally misleading the people of the United States’
- Georgia state election official Gabriel Sterling took on Trump’s fraud after a leaked phone call
- His criticisms came after Trump asked Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to ‘find’ 11,780 votes for him
- He blasted ‘fantastical’ claims by President Trump and his allies and issued a point-by-point breakdown
- He said they taped infamous hour-long call with the president out ‘of an abundance of caution’
Georgia state election official Gabriel Sterling tore into President Donald Trump’s election fraud claims a day after the explosive leak of Trump demanding his boss ‘find’ 11,780 votes to make Trump the winner.
Sterling called a press conference Georgia on the eve of critical statewide elections there – telling the media there was ‘not a whit’ of truth to claims that ballot machines ‘flipped’ votes from Trump to President-elect Joe Biden.
Sterling issued a furious point-by-point take down of claims and conspiracy theories put forward by Trump and his allies – blasting ‘misinformation’ and ‘disinformation.’
His point-by-point rebuttal came on an extraordinary day whose developments included:
- In Georgia, the Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis said she was ready to launch an investigation into Trump’s demands for the election result to be changed and said it would be into ‘felony wrongdoing’;
- And in Washington the FBI is facing demands to launch a federal investigation into the president, with two House Democrats writing to the bureau’s director Chris Wray accusing the president of conspiracy to tamper with elections;
- Republicans split Monday over whether the tape could cost them the Georgia Senate elections, with the state’s lieutenant governor Geoff Duncan telling CNN ‘it’s not a solution for us winning’;
- David Perdue, one of the two sitting senators facing a battle for survival claimed it would not have an impact. Instead he called the leak – not the call’s contents – ‘disgusting’ during an appearance on Fox News;
- Trump himself heads to Georgia Monday evening for a rally which Republicans fear he will use to vent grievances rather than get out the vote for Perdue and Kelly Loeffler;
- In a rage after the Raffensperger call, Trump floated the idea of pulling out of the rally, which would have potentially devastated the GOP chances in what is expected to be a pair of razor-thin races;
- But Trump was persuaded to go ahead with the rally as a stage from which to reiterate his claims of election fraud and to present, as he tweeted Monday, the ‘real numbers’ from the race;
- On Wednesday vice president Mike Pence will preside as both House and Senate confirm Joe Biden’s election victory;
- But a ‘dirty dozen’ of Senate Republicans say they will join more than 140 House GOP members to challenge the certification, a move which other Republican senators have slammed as a dangerous attack on democracy. The pro-Trump senators, led by Ted Cruz, had appeared likely to have more support until the tape emerged.
- Marsha Blackburn, a pro-Trump senator who is part of the Cruz group told Fox News the call ‘was not helpful.’
- Trump himself vowed revenge on the ‘surrender caucus’ highlighting ultra-conservative Arkansas senator Tom Cotton’s refusal to join the Cruz-led group and tweeting ‘Republicans NEVER FORGET.’
Gabriel Sterling, Voting System Implementation Manager with the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, blasted ‘fantastical’ claims by President Trump and his allies
With rapid-fire speech, Sterling spelled out the redundant cross-checks and safeguards in the state’s election systems – and ridiculed several of Trump’s claims.
‘There is no shredding of ballots going on. That’s not real. It’s not happening,’ he said, after Trump raised the prospect on his hour-long call with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
He mocked a claim put forward by Trump about the innards of voting machines – a charge Trump leveled with such generality it drew mockery online.
‘This is one I don’t fully understand. No one is changing parts or pieces out of Dominion voting machines. That’s not a real – I don’t even know what that means. It’s not a real thing,’ he said.
Trump had asked on the Saturday call: ‘But have they moved the inner parts of the machines and replaced them with other parts?’
Sterling spoke to reporters following the release of a phone call where President Trump asked state officials into ‘find’ 11,780 votes for him
A ‘claime vs. fact’ chart sought to take down election fraud claims
Sterling ridiculed some of Trump’s claims, including those about Dominion voting machines
Election lawyer Brian Germany responded simply on the call: ‘No.’
Sterling revealed his frustration at Trump repeating conspiracy theories about alleged fraud in the count at the State Farm Arena – claims his office has repeatedly debunked.
‘I will admit when I listened to the audio of the phone call and the president brought that up again and I heard him on radio ad again today I wanted so scream … I screamed in my car at the radio talking about this because this has been thoroughly debunked,’ he said.
Describing the scene, he said: ‘There are monitors in the room. There is press in the room. They take the ballots that have been opened, and put them in carrier trays and put them in there, and then put through the boxes, put the lid on, the lid matches the box,’ he said, describing a part of the video Trump lawyers have said showed potentially nefarious activity.
Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger
Sterling fielded a question about why his office taped the hour-long call – which has prompted officials in Georgia and Washington, D.C. to call for a criminal investigation of the president.
‘I think given the environment we’re in right now and political situation that we’re in, and the history of the president, knowing that he sometimes doesn’t necessarily characterize things that they might have actually occurred, it was kind of an abundance of caution,’ he said.
I’m sure the president’s side recorded it too so they might have been the ones that leaked part of that as well,’ he said.
Sterling ridiculed the claim that Dominion Voting Systems machines were hacked as a ‘fantastical thing.’
He noted that ballot marking devices and scanners aren’t connected to the internet – and that his team was not even asked to attend a state Senate hearing where Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and witnesses raised allegations of fraud.
Even as he debunked Trump’s fraud claims, Sterling pleaded with residents to vote in two runoff elections Tuesday.
Democrats turned out in considerable numbers for early voting.
‘Everybody’s vote is going to count. Everybody’s vote did count,’ he said.
‘I never wanted to speak to him’: How Georgia Sec of State Raffensperger only took President’s threatening phone call after being pestered 18 TIMES and leaked tape after Trump tweeted he had ‘no clue’ – as Dems call on FBI to launch probe
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger leaked the tape of his hour-long conversation with President Donald Trump after the president attacked him on Twitter and claimed he had ‘no clue’ following his refusal to bow to pressure and threats, it emerged Monday.
The two men spoke Saturday in an explosive call that also included Raffensperger’s counsel Brian Germany, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and at least two Trump legal advisors.
The release of the tape – where Trump demands Raffensperger ‘find’ 11,780 votes and make immediate statements that he won the election – followed Trump’s public attacks on the elected Republican official.
Raffensperger himself appeared on GMA Monday to say that he believed Trump could face a criminal investigation in Georgia, and to call Trump’s claims of fraud ‘plain wrong.’
A source said that the call came after 18 separate attempts by the White House to get Raffensperger to speak to Trump, which he had turned down. ‘I never believed it was appropriate to speak to the president,’ Raffesnperger said Monday. When the Georgia official did speak, he had his general counsel, Ryan Germany, with him and recorded the call.
Raffesnperger revealed that the Fulton County District attorney Fani Willis was ready to launch an investigation, which she confirmed. The prosecutor said Monday she was waiting for a referral from the Georgia Board of Elections and said: ‘Anyone who commits a felony violation of Georgia law in my jurisdiction will be held accountable.’
The tape’s release has created a metastasizing crisis for Republicans. On Tuesday voters in Georgia decide whether Republicans hold its two Senate seats and control of the upper chamber or hand them to Democrats, giving Joe Biden’s party control of the White House and all of Congress.
As the scandal reverberated, the fact that Raffensperger had recorded the tape and leaked it emerged in a Politico report which revealed that he only acted after Trump disclosed the existence of the call and attacked the Georgia Secretary of State on Twitter.
‘I spoke to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger yesterday about Fulton County and voter fraud in Georgia,’ Trump tweeted Sunday morning from Washington, on a day when area golf courses were soggy from rain.
‘He was unwilling, or unable, to answer questions such as the ‘ballots under table’ scam, ballot destruction, out of state ‘voters’, dead voters, and more. He has no clue!’ Trump wrote.
Trump’s tweet referenced some of the allegations and conspiracy theories he raised in the hour-long call with Raffensperger, where the official and his counsel repeatedly resisted or sought to counter Trump’s repeated claims.
‘Respectfully, President Trump: What you’re saying is not true. The truth will come out,’ Raffensperger replied Sunday at about 10:30 AM from his official account.
Brad Raffensperger, Georgia Secretary of State, took part in an hour-long recorded phone call where President Trump told him to ‘find’ 11,780 votes, which would make him the winner
Trump wrote Sunday that Raffensperger ‘has no clue!’ What followed was a leak that has Trump facing potential criminal exposure, although it is unclear if he would be prosecuted for laws that prohibit knowingly pressuring an election official
Hanging in the balance: Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock, the two Democratic Senate candidates, held a rally Monday ahead of an appearance by Joe Biden in Georgia. If Democrats depose both Republican senators in the run-offs, they will control the Senate. Republicans are warning that Trump’s leaked call could cost the party the election
Campaigning solo: Republican Kelly Loeffler hit the trail in Canton and is expected to appear with Trump Monday night, but David Perdue is quarantining after exposure to someone with COVID
‘Disgusting.’ David Perdue appeared from quarantine on Fox News to slam leak of the call and to claim that Trump was right that there was fraud in the November election
THIS COULD COST US THE SENATE, REPUBLICANS WARN
Republicans have warned that Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of his own election could have a negative impact on the party’s chances – and the president himself raised the issue in his call with Raffensperger, where he demanded state election officials meet Monday and ‘work out on these numbers.’
‘But I’ll tell you it’s going to have a big impact on Tuesday if you guys don’t get this thing straightened out fast,’ he told Raffensperger, who repeatedly resisted his demands on the call.
Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan warned Monday that Trump’s flailing actions are a political anchor for his party.
‘I can’t think of a scenario where it helps,’ Duncan told CNN. ‘You know, if we look back to the last ten weeks, any Republican using this misinformation or election fraud is only an excuse, it’s not a solution for us winning on Tuesday.’
If Republican Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue successfully defend their seats, their party would maintain a 52-seat majority in the 100-seat Senate, giving them the power to block much of Biden’s agenda when he takes office on Jan. 20.
Perdue blasted the leak of the call – and downplayed the president’s comments some legal experts are already saying could constitute criminal interference in the vote count, dismissing the idea it could hurt his own race.
‘I don’t think it’s really going to affect our election. I’m still shocked that a member of the Republican Party would tape a sitting president and then leak that. It’s disgusting in my view,’ he told Fox News. ‘But what the president said is exactly what he’s been saying the last few months.’
He said the president just ‘wants some answers.’
A sweep by Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff would hand control to Biden’s party, as Vice President-elect Kamala Harris would hold the tiebreaking vote in the 50-50 chamber. That would make it easier for Biden to enact further coronavirus relief and tackle climate change, as Democrats also control the House of Representatives.
President- elect Joe Biden heads to Atlanta Monday
None of the candidates won a majority in their November races, which spurred the runoff elections.
Biden narrowly won Georgia in November, breaking years of Republican dominance in the state. Trump has refused to acknowledge his defeat and his campaign has unsuccessfully sought to overturn the results in Georgia and several other battleground states.
It is not clear whether Trump’s actions and his repeated claims of election fraud will affect the outcome of the Senate races. Strategists from both parties say the outcome could likely hinge on how many Republican voters participate on Tuesday, given strong Democratic early-voting turnout.
‘If we get our vote out on Election Day then I think Perdue and Loeffler both have a very strong chance of winning,’ Cobb County Republican Party Chairman Jason Shepherd told Reuters.
Trump warned Raffensperger on Saturday that Republican voters might be disheartened if Biden’s victory is allowed to stand.
‘Because of what you’ve done to the president a lot of people aren’t going to vote, and a lot of people are going to vote negative,’ he said on the call. He has previously called for both Raffensperger and Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, both Republicans, to resign for not backing his unsupported allegations of election fraud.
The campaigns have obliterated spending records and spurred unprecedented turnout. More than 3 million Georgians have already cast their votes and political groups have flooded the southern state with a tsunami of advertising.
Trump is due to visit Dalton, a city in the state’s heavily Republican northwest.
Biden will rally along with Ossoff and Warnock in Atlanta.
Later Sunday, the Washington Post reported on the stunning phone call, having obtained a copy of the complete conversation.
The call came on a day 11 Republican senators joined Trump ally Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) in saying they would challenge the electoral vote count Wednesday in multiple states Trump lost.
The phone call has the potential to impact the critical Georgia Senate runoff elections on Tuesday – and could even put Trump on the wrong side of criminal statutes barring interference in elections.
‘All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,’ Trump says on the call. ‘There’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, that you’ve recalculated.’
Raffensperger previously accused South Carolina GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally and golf partner, of calling him and asking him to toss out ballots. Graham acknowledged the call but denied the pressure, which appears to have prompted Raffensperger’s team to record his conversation with Trump.
The call that finally took place Saturday, following state certification and a recount, came after the White House sought to contact Raffensperger’s office 18 times, CNN reported.
When it finally did happen, Raffensperger and his team had evidence of the president’s pressure.
‘This is a man who has a history of reinventing history as it occurs,’ a Raffensperger advisor told Politico.
‘So if he’s going to try to dispute anything on the call, it’s nice to have something like this, hard evidence, to dispute whatever he’s claiming about the secretary. So yeah, after that call, we decided maybe we should do this,’ the person said.
Raffensperger told George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s ‘Good Morning America’ Monday he has ‘been fighting a rumor whack-a-mole’ and attacked Trump as ‘just plain wrong.’
‘Did you consider it a lawful request when the president asked you to find the votes?’ Stephanopoulos asked.
‘I’m not a lawyer. All I know is that we’re gonna follow the law, follow the process. Truth matters, and we’ve been fighting these rumors for the last two months,’ Raffensperger said.
‘It was pretty obvious very early on that we debunked every one of those theories that had been out there, but President Trump continues to believe them,’ he said.
‘He did most of the talking. We did most of the listening but I did want to make my points that the data that he has is just plain wrong,’ he said.
‘He did most of the talking,’ Raffensperger told ABC host George Stephanopoulos. ‘We did most of the listening, but I did want to make my points that the data that he has is just plain wrong.’
‘He had hundreds and hundreds of people he said that were dead that voted. We found two, that’s an example of just – he has bad data,’ he continued.
Trump on the call claimed the ballots were ‘corrupt’ and that failing to say so and make him the winner was a ‘criminal offense.’
‘And you are going to find that they are — which is totally illegal — it is more illegal for you than it is for them because, you know, what they did and you’re not reporting it. That’s a criminal, that’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you and to Ryan, your lawyer. And that’s a big risk,’ Trump said on the call.
‘Did you feel the pressure when he said ‘find’ the votes?’ Stephanopoulos pressed of the Georgia Republican.
‘No,’ Raffensperger said. ‘We have to follow the process, follow the law. Everything we’ve done for the last 12 months follows the constitution of the State of Georgia, follows the United States Constitution, follows state law.’
But a pair of Democratic House members urged FBI Director Christopher Wray to open an investigation into President Donald Trump’s extraordinary phone call with Georgia’s secretary of state.
‘As members of Congress and former prosecutors, we believe Donald Trump engaged in solicitation of, or conspiracy to commit, a number of election crimes,’ Representatives Ted Lieu of California and Kathleen Rice of New York wrote in a letter to Wray on Monday.
‘We ask you to open an immediate criminal investigation into the president,’ they demanded.
The letter claims Trump made ‘a number of other statements soliciting election fraud.’
Lieu and Rice claim that Trump is now guilty of committing voter fraud himself by attempting to persuade Georgia officials – through threats, flattery and otherwise – to conjure votes for him that are not there.
‘The evidence of election fraud by Mr. Trump is now in broad daylight,’ the two said now that audio of the full call is widely published. ‘Given the more than ample factual predicate, we are making a criminal to you to open an investigation into Mr. Trump.’
News of Lieu and Rice’s letter to the head of the FBI comes as Georgia State Election Board member David Worley sent an email over the weekend demanding the state open a probe into Trump’s hour-long call with Raffensperger.
The sole Democrat on the five-person panel, David Worley, wrote in an email to Raffensperger – who, as Georgia’s secretary of State, serves as the State Election Board chairman – claiming an investigation is required.
‘To say that I am troubled by President Trump’s attempt to manipulate the votes of Georgians would be an understatement,’Worley, who is a Joe Biden supporter, wrote in the email, according to The New York Times.
He continued: ‘Once we have received your investigative report, it will be the board’s duty to determine whether probable cause exists to refer this matter.’
Worley says the probe would help determine if the call violated Georgia law, including a provision prohibiting any conspiracies to commit election fraud.
Legal experts say Trump broke Georgia law when he pressured Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to ‘find’ just enough votes to overturn Biden’s election victory in the southern swing state.
If the investigation request by Worley were to find the law had been broken, the Election Board officials says it could ask Georgia law enforcement authorities to consider filing criminal charges or a civil case against Trump.
There are concerns, however, that the issue would end up needing to be settled by Biden’s incoming attorney general.
Former chair of the Federal Election Commission, Trevor Potter, a Republican, told the Times that any decisions regarding potential foul play in the hour-long call between Trump and Raffensperger would likely fall on the shoulders of the Justice Department in Biden’s administration.
‘There is a good argument that Trump is seeking to procure a fraudulent vote count by stating that he needs exactly 11,780 votes and is threatening the secretary of state if he does not produce them,’Potter said, adding: ‘But even if the Biden Justice Department thinks they have a good case, is that how they want to start off the Biden presidency? That is a policy decision.’
‘We ask you to open an immediate criminal investigation into the president,’ the duo wrote
Two Democratic representatives are demanding FBI Director Christopher Wray (pictured) open an investigation into President Donald Trump’s hour-long call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger
Representatives Ted Lieu (left) and Kathleen Rice (right) wrote in a letter to Wray Monday: ‘As members of Congress and former prosecutors, we believe Donald Trump engaged in solicitation of, or conspiracy to commit, a number of election crimes’
Audio of the hour-long Saturday phone call was published Sunday by the Washington Post, capturing Trump berating Raffensperger and Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp, pleading they do anything they could to change the outcome of the election in their state.
He told the Republican officials: ‘So look. All I want to do is this – I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state. There’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.’
Several legal experts have come forward to argue that Trump’s plea constituted a violation of Georgia’s law for criminal solicitation of election fraud.
‘The president asked, in no uncertain terms, the secretary of state to invent votes, to create votes that were not there,’ Anthony Michael Kreis, a professor at the Georgia State University College of Law, told Politico.
‘Not only did he ask for that in terms of just overturning the specific margin that Joe Biden won by, but then said we needed one additional vote to secure victory in Georgia.’
The Post did not reveal its source for the audio, but experts noted that under Georgia law only one party in a conversation needs to consent to a recording, meaning that whoever turned on their microphone would not be legally liable.
The recording sparked uproar among Democrats, including calls for impeachment or for Trump to resign. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris called it ‘the voice of desperation’ and a ‘bald-faced, bold abuse of power by the president’.
Some political commentators compared the call to the Watergate tapes that led to the fall of past US president Richard Nixon.
Carl Bernstein, one of the reporters who helped bring down Nixon’s presidency, called it ‘the ultimate smoking gun tape.’
Trump went on a Twitter rampage in apparent response to his detractors just after midnight, retweeting a string of videos in which his allies in Congress and the media defended his relentless efforts to overturn the results.
Both Kreis and Jed Shugerman, a professor at the Fordham University School of Law, noted that Trump would not be able to pardon himself if he was formally accused over the phone call because the case would be in state court, not federal.
Kreis first voiced his legal concerns with the phone call on Twitter, writing: ‘The most damaging part of the call is when Trump says that the Secretary of State should just say he ‘retabulated’ the numbers.
‘It reveals that he isn’t blowing off steam or sincerely seeking out the truth. His only demand is to have votes tossed or invented to fabricate a win.
Trump went on a Twitter rampage in apparent response to his detractors just after midnight, retweeting a string of videos in which his allies in Congress and the media defended his relentless efforts to overturn the results
‘Between that and ‘we need’ the number of votes Biden won by plus one is just an astonishing demand. There’s no way to read this other than a blatant attempt to pressure Georgia officials to lie and alter legitimate election results with a wink and a nod to a looming consequence.’
Shugerman agreed, tweeting that Trump ‘arguably’ violated both state and federal law by ‘criminally soliciting election fraud’.
He added: ‘Reminder: A presidential pardon has no effect on state criminal charges. Trump cannot pardon himself for the violation of Georgia state criminal law in his soliciting election felonies by Georgia state officials.’
Kreis told Politico: ‘If I’m the president of the United States and my pardon power is not — does not extend to state acts, I don’t think that in the last few days of my term that I would want to be engaging in activities that even remotely subject me to the possibility of state criminal prosecution.’
Andrew Weissman, a veteran attorney who spent 20 years with the Department of Justice, tweeted: ‘Trump’s statement shows he knows what the law is and he is doing precisely what it forbids: seeking to cause submission of false election results, and threatening folks to do that to book. Federal and state crimes.’
Meanwhile the head of the Georgia Republican Party, David Shafer, came out to defend the president on Twitter, saying that the call served as a ‘confidential settlement discussion’ of two lawsuits Trump had filed against Raffensperger in state and federal court.
‘The audio published by @TheWashingtonPost is heavily edited and omits the stipulation that all discussions were for the purpose of settling litigation and confidential under federal and state law,’ Shafer tweeted.
Contrary to Shafer’s assertion, the Post’s transcript of the call does make mention of the litigation. And the confidentiality argument was thwarted by Trump himself when he tweeted about the call earlier on Sunday.
Shafer also tweeted a link to a story declaring that Trump acted properly on the call, arguing that the transcript showed clear evidence of voter fraud – which was presented by Trump and repeatedly refuted by Raffensperger.
Chair of the Georgia Republican Party David Shafer came out to defend the president on Twitter, saying that the call served as a ‘confidential settlement discussion’ of two lawsuits Trump had filed against Raffensperger in state and federal court
Shafer also tweeted a link to a story declaring that Trump acted properly on the call, arguing that the transcript showed clear evidence of voter fraud – which was presented by Trump and repeatedly refuted by Raffensperger
In what the Post described as an incoherent conversation full of ramblings by the president, Trump repeated again and again that there was no way he could have lost the election in Georgia.
‘The people of Georgia are angry, the people in the country are angry,’ Trump said on the call. ‘And there’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.’
‘Well, Mr President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong,’ Raffensperger responded.
The Biden campaign quickly seized on the president’s comments, calling it proof of his ‘assault on democracy’.
‘We now have irrefutable proof of a president pressuring and threatening an official of his own party to get him to rescind a state’s lawful, certified vote count and fabricate another in its place,’ Biden Senior Advisor Bob Bauer said.
‘It captures the whole, disgraceful story about Donald Trump’s assault on American democracy.’
Harris reacted to the call during a campaign event for Georgia’s Democratic senate hopefuls Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock in Savannah on Sunday.
‘[Trump] called the Senate race in Georgia illegitimate … illegal and invalid … suggesting that the people of Georgia are trying to commit a crime,’ she said.
‘They filed six lawsuits — not one, not two — six lawsuits trying to challenge your voice in that election. And they failed every time. And the people’s voice remains standing.’
‘We know, were there not powerful people trying to mess with folks’ right to vote, we would be talking about Governor Stacey Abrams,’ Harris added, referencing claims that Abrams would have won the gubernatorial election in 2016 if it weren’t for voter suppression by then-Secretary of State Kemp.
Kemp was notably silent on the phone call between Raffensperger and Trump on Saturday.
Shortly after news of his call broke Trump took to Twitter to repeat his calls of voter fraud in the presidential election.
‘Sorry, but the number of votes in the Swing States that we are talking about is VERY LARGE and totally OUTCOME DETERMINATIVE!’ he wrote.
‘Only the Democrats and some RINO’S would dare dispute this – even though they know it is true!’
‘The Swing States did not even come close to following the dictates of their State Legislatures,’ he continued in a second tweet. ‘These States ‘election laws’ were made up by local judges & politicians, not by their Legislatures, & are therefore, before even getting to irregularities & fraud, UNCONSTITUTIONAL!’
Later on Sunday night Trump retweeted a string of news segments with people defending his efforts to overturn the election results, including a Fox News interview with Florida Rep Matt Gaetz.
READ THE FULL TRANSCRIPT OF TRUMP’S INFAMOUS CALL WITH GEORGIA’S SEC. OF STATE
The Washington Post published the full transcript of the call between Donald Trump and Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, which has led to calls for Trump to face a criminal probe, accused by two House Democrats of conspiracy to interfere in elections.
On the call on Saturday January 2 were Trump, his chief of staff Mark Meadows, and Republican attorneys Cleta Mitchell and Kurt Hilbert, and from Georgia Raffesnperger and his general counsel Ryan Germany. Not on the call but mentioned was Georgia Governor Brian Kemp.
Here is the full transcript:
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows: Okay. Alright. Mr. President, everyone is on the line. This is Mark Meadows, the chief of staff. Just so we all are aware. On the line is secretary of state and two other individuals. Jordan and Mr. Germany with him. You also have the attorneys that represent the president, Kurt and Alex and Cleta Mitchell — who is not the attorney of record but has been involved — myself and then the president. So Mr. President, I’ll turn it over to you.
President Donald Trump: Okay, thank you very much. Hello Brad and Ryan and everybody. We appreciate the time and the call. So we’ve spent a lot of time on this, and if we could just go over some of the numbers, I think it’s pretty clear that we won. We won very substantially in Georgia. You even see it by rally size, frankly. We’d be getting 25-30,000 people a rally, and the competition would get less than 100 people. And it never made sense.
But we have a number of things. We have at least 2 or 3 — anywhere from 250 to 300,000 ballots were dropped mysteriously into the rolls. Much of that had to do with Fulton County, which hasn’t been checked. We think that if you check the signatures — a real check of the signatures going back in Fulton County — you’ll find at least a couple of hundred thousand of forged signatures of people who have been forged. And we are quite sure that’s going to happen.
Donald Trump (left) pressured Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (right) to ‘find’ enough votes to overturn Joe Biden’s win in the Peach State during an extraordinary leaked phone call on Saturday
Another tremendous number. We’re going to have an accurate number over the next two days with certified accountants. But an accurate number will be given, but it’s in the 50s of thousands — and that’s people that went to vote and they were told they can’t vote because they’ve already been voted for. And it’s a very sad thing. They walked out complaining. But the number’s large. We’ll have it for you. But it’s much more than the number of 11,779 that’s — the current margin is only 11,779. Brad, I think you agree with that, right? That’s something I think everyone — at least that’s a number that everyone agrees on.
But that’s the difference in the votes. But we’ve had hundreds of thousands of ballots that we’re able to actually — we’ll get you a pretty accurate number. You don’t need much of a number because the number that in theory I lost by, the margin would be 11,779. But you also have a substantial numbers of people, thousands and thousands, who went to the voting place on November 3, were told they couldn’t vote, were told they couldn’t vote because a ballot had been put on their name. And you know that’s very, very, very, very sad.
We had, I believe it’s about 4,502 voters who voted but who weren’t on the voter registration list, so it’s 4,502 who voted, but they weren’t on the voter registration roll, which they had to be. You had 18,325 vacant address voters. The address was vacant, and they’re not allowed to be counted. That’s 18,325.
Smaller number — you had 904 who only voted where they had just a P.O. — a post office box number — and they had a post office box number, and that’s not allowed. We had at least 18,000 — that’s on tape, we had them counted very painstakingly — 18,000 voters having to do with [name]. She’s a vote scammer, a professional vote scammer and hustler [name]. That was the tape that’s been shown all over the world that makes everybody look bad, you, me and everybody else.
Where they got — number one they said very clearly and it’s been reported that they said there was a major water main break. Everybody fled the area. And then they came back, [name] and her daughter and a few people. There were no Republican poll watchers. Actually, there were no Democrat poll watchers, I guess they were them. But there were no Democrats, either, and there was no law enforcement. Late in the morning, early in the morning, they went to the table with the black robe and the black shield, and they pulled out the votes. Those votes were put there a number of hours before — the table was put there — I think it was, Brad, you would know, it was probably eight hours or seven hours before, and then it was stuffed with votes.
They weren’t in an official voter box; they were in what looked to be suitcases or trunks, suitcases, but they weren’t in voter boxes. The minimum number it could be because we watched it, and they watched it certified in slow motion instant replay if you can believe it, but slow motion, and it was magnified many times over, and the minimum it was 18,000 ballots, all for Biden.
You had out-of-state voters. They voted in Georgia, but they were from out of state, of 4,925. You had absentee ballots sent to vacant, they were absentee ballots sent to vacant addresses. They had nothing on them about addresses, that’s 2,326.
And you had dropboxes, which is very bad. You had dropboxes that were picked up. We have photographs, and we have affidavits from many people.
I don’t know if you saw the hearings, but you have dropboxes where the box was picked up but not delivered for three days. So all sorts of things could have happened to that box, including, you know, putting in the votes that you wanted. So there were many infractions, and the bottom line is, many, many times the 11,779 margin that they said we lost by — we had vast, I mean the state is in turmoil over this.
And I know you would like to get to the bottom of it, although I saw you on television today, and you said that you found nothing wrong. I mean, you know, and I didn’t lose the state, Brad. People have been saying that it was the highest vote ever. There was no way. A lot of the political people said that there’s no way they beat me. And they beat me. They beat me in the . . . As you know, every single state, we won every state. We won every statehouse in the country. We held the Senate, which is shocking to people, although we’ll see what happens tomorrow or in a few days.
And we won the House, but we won every single statehouse, and we won Congress, which was supposed to lose 15 seats, and they gained, I think 16 or 17 or something. I think there’s a now difference of five. There was supposed to be a difference substantially more. But politicians in every state, but politicians in Georgia have given affidavits and are going to that, that there was no way that they beat me in the election, that the people came out, in fact, they were expecting to lose, and then they ended up winning by a lot because of the coattails. And they said there’s no way, that they’ve done many polls prior to the election, that there was no way that they won.
Ballots were dropped in massive numbers. And we’re trying to get to those numbers and we will have them.
They’ll take a period of time. Certified. But but they’re massive numbers. And far greater than the 11,779.
The other thing, dead people. So dead people voted, and I think the number is close to 5,000 people. And they went to obituaries. They went to all sorts of methods to come up with an accurate number, and a minimum is close to about 5,000 voters.
The bottom line is, when you add it all up and then you start adding, you know, 300,000 fake ballots. Then the other thing they said is in Fulton County and other areas. And this may or may not be true . . . this just came up this morning, that they are burning their ballots, that they are shredding, shredding ballots and removing equipment. They’re changing the equipment on the Dominion machines and, you know, that’s not legal.
And they supposedly shredded I think they said 300 pounds of, 3,000 pounds of ballots. And that just came to us as a report today. And it is a very sad situation.
But Brad, if you took the minimum numbers where many, many times above the 11,779, and many of those numbers are certified, or they will be certified, but they are certified. And those are numbers that are there, that exist. And that beat the margin of loss, they beat it, I mean, by a lot, and people should be happy to have an accurate count instead of an election where there’s turmoil.
I mean there’s turmoil in Georgia and other places. You’re not the only one, I mean, we have other states that I believe will be flipping to us very shortly. And this is something that — you know, as an example, I think it in Detroit, I think there’s a section, a good section of your state actually, which we’re not sure so we’re not going to report it yet. But in Detroit, we had, I think it was, 139 percent of the people voted. That’s not too good.
In Pennsylvania, they had well over 200,000 more votes than they had people voting. And that doesn’t play too well, and the legislature there is, which is Republican, is extremely activist and angry. I mean, there were other things also that were almost as bad as that. But they had as an example, in Michigan, a tremendous number of dead people that voted. I think it was, I think, Mark, it was 18,000. Some unbelievably high number, much higher than yours, you were in the 4-5,000 category.
And that was checked out laboriously by going through, by going through the obituary columns in the newspapers.
So I guess with all of it being said, Brad, the bottom line, and provisional ballots, again, you know, you’ll have to tell me about the provisional ballots, but we have a lot of people that were complaining that they weren’t able to vote because they were already voted for. These are great people.
And, you know, they were shellshocked. I don’t know if you call that provisional ballots. In some states, we had a lot of provisional ballot situations where people were given a provisional ballot because when they walked in on November 3 and they were already voted for.
So that’s it. I mean, we have many, many times the number of votes necessary to win the state. And we won the state, and we won it very substantially and easily, and we’re getting, we have, much of this is a very certified, far more certified than we need. But we’re getting additional numbers certified, too. And we’re getting pictures of dropboxes being delivered and delivered late. Delivered three days later, in some cases, plus we have many affidavits to that effect.
Trump was joined on the call by several of his most loyal allies, including White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows (left) and conservative lawyers Cleta Mitchell (center) and Kurt Hilbert (right)
Meadows: So, Mr. President, if I might be able to jump in, and I’ll give Brad a chance. Mr. Secretary, obviously there is, there are allegations where we believe that not every vote or fair vote and legal vote was counted, and that’s at odds with the representation from the secretary of state’s office.
What I’m hopeful for is there some way that we can, we can find some kind of agreement to look at this a little bit more fully? You know the president mentioned Fulton County.
But in some of these areas where there seems to be a difference of where the facts seem to lead, and so Mr. Secretary, I was hopeful that, you know, in the spirit of cooperation and compromise, is there something that we can at least have a discussion to look at some of these allegations to find a path forward that’s less litigious?
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger: Well, I listened to what the president has just said. President Trump, we’ve had several lawsuits, and we’ve had to respond in court to the lawsuits and the contentions. We don’t agree that you have won. And we don’t — I didn’t agree about the 200,000 number that you’d mentioned. I’ll go through that point by point.
What we have done is we gave our state Senate about one and a half hours of our time going through the election issue by issue and then on the state House, the government affairs committee, we gave them about two and a half hours of our time, going back point by point on all the issues of contention. And then just a few days ago, we met with our U.S. congressmen, Republican congressmen, and we gave them about two hours of our time talking about this past election. Going back, primarily what you’ve talked about here focused in on primarily, I believe, is the absentee ballot process. I don’t believe that you’re really questioning the Dominion machines. Because we did a hand re-tally, a 100 percent re-tally of all the ballots, and compared them to what the machines said and came up with virtually the same result. Then we did the recount, and we got virtually the same result. So I guess we can probably take that off the table.
I don’t think there’s an issue about that.
Trump: Well, Brad. Not that there’s not an issue, because we have a big issue with Dominion in other states and perhaps in yours. But we haven’t felt we needed to go there. And just to, you know, maybe put a little different spin on what Mark is saying, Mark Meadows, yeah we’d like to go further, but we don’t really need to. We have all the votes we need.
You know, we won the state. If you took, these are the most minimal numbers, the numbers that I gave you, those are numbers that are certified, your absentee ballots sent to vacant addresses, your out-of-state voters, 4,925. You know when you add them up, it’s many more times, it’s many times the 11,779 number. So we could go through, we have not gone through your Dominion. So we can’t give them blessing. I mean, in other states, we think we found tremendous corruption with Dominion machines, but we’ll have to see.
But we only lost the state by that number, 11,000 votes, and 779. So with that being said, with just what we have, with just what we have, we’re giving you minimal, minimal numbers. We’re doing the most conservative numbers possible; we’re many times, many, many times above the margin. And so we don’t really have to, Mark, I don’t think we have to go through . . .
Meadows: Right
Trump: Because what’s the difference between winning the election by two votes and winning it by half a million votes. I think I probably did win it by half a million. You know, one of the things that happened, Brad, is we have other people coming in now from Alabama and from South Carolina and from other states, and they’re saying it’s impossible for you to have lost Georgia. We won. You know in Alabama, we set a record, got the highest vote ever. In Georgia, we set a record with a massive amount of votes. And they say it’s not possible to have lost Georgia.
And I could tell you by our rallies. I could tell you by the rally I’m having on Monday night, the place, they already have lines of people standing out front waiting. It’s just not possible to have lost Georgia. It’s not possible. When I heard it was close, I said there’s no way. But they dropped a lot of votes in there late at night. You know that, Brad. And that’s what we are working on very, very stringently. But regardless of those votes, with all of it being said, we lost by essentially 11,000 votes, and we have many more votes already calculated and certified, too.
And so I just don’t know, you know, Mark, I don’t know what’s the purpose. I won’t give Dominion a pass because we found too many bad things. But we don’t need Dominion or anything else. We have won this election in Georgia based on all of this. And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, Brad. You know, I mean, having the correct — the people of Georgia are angry. And these numbers are going to be repeated on Monday night. Along with others that we’re going to have by that time, which are much more substantial even. And the people of Georgia are angry, the people of the country are angry. And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, you know, that you’ve recalculated. Because the 2,236 in absentee ballots. I mean, they’re all exact numbers that were done by accounting firms, law firms, etc. And even if you cut ’em in half, cut ’em in half and cut ’em in half again, it’s more votes than we need.
Raffensperger: Well, Mr. President, the challenge that you have is the data you have is wrong. We talked to the congressmen, and they were surprised.
But they — I guess there was a person named Mr. Braynard who came to these meetings and presented data, and he said that there was dead people, I believe it was upward of 5,000. The actual number were two. Two. Two people that were dead that voted. So that’s wrong.
Trump: Well, Cleta, how do you respond to that? Maybe you tell me?
Trump attorney Cleta Mitchell: Well, I would say, Mr. Secretary, one of the things that we have requested and what we said was, if you look, if you read our petition, it said that we took the names and birth years, and we had certain information available to us. We have asked from your office for records that only you have, and so we said there is a universe of people who have the same name and same birth year and died.
But we don’t have the records that you have. And one of the things that we have been suggesting formally and informally for weeks now is for you to make available to us the records that would be necessary —
Trump: But, Cleta, even before you do that, and not even including that, that’s why I hardly even included that number, although in one state, we have a tremendous amount of dead people. So I don’t know — I’m sure we do in Georgia, too. I’m sure we do in Georgia, too.
But we’re so far ahead. We’re so far ahead of these numbers, even the phony ballots of [name] , known scammer. You know the Internet? You know what was trending on the Internet? ‘Where’s [name]?’ Because they thought she’d be in jail. ‘Where’s [name]?’ It’s crazy, it’s crazy. That was. The minimum number is 18,000 for [name] , but they think it’s probably about 56,000, but the minimum number is 18,000 on the [name] night where she ran back in there when everybody was gone and stuffed, she stuffed the ballot boxes. Let’s face it, Brad, I mean. They did it in slow motion replay magnified, right? She stuffed the ballot boxes. They were stuffed like nobody has ever seen them stuffed before.
So there’s a term for it when it’s a machine instead of a ballot box, but she stuffed the machine. She stuffed the ballot. Each ballot went three times, they were showing: Here’s ballot No 1. Here it is a second time, third time, next ballot.
I mean, look. Brad. We have a new tape that we’re going to release. It’s devastating. And by the way, that one event, that one event is much more than the 11,000 votes that we’re talking about. It’s, you know, that one event was a disaster. And it’s just, you know, but it was, it was something, it can’t be disputed. And again, we have a version that you haven’t seen, but it’s magnified. It’s magnified, and you can see everything. For some reason, they put it in three times, each ballot, and I don’t know why. I don’t know why three times. Why not five times, right? Go ahead.
Raffensperger: You’re talking about the State Farm video. And I think it’s extremely unfortunate that Rudy Giuliani or his people, they sliced and diced that video and took it out of context. The next day, we brought in WSB-TV, and we let them show, see the full run of tape, and what you’ll see, the events that transpired are nowhere near what was projected by, you know —
Trump: But where were the poll watchers, Brad? There were no poll watchers there. There were no Democrats or Republicans. There was no security there.
It was late in the evening, late in the, early in the morning, and there was nobody else in the room. Where were the poll watchers, and why did they say a water main broke, which they did and which was reported in the newspapers? They said they left. They ran out because of a water main break, and there was no water main. There was nothing. There was no break. There was no water main break. But we’re, if you take out everything, where were the Republican poll watchers, even where were the Democrat pollwatchers, because there were none.
And then you say, well, they left their station, you know, if you look at the tape, and this was, this was reviewed by professional police and detectives and other people, when they left in a rush, everybody left in a rush because of the water main, but everybody left in a rush. These people left their station.
When they came back, they didn’t go to their station. They went to the apron, wrapped around the table, under which were thousands and thousands of ballots in a box that was not an official or a sealed box. And then they took those. They went back to a different station. So if they would have come back, they would have walked to their station, and they would have continued to work. But they couldn’t do even that because that’s illegal, because they had no Republican pollwatchers. And remember, her reputation is — she’s known all over the Internet, Brad. She’s known all over.
I’m telling you, ‘Where’s [name] ‘ was one of the hot items . . . [name] They knew her. ‘Where’s [name]?’ So Brad, there can be no justification for that. And I, you know, I give everybody the benefit of the doubt. But that was — and Brad, why did they put the votes in three times? You know, they put ’em in three times.
Raffensperger: Mr. President, they did not put that. We did an audit of that, and we proved conclusively that they were not scanned three times.
Trump: Where was everybody else at that late time in the morning? Where was everybody? Where were the Republicans? Where were the security guards? Were the people that were there just a little while before when everyone ran out of the room. How come we had no security in the room. Why did they run to the bottom of the table? Why do they run there and just open the skirt and rip out the votes. I mean, Brad. And they were sitting there, I think for five hours or something like that, the votes.
Raffensperger: Mr. President, we’ll send you the link from WSB.
Trump: I don’t care about the link. I don’t need it. Brad, I have a much better —
Mitchell: I will tell you. I’ve seen the tape. The full tape. So has Alex. We’ve watched it. And what we saw and what we’ve confirmed in the timing is that they made everybody leave — we have sworn affidavits saying that. And then they began to process ballots. And our estimate is that there were roughly 18,000 ballots. We don’t know that. If you know that . . .
Trump: It was 18,000 ballots, but they used each one three times.
Mitchell: Well, I don’t know about that.
Trump: I do think we had ours magnified out.
Mitchell: I’ve watched the entire tape.
Trump: Nobody can make a case for that, Brad. Nobody. I mean, look, you’d have to be a child to think anything other than that. Just a child.
Mitchell: How many ballots, Mr. Secretary, are you saying were processed then?
Raffensperger: We had GBI . . . investigate that.
Germany: We had our — this is Ryan Germany. We had our law enforcement officers talk to everyone who was, who was there after that event came to light. GBI was with them as well as FBI agents.
Trump: Well, there’s no way they could — then they’re incompetent. They’re either dishonest or incompetent, okay?
Mitchell: Well, what did they find?
Trump: There’s only two answers, dishonesty or incompetence. There’s just no way. Look. There’s no way. And on the other thing, I said too, there is no way. I mean, there’s no way that these things could have been, you know, you have all these different people that voted, but they don’t live in Georgia anymore. What was that number, Cleta? That was a pretty good number, too.
Mitchell: The number who have registered out of state after they moved from Georgia. And so they had a date when they moved from Georgia, they registered to vote out of state, and then it’s like 4,500, I don’t have that number right in front of me.
Trump: And then they came back in, and they voted.
Mitchell: And voted. Yeah.
Trump: I thought that was a large number, though. It was in the 20s.
Ryan Germany, Raffensberger’s General Counsel: We’ve been going through each of those as well, and those numbers that we got, that Ms. Mitchell was just saying, they’re not accurate. Every one we’ve been through are people that lived in Georgia, moved to a different state, but then moved back to Georgia legitimately. And in many cases —
Trump: How may people do that? They moved out, and then they said, ‘Ah, to hell with it, I’ll move back.’ You know, it doesn’t sound like a very normal . . . you mean, they moved out, and what, they missed it so much that they wanted to move back in? It’s crazy.
Germany: They moved back in years ago. This was not like something just before the election. So there’s something about that data that, it’s just not accurate.
Trump: Well, I don’t know, all I know is that it is certified. And they moved out of Georgia, and they voted. It didn’t say they moved back in, Cleta, did it?
Mitchell: No, but I mean, we’re looking at the voter registration. Again, if you have additional records, we’ve been asking for that, but you haven’t shared any of that with us. You just keep saying you investigated the allegations.
Trump: Cleta, a lot of it you don’t need to be shared. I mean, to be honest, they should share it. They should share it because you want to get to an honest election.
I won this election by hundreds of thousands of votes. There’s no way I lost Georgia. There’s no way. We won by hundreds of thousands of votes. I’m just going by small numbers, when you add them up, they’re many times the 11,000. But I won that state by hundreds of thousands of votes.
Do you think it’s possible that they shredded ballots in Fulton County? Because that’s what the rumor is. And also that Dominion took out machines. That Dominion is really moving fast to get rid of their, uh, machinery.
Do you know anything about that? Because that’s illegal, right?
Trump suggested that Raffensberger and his general counsel Ryan Germany (pictured) could be subject to criminal liability if they failed to find that thousands of ballots cast in Fulton County had been illegally destroyed – despite no evidence supporting that allegation
Germany: This is Ryan Germany. No, Dominion has not moved any machinery out of Fulton County.
Trump: But have they moved the inner parts of the machines and replaced them with other parts?
Germany: No.
Trump: Are you sure, Ryan?
Germany: I’m sure. I’m sure, Mr. President.
Trump: What about, what about the ballots. The shredding of the ballots. Have they been shredding ballots?
Germany: The only investigation that we have into that — they have not been shredding any ballots. There was an issue in Cobb County where they were doing normal office shredding, getting rid of old stuff, and we investigated that. But this stuff from, you know, from you know past elections.
Trump: It doesn’t pass the smell test because we hear they’re shredding thousands and thousands of ballots, and now what they’re saying, ‘Oh, we’re just cleaning up the office.’ You know.
Raffensperger: Mr. President, the problem you have with social media, they — people can say anything.
Trump: Oh this isn’t social media. This is Trump media. It’s not social media. It’s really not; it’s not social media. I don’t care about social media. I couldn’t care less. Social media is Big Tech. Big Tech is on your side, you know. I don’t even know why you have a side because you should want to have an accurate election. And you’re a Republican.
Raffensperger: We believe that we do have an accurate election.
Trump: No, no you don’t. No, no you don’t. You don’t have. Not even close. You’re off by hundreds of thousands of votes. And just on the small numbers, you’re off on these numbers, and these numbers can’t be just — well, why wont? — Okay. So you sent us into Cobb County for signature verification, right? You sent us into Cobb County, which we didn’t want to go into. And you said it would be open to the public. So we had our experts there, they weren’t allowed into the room. But we didn’t want Cobb County. We wanted Fulton County. And you wouldn’t give it to us. Now, why aren’t we doing signature — and why can’t it be open to the public?
And why can’t we have professionals do it instead of rank amateurs who will never find anything and don’t want to find anything? They don’t want to find, you know they don’t want to find anything. Someday you’ll tell me the reason why, because I don’t understand your reasoning, but someday you’ll tell me the reason why. But why don’t you want to find?
Germany: Mr. President, we chose Cobb County —
Trump: Why don’t you want to find . . . What?
Germany: Sorry, go ahead.
Trump: So why did you do Cobb County? We didn’t even request — we requested Fulton County, not Cobb County. Go ahead, please. Go ahead.
Germany: We chose Cobb County because that was the only county where there’s been any evidence submitted that the signature verification was not properly done.
Trump: No, but I told you. We’re not, we’re not saying that.
Mitchell: We did say that.
Trump: Fulton County. Look. Stacey, in my opinion, Stacey is as dishonest as they come. She has outplayed you . . . at everything. She got you to sign a totally unconstitutional agreement, which is a disastrous agreement. You can’t check signatures. I can’t imagine you’re allowed to do harvesting, I guess, in that agreement. That agreement is a disaster for this country. But she got you somehow to sign that thing, and she has outsmarted you at every step.
And I hate to imagine what’s going to happen on Monday or Tuesday, but it’s very scary to people. You know, when the ballots flow in out of nowhere. It’s very scary to people. That consent decree is a disaster. It’s a disaster. A very good lawyer who examined it said they’ve never seen anything like it.
Raffensperger: Harvesting is still illegal in the state of Georgia. And that settlement agreement did not change that one iota.
Trump: It’s not a settlement agreement, it’s a consent decree. It even says consent decree on it, doesn’t it? It uses the term consent decree. It doesn’t say settlement agreement. It’s a consent decree. It’s a disaster.
Raffensperger: It’s a settlement agreement.
Trump: What’s written on top of it?
Raffensperger: Ryan?
Germany: I don’t have it in front of me, but it was not entered by the court, it’s not a court order.
Trump: But Ryan, it’s called a consent decree, is that right? On the paper. Is that right?
Germany: I don’t. I don’t. I don’t believe so, but I don’t have it in front of me.
Trump: Okay, whatever, it’s a disaster. It’s a disaster. Look. Here’s the problem. We can go through signature verification, and we’ll find hundreds of thousands of signatures, if you let us do it. And the only way you can do it, as you know, is to go to the past. But you didn’t do that in Cobb County. You just looked at one page compared to another. The only way you can do a signature verification is go from the one that signed it on November whatever. Recently. And compare it to two years ago, four years ago, six years ago, you know, or even one. And you’ll find that you have many different signatures. But in Fulton, where they dumped ballots, you will find that you have many that aren’t even signed and you have many that are forgeries.
Okay, you know that. You know that. You have no doubt about that. And you will find you will be at 11,779 within minutes because Fulton County is totally corrupt, and so is she totally corrupt.
And they’re going around playing you and laughing at you behind your back, Brad, whether you know it or not, they’re laughing at you. And you’ve taken a state that’s a Republican state, and you’ve made it almost impossible for a Republican to win because of cheating, because they cheated like nobody’s ever cheated before. And I don’t care how long it takes me, you know, we’re going to have other states coming forward — pretty good.
But I won’t . . . this is never . . . this is . . . We have some incredible talent said they’ve never seen anything . . . Now the problem is they need more time for the big numbers. But they’re very substantial numbers. But I think you’re going to fine that they — by the way, a little information — I think you’re going to find that they are shredding ballots because they have to get rid of the ballots because the ballots are unsigned. The ballots are corrupt, and they’re brand new, and they don’t have seals, and there’s a whole thing with the ballots. But the ballots are corrupt.
And you are going to find that they are — which is totally illegal — it is more illegal for you than it is for them because, you know, what they did and you’re not reporting it. That’s a criminal, that’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you and to Ryan, your lawyer. And that’s a big risk. But they are shredding ballots, in my opinion, based on what I’ve heard. And they are removing machinery, and they’re moving it as fast as they can, both of which are criminal finds. And you can’t let it happen, and you are letting it happen. You know, I mean, I’m notifying you that you’re letting it happen. So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the state.
And flipping the state is a great testament to our country because, you know, this is — it’s a testament that they can admit to a mistake or whatever you want to call it. If it was a mistake, I don’t know. A lot of people think it wasn’t a mistake. It was much more criminal than that. But it’s a big problem in Georgia, and it’s not a problem that’s going away. I mean, you know, it’s not a problem that’s going away.
Germany: This is Ryan. We’re looking into every one of those things that you mentioned.
Trump: Good. But if you find it, you’ve got to say it, Ryan.
Germany: . . . Let me tell you what we are seeing. What we’re seeing is not at all what you’re describing. These are investigators from our office, these are investigators from GBI, and they’re looking, and they’re good. And that’s not what they’re seeing. And we’ll keep looking, at all these things.
Trump: Well, you better check on the ballots because they are shredding ballots, Ryan. I’m just telling you, Ryan. They’re shredding ballots. And you should look at that very carefully. Because that’s so illegal. You know, you may not even believe it because it’s so bad. But they’re shredding ballots because they think we’re going to eventually get there . . . because we’ll eventually get into Fulton. In my opinion, it’s never too late. . . . So, that’s the story. Look, we need only 11,000 votes. We have are far more than that as it stands now. We’ll have more and more. And . . . do you have provisional ballots at all, Brad? Provisional ballots?
Raffensperger: Provisional ballots are allowed by state law.
Trump: Sure, but I mean, are they counted, or did you just hold them back because they, you know, in other words, how many provisional ballots do you have in the state?
Raffensperger: We’ll get you that number.
Trump: Because most of them are made out to the name Trump. Because these are people that were scammed when they came in. And we have thousands of people that have testified or that want to testify. When they came in, they were proudly going to vote on November 3. And they were told, ‘I’m sorry, you’ve already been voted for, you’ve already voted.’ The women, men started screaming, ‘No. I proudly voted till November 3.’ They said, ‘I’m sorry, but you’ve already been voted for, and you have a ballot.’ And these people are beside themselves. So they went out, and they filled in a provisional ballot, putting the name Trump on it.
And what about that batch of military ballots that came in. And even though I won the military by a lot, it was 100 percent Trump. I mean 100 percent Biden. Do you know about that? A large group of ballots came in, I think it was to Fulton County, and they just happened to be 100 percent for Trump — for Biden — even though Trump won the military by a lot, you know, a tremendous amount. But these ballots were 100 percent for Biden. And do you know about that? A very substantial number came in, all for Biden. Does anybody know about it?
Mitchell: I know about it, but —
Trump: Okay, Cleta, I’m not asking you, Cleta, honestly. I’m asking Brad. Do you know about the military ballots that we have confirmed now. Do you know about the military ballots that came in that were 100 percent, I mean 100 percent, for Biden. Do you know about that?
Germany: I don’t know about that. I do know that we have, when military ballots come in, it’s not just military, it’s also military and overseas citizens. The military part of that does generally go Republican. The overseas citizen part of it generally goes very Democrat. This was a mix of ’em.
Trump: No, but this was. That’s okay. But I got like 78 percent of the military. These ballots were all for . . . They didn’t tell me overseas. Could be overseas, too, but I get votes overseas, too, Ryan, in all fairness. No they came in, a large batch came in, and it was, quote, 100 percent for Biden. And that is criminal. You know, that’s criminal. Okay. That’s another criminal, that’s another of the many criminal events, many criminal events here.
I don’t know, look, Brad. I got to get . . . I have to find 12,000 votes, and I have them times a lot. And therefore, I won the state. That’s before we go to the next step, which is in the process of right now. You know, and I watched you this morning, and you said, well, there was no criminality.
But I mean all of this stuff is very dangerous stuff. When you talk about no criminality, I think it’s very dangerous for you to say that.
I just, I just don’t know why you don’t want to have the votes counted as they are. Like even you when you went and did that check. And I was surprised because, you know . . . And we found a few thousand votes that were against me. I was actually surprised because the way that check was done, all you’re doing, you know, recertifying existing votes and, you know, and you were given votes and you just counted them up, and you still found 3,000 that were bad. So that was sort of surprising that it came down to three or five, I don’t know. Still a lot of votes. But you have to go back to check from past years with respect to signatures. And if you check with Fulton County, you’ll have hundreds of thousands because they dumped ballots into Fulton County and the other county next to it.
So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break. You know, we have that in spades already. Or we can keep it going, but that’s not fair to the voters of Georgia because they’re going to see what happened, and they’re going to see what happened. I mean, I’ll, I’ll take on anybody you want with regard to [name] and her lovely daughter, a very lovely young lady, I’m sure. But, but [name] . . . I will take on anybody you want. And the minimum, there were 18,000 ballots, but they used them three times. So that’s, you know, a lot of votes. And they were all to Biden, by the way, that’s the other thing we didn’t say. You know, [name] , the one thing I forgot to say, which was the most important. You know that every single ballot she did went to Biden. You know that, right? Do you know that, by the way, Brad?
Every single ballot that she did through the machines at early, early in the morning went to Biden. Did you know that, Ryan?
Germany: That’s not accurate, Mr. President.
Trump: Huh. What is accurate?
Germany: The numbers that we are showing are accurate.
Trump: No, about [name] . About early in the morning, Ryan. Where the woman took, you know, when the whole gang took the stuff from under the table, right? Do you know, do you know who those ballots, do you know who they were made out to, do you know who they were voting for?
Germany: No, not specifically.
Trump: Did you ever check?
Germany: We did what I described to you earlier —
Trump: No no no — did you ever check the ballots that were scanned by [name] , a known political operative, balloteer? Did ever check who those votes were for?
Germany: We looked into that situation that you described.
Trump: No, they were 100 percent for Biden. 100 percent. There wasn’t a Trump vote in the whole group. Why don’t you want to find this, Ryan? What’s wrong with you? I heard your lawyer is very difficult, actually, but I’m sure you’re a good lawyer. You have a nice last name.
But, but I’m just curious, why wouldn’t, why do you keep fighting this thing? It just doesn’t make sense. We’re way over the 17,779, right? We’re way over that number, and just if you took just [name] , we’re over that number by five, five or six times when you multiply that times three.
And every single ballot went to Biden, and you didn’t know that, but now you know it. So tell me, Brad, what are we going to do? We won the election, and it’s not fair to take it away from us like this. And it’s going to be very costly in many ways. And I think you have to say that you’re going to reexamine it, and you can reexamine it, but reexamine it with people that want to find answers, not people that don’t want to find answers. For instance, I’m hearing Ryan that he’s probably, I’m sure a great lawyer and everything, but he’s making statements about those ballots that he doesn’t know. But he’s making them with such — he did make them with surety. But now I think he’s less sure because the answer is, they all went to Biden, and that alone wins us the election by a lot. You know, so.
Raffensperger: Mr. President, you have people that submit information, and we have our people that submit information. And then it comes before the court, and the court then has to make a determination. We have to stand by our numbers. We believe our numbers are right.
Trump: Why do you say that, though? I don’t know. I mean, sure, we can play this game with the courts, but why do you say that? First of all, they don’t even assign us a judge. They don’t even assign us a judge. But why wouldn’t you . . . Hey Brad, why wouldn’t you want to check out [name] ? And why wouldn’t you want to say, hey, if in fact, President Trump is right about that, then he wins the state of Georgia, just that one incident alone without going through hundreds of thousands of dropped ballots. You just say, you stick by, I mean I’ve been watching you, you know, you don’t care about anything. ‘Your numbers are right.’ But your numbers aren’t right. They’re really wrong, and they’re really wrong, Brad. And I know this phone call is going nowhere other than, other than ultimately, you know — Look, ultimately, I win, okay? Because you guys are so wrong. And you treated this. You treated the population of Georgia so badly. You, between you and your governor, who is down at 21, he was down 21 points. And like a schmuck, I endorsed him, and he got elected, but I will tell you, he is a disaster.
The people are so angry in Georgia, I can’t imagine he’s ever getting elected again, I’ll tell you that much right now. But why wouldn’t you want to find the right answer, Brad, instead of keep saying that the numbers are right? ‘Cause those numbers are so wrong?
Mitchell: Mr. Secretary, Mr. President, one of the things that we have been, Alex can talk about this, we talked about it, and I don’t know whether the information has been conveyed to your office, but I think what the president is saying, and what we’ve been trying to do is to say, look, the court is not acting on our petition. They haven’t even assigned a judge. But the people of Georgia and the people of America have a right to know the answers. And you have data and records that we don’t have access to.
And you can keep telling us and making public statement that you investigated this and nothing to see here. But we don’t know about that. All we know is what you tell us. What I don’t understand is why wouldn’t it be in everyone’s best interest to try to get to the bottom, compare the numbers, you know, if you say, because . . . to try to be able to get to the truth because we don’t have any way of confirming what you’re telling us. You tell us that you had an investigation at the State Farm Arena. I don’t have any report. I’ve never seen a report of investigation. I don’t know that is. I’ve been pretty involved in this, and I don’t know. And that’s just one of 25 categories. And it doesn’t even. And as I, as the president said, we haven’t even gotten into the Dominion issue. That’s not part of our case. It’s not part of, we just didn’t feel as though we had any to be able to develop —
Trump: No, we do have a way, but I don’t want to get into it. We found a way . . . excuse me, but we don’t need it because we’re only down 11,000 votes, so we don’t even need it. I personally think they’re corrupt as hell. But we don’t need that. All we have to do, Cleta, is find 11,000-plus votes. So we don’t need that. I’m not looking to shake up the whole world. We won Georgia easily. We won it by hundreds of thousands of votes. But if you go by basic, simple numbers, we won it easily, easily. So we’re not giving Dominion a pass on the record. We don’t need Dominion because we have so many other votes that we don’t need to prove it any more than we already have.
Trump attorney Kurt Hilbert: Mr. President and Cleta, this is Kurt Hilbert, if I might interject for a moment. Ryan, I would like to suggest that just four categories that have already been mentioned by the president that have actually hard numbers of 24,149 votes that were counted illegally. That in and of itself is sufficient to change the results or place the outcome in doubt. We would like to sit down with your office, and we can do it through purposes of compromise and just like this phone call, just to deal with that limited category of votes. And if you are able to establish that our numbers are not accurate, then fine. However, we believe that they are accurate. We’ve had now three to four separate experts looking at these numbers.
Trump: Certified accountants looked at them.
Hilbert: Correct. And this is just based on USPS data and your own secretary of state data. So that’s what we would entreat and ask you to do, to sit down with us in a compromise and settlements proceeding and actually go through the registered voter IDs and the registrations. And if you can convince us that 24,149 is inaccurate, then fine. But we tend to believe that is, you know, obviously more than 11,779. That’s sufficient to change the results entirely in and of itself. So what would you say to that, Mr. Germany?
Germany: I’m happy to get with our lawyers, and we’ll set that up. That number is not accurate. And I think we can show you, for all the ones we’ve looked at, why it’s not. And so if that would be helpful, I’m happy to get with our lawyers and set that up with you guys.
Trump: Well, let me ask you, Kurt, you think that is an accurate number. That was based on the information given to you by the secretary of state’s department, right?
Hilbert: That is correct. That information is the minimum, most conservative data based upon the USPS data and the secretary of state’s office data that has been made publicly available. We do not have the internal numbers from the secretary of state. Yet we have asked for it six times. I sent a letter over to . . . several times requesting this information, and it’s been rebuffed every single time. So it stands to reason that if the information is not forthcoming, there’s something to hide. That’s the problem that we have.
Germany: Well, that’s not the case, sir. There are things that you guys are entitled to get. And there’s things that under law, we are not allowed to give out.
Trump: Well, you have to. Well, under law, you’re not allowed to give faulty election results, okay? You’re not allowed to do that. And that’s what you done. This is a faulty election result. And honestly, this should go very fast. You should meet tomorrow because you have a big election coming up, and because of what you’ve done to the president — you know, the people of Georgia know that this was a scam — and because of what you’ve done to the president, a lot of people aren’t going out to vote. And a lot of Republicans are going to vote negative because they hate what you did to the president. Okay? They hate it. And they’re going to vote. And you would be respected. Really respected, if this thing could be straightened out before the election. You have a big election coming up on Tuesday. And I think that it is really is important that you meet tomorrow and work out on these numbers. Because I know, Brad, that if you think we’re right, I think you’re going to say, and I’m not looking to blame anybody, I’m just saying, you know, and, you know, under new counts, and under new views, of the election results, we won the election. You know? It’s very simple. We won the election. As the governors of major states and the surrounding states said, there is no way you lost Georgia. As the Georgia politicians say, there is no way you lost Georgia. Nobody. Everyone knows I won it by hundreds of thousands of votes. But I’ll tell you it’s going to have a big impact on Tuesday if you guys don’t get this thing straightened out fast.
Meadows: Mr. President, this is Mark. It sounds like we’ve got two different sides agreeing that we can look at those areas, and I assume that we can do that within the next 24 to 48 hours, to go ahead and get that reconciled so that we can look at the two claims and making sure that we get the access to the secretary of state’s data to either validate or invalidate the claims that have been made. Is that correct?
Germany: No, that’s not what I said. I’m happy to have our lawyers sit down with Kurt and the lawyers on that side and explain to him, hey, here’s, based on what we’ve looked at so far, here’s how we know this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong.
Meadows: So what you’re saying, Ryan, let me let me make sure . . . so what you’re saying is you really don’t want to give access to the data. You just want to make another case on why the lawsuit is wrong?
Germany: I don’t think we can give access to data that’s protected by law. But we can sit down with them and say —
Trump: But you’re allowed to have a phony election? You’re allowed to have a phony election, right?
Germany: No, sir.
Trump: When are you going to do signature counts, when are you going to do signature verification on Fulton County, which you said you were going to do, and now all of a sudden, you’re not doing it. When are you doing that?
Germany: We are going to do that. We’ve announced —
Hilbert: To get to this issue of the personal information and privacy issue, is it possible that the secretary of state could deputize the lawyers for the president so that we could access that information and private information without you having any kind of violation?
Trump: Well, I don’t want to know who it is. You guys can do it very confidentially. You can sign a confidentiality agreement. That’s okay. I don’t need to know names. But on this stuff that we’re talking about, we got all that information from the secretary of state.
Meadows: Yeah. So let me let me recommend, Ryan, if you and Kurt will get together, you know, when we get off of this phone call, if you could get together and work out a plan to address some of what we’ve got with your attorneys where we can we can actually look at the data. For example, Mr. Secretary, I can you say they were only two dead people who would vote. I can promise you there are more than that. And that may be what your investigation shows, but I can promise you there are more than that. But at the same time, I think it’s important that we go ahead and move expeditiously to try to do this and resolve it as quickly as we possibly can. And if that’s the good next step. Hopefully we can, we can finish this phone call and go ahead and agree that the two of you will get together immediately.
Trump: Well, why don’t my lawyers show you where you got the information. It will show the secretary of state, and you don’t even have to look at any names. We don’t want names. We don’t care. But we got that information from you. And Stacey Abrams is laughing about you. She’s going around saying these guys are dumber than a rock. What she’s done to this party is unbelievable, I tell you. And I only ran against her once. And that was with a guy named Brian Kemp, and I beat her. And if I didn’t run, Brian wouldn’t have had even a shot, either in the general or in the primary. He was dead, dead as a doornail. He never thought he had a shot at either one of them. What a schmuck I was. But that’s the way it is. That’s the way it is. I would like you . . . for the attorneys . . . I’d like you to perhaps meet with Ryan, ideally tomorrow, because I think we should come to a resolution of this before the election. Otherwise you’re going to have people just not voting. They don’t want to vote. They hate the state, they hate the governor, and they hate the secretary of state. I will tell you that right now. The only people that like you are people that will never vote for you. You know that, Brad, right? They like you, you know, they like you. They can’t believe what they found. They want more people like you. So, look, can you get together tomorrow? And, Brad, we just want the truth. It’s simple.
And everyone’s going to look very good if the truth comes out. It’s okay. It takes a little while, but let the truth come out. And the real truth is, I won by 400,000 votes. At least. That’s the real truth. But we don’t need 400,000 votes. We need less than 2,000 votes. And are you guys able to meet tomorrow, Ryan?
Germany: I’ll get with Chris, the lawyer who’s representing us in the case, and see when he can get together with Kurt.
Raffensperger: Ryan will be in touch with the other attorney on this call, Mr. Meadows. Thank you, President Trump, for your time.
Trump: Okay, thank you, Brad. Thank you, Ryan. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you very much. Bye.
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