Fulton County, Georgia had more election integrity problems during last year’s U.S. presidential elections than were previously known, according to a new investigative report that Just the News published late Thursday night.
Reporters John Solomon and Daniel Payne cited a 29-page memo they obtained that documented double counting of votes, insecure storage, threats, and massive chain of custody irregularities.
The memo, Solomon and Payne wrote, “provides a stunning roadmap for an independent investigation of the vote count in Fulton County, such as the one a state judge recently approved to be led by attorney Bob Cheeley.”
According to Just the News, Carter Jones warned about these problems in a memo that his firm Seven Hill Strategies delivered to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger shortly after last year’s election. Solomon and Payne went on to report that Jones witnessed these events in Atlanta-area election centers. Jones’ memo, the two reporters said, reads “like a minute-by-minute diary, [and] cited a litany of high-risk problems such as the double-counting of votes, insecure storage of ballots, possible violations of voter privacy, the mysterious removal of election materials at a vote collection warehouse, and the suspicious movement of ‘too many’ ballots on Election Day.”
“The public emergence of the Jones report Thursday doesn’t confirm enough suspect votes to overturn Georgia’s election results, or prove a plot to commit widespread ballot fraud,” Solomon and Payne wrote.
“But its portrait of incompetence, mismanagement and bad election processes in Georgia’s largest voting center undercuts claims by state officials that the election went swimmingly.”
Jones witnessed absentee ballots coming into Atlanta’s State Farm Arena “in rolling bins 2k at a time,” Just the News reported.
“It is my understanding is that the ballots are supposed to be moved in numbered, sealed boxes to protect them,” Jones reportedly wrote, noting these ballots weren’t.
Jones, according to Just the News, feared the flow of absentee ballots seemed too voluminous.
The full memo is available here.
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Poll Worker” by Phil Roeder. CC BY 2.0.
