GOP election officials say to Jan. 6 panel they fought Trump pressure to overturn 2020 election

Mr sterling thank you also for being here today Following the 2020 election. In addition to your normal duties I understand that you became *** spokesperson to try to combat disinformation about the election and the danger it was creating for elections officials among others. In *** December one press conference you addressed some of your marks directly to president Trump. Let's take *** look at what you said that day. Mr President. It looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia. We're investigating there's always *** possibility I get and you have the right to go through the course. What you don't have the ability to do and you need to step up and say this is stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone's gonna get hurt, someone's gonna get shot, someone's gonna get killed. And it's not right I it's not right. Mr sterling. What prompted you to make these remarks? Mr Schiff? We had had *** previously scheduled press conference that day as we were in the habit of doing trying to be as transparent as we could about the election and the count's going on um *** little after lunch that day lunch time. I received *** call from the project manager from Dominion voting systems who was oddly audibly shaken. She's not the kind of person I would assume would be that way she has *** masters from M. I. T. *** graduate of the Naval Academy and is very much on the ball and pretty unflappable. And she informed me about *** *** young contractor. They had who had been receiving threats um from *** video posted by some Q and on supporters. And at that point we had been sort of been steeping in this kind of stuff. So we were, it was around us all the time. So I didn't take note of it more than adding to the pile of other stuff we were having to deal with. And I did pull up twitter and I scrolled through it and I saw the young man's name. It was *** particular tweet that for lack of better word was the straw that broke the camel's back. Um had *** young man's name. It's *** very unique name I believe is *** first generation american and it had his name. You committed treason, may God have mercy on your soul with *** slowly twisting gift of *** noose and for lack of *** better word, I lost it. I just got irate. Um my boss was with me at the time, the deputy secretary Jordan fuchsia. And she could tell that I was angry. I'm turning, I tend to turn red from here up when that happens. And that happened at that time. And she called Secretary raffensperger to say we're seeing these kind of threats and Gabe thinks we need to say something about it. And secretary said yes and that's what prompted me to do what I did. I lost my temper, but it seemed necessary at the time because it was just getting worse. And I don't, I could not tell you why that particular one was the one that put me over the edge. But it did after you made this plea to the President did Donald trump urged his supporters to avoid the use of violence. Not to my knowledge. Now as we know, the President was aware of your speech because he tweeted about it later that day, let's take *** look at what the President said in the tweet. Donald trump claims that there was quote massive voter fraud in Georgia mr sterling. That was just plain false, wasn't it? Yes sir. Nevertheless, the very next day on December two President Trump released *** lengthy video again making false claims of election fraud in Georgia. Let's take *** look at what he said this time. They found thousands and thousands of votes that were out of whack all against me. In fact, the day after Donald trump released that video. So now we're talking just two days after the emotional warning that you gave that someone's going to get killed. Representatives of President trump appeared in Georgia including Rudy Giuliani and launched *** new conspiracy theory that would take on *** life of its own and threatened the lives of several innocent election workers. This story falsely alleges that sometime during election night election workers at the state farm arena in Atlanta Georgia kicked out poll observers after the observers left the story goes these workers pulled so called suitcases of ballots from under *** table and ran those ballots through the counting machines multiple times Electricly without evidence. President Trump and his allies claimed that these suitcases contained as many as 18,000 ballots. All for Joe Biden. None of this was true. But Rudy Giuliani appeared before the Georgia state Senate and played *** surveillance video from State Farm Arena falsely claiming that it showed this conspiracy taking place. Here's *** sample of what Mr Giuliani had to say during that hearing and when you look at what you saw on the video, which to me was *** smoking gun, powerful smoking gun. Well, I don't I don't have to be *** genius to figure out what happened. I don't have to be *** genius to figure out that those votes are not legitimate votes. You don't put legitimate votes under *** table. No wait until you throw the opposition out and in the middle of the night count them. We would have to be fools to think that President trump's campaign amplified Giuliani's false testimony in *** tweet pushing out the video footage. Giuliani likewise pushed out his testimony on social media as you can see in this tweet Mr Giuliani wrote that it was quote now beyond doubt unquote that Fulton County democrats had stolen the election later in this hearing. We'll hear directly from one of the election workers in this video about the effect these lies had on her and on her family. Mr sterling did the investigators in your office review the entire surveillance tape from the State Farm Arena on Election night. They actually Reviewed approximately 48 hours going over the time period where action was taking place at the Counting Center at State Farm Arena. And what did the tape actually show? Depending on which time you want to start? Because as was mentioned, this conspiracy theory took on *** life of its own um where they conflated *** water main break, that wasn't *** water main break and throwing observers out and *** series of other things. What it actually showed was Fulton County election workers engaging in normal ballot processing. one of the specific things. One thing that's very frustrating was the so called suitcases of ballots from under the table. If you watch the entirety of the video, You saw that these were election workers who were under the impression they were going to get to go home around 10, people are putting on their coats, they're putting ballots that are prepared to be scanned into ballot carriers that are then sealed with tamper proof seals. So they, you know, they're not messed with. Um And the it's an interesting thing because you watch all, there's four screens of the video and as you're watching it, you can see the election monitors in the corner with the press as they're taking these Balladares and putting them under the under the table. You see it there one of the other hidden ones. If you look at the actual tape was on the outside of the table just from the camera angle, you couldn't see it originally and this goes under the no good deed goes unpunished. We were told that we were at Jima as the secretary pointed out and we were under the we were told that it looked like they were shutting down with Fulton County counting secretary expressing displeasure at that because we wanted to, everybody keep counting so we can get to the results and know what was happening. So our Elections director called their Elections Director who was at another location because this was Election Day, there was two different places where ballot things were being done by the Fulton County office. Um so he called the elections dr Fulton then called ralph jones who was at the State Farm Arena and said, what the heck are you doing? Go ahead and stay as you watch the video itself. You see him take the phone call as people are putting things away and getting ready to leave. You can tell for about 15, 20 seconds, he does not want to tell these people they have to stay, he walks over, he thinks about it for *** second, You see him come back to the corner of the desk and kind of slumps his shoulders says, okay, y'all we gotta keep on counting and then you see him take their coats off, get the ballots out and then *** secondary thing that you'll see on there is, you'll have people who are counting ballots, who *** batch will go through, they will take them off and run that through again. What happens? There is *** standard operating procedure, if there is *** miss scan, if there's *** misalignment, if it doesn't read right, these are high speed, high capacity scanners. So three or four will go through after *** miss. Can you have to delete that batch and put it back through again? And by going through the hand tally, As secretary pointed out, we showed that it had there been multiple ballots scanned without *** corresponding physical ballot. Your counts would have been *** lot higher than the ballots themselves. And by doing the hand tally, we saw two specific numbers that were met the hand tally got us to *** 20.1053% off of the total votes cast and 0.99% on the margin, which is essentially dead on accurate. Um, Most academic studies say on *** hand tally, you'll have between one and 2% but because we use ballot marking devices where it's very clear what the voter intended made *** lot easier to use force to conduct that hand count and show that none of that was true. Now I understand that um, when you review these tapes and did the analysis, it just proved this conspiracy theory. Um, but you still have to take *** lot of steps to try to make sure the public knew the truth about these allegations. Uh and you did frequent briefings for the press. Let's take *** look at one of those press briefings Mr Sterling that you held on December seven to make the point that you just did today move on to what I'm gonna call disinformation monday out of the gate. Um many of you all saw the videotape from State Farm Arena. I spent hours with our post certified investigators Justin gray from WSB, spent hours with us going over this video to explain to people that what you saw the secret suitcases, magic ballots or actually ballots that had been packed into those absentee ballot carriers by the workers in plain view of the monitors and the press. And what's really frustrating is the President's attorneys had this same videotape, they saw the exact same things the rest of us could see and they chose to mislead state senators and the public about what was on that video. I'm quite sure that they will not characterize the video if they try to enter into evidence because that is the kind of thing that could lead to sanctions because it's obviously untrue. They knew it was untrue and they continue to do things like this. Mr sterling despite the efforts by your office to combat this misinformation misinformation by speaking out publicly and through local media, you are unable to match the reach of President trump's platform and social media megaphone spreading these false conspiracy theories. What was it like to compete with the President who had the biggest bully pulpit in the world to push out these false claims for lack of *** better word. It was frustrating, but often times I felt our information was getting out that there was *** reticence, people who needed to believe it to believe it because the President, United States, who many looked up to and respected, was telling them it wasn't true despite the facts. And I have characterized at one point it was kind of like *** shovel trying to empty the ocean. And yes, it was frustrating. I even have, you know, family members who I had to argue with about some of these things and I would show them things. And the problem you have is you're getting to people's hearts. I remember there's one specific an attorney that we know that we show to walk him through. This wasn't true. Okay, I get that this wasn't true. Okay, I get that this wasn't five or six things, but at the end he goes, I just know in my heart that cheated. And so once you get past the heart, the facts don't matter as much. And our job, from our point of view is to get the facts out, do our job, tell the truth, follow the constitution, follow the law and defend the institutions and the institutions held

The House 1/6 committee heard chilling, tearful testimony Tuesday that Donald Trump's relentless pressure to overturn the 2020 presidential election provoked widespread threats to the “backbone of our democracy"— election workers and local officials who fended off the defeated president’s demands despite personal risks.The panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the U.S. Capitol focused on Trump’s efforts to undo Joe Biden’s victory in a most local way — by leaning on officials in key battleground states to reject ballots outright or to submit alternative electors for the final tally in Congress.The pressure, described as potentially illegal, was fueled by the president’s false claims of voter fraud which, the panel says, led directly to the deadly insurrection at the Capitol.“A handful of election officials in several key states stood between Donald Trump and the upending of American democracy,” Chairman Bennie Thompson said, praising them as heroes and the “backbone of our democracy.”The hearing was punctuated throughout with accounts of the personal attacks faced by state and local officials.Arizona Republican House Speaker Rusty Bowers said he was subjected to a public smear campaign, including relentless bull-horn protests at his home and a pistol-wielding man taunting his family and neighbors.Officials in Michigan, Pennsylvania and other states told similar stories of having their cellphone numbers and home addresses spread publicly after they refused Trump’s demands.At one gripping moment, two Georgia election workers, a mother and daughter, testified that they lived in fear of saying their names aloud after Trump wrongly accused them of voter fraud.“There were a lot of threats wishing death upon me,” said Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, a former state election worker.The public hearing, the fourth by the panel this month, stemmed from its yearlong investigation into Trump’s unprecedented attempt to remain in power, a sprawling scheme that the chairman of the Jan. 6 committee has likened to an “attempted coup.” The panel insisted that Trump's lies over the election threaten democracy to this day, as local officials face ongoing threats and challengers try to take over their jobs.The committee's vice chair, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, implored Americans to pay attention to the evidence being presented, declaring, “Donald Trump didn’t care about the threats of violence. He did not condemn them, he made no effort to stop them.”“We cannot let America become a nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence,” she said.Other key witnesses included Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who testified about Trump’s phone call asking him to “find 11,780” votes that could flip his state to prevent Biden’s election victory, and his deputy Gabe Sterling, who became a notable figure during Georgia's long recount in 2020 when he urged Trump to tone down the rhetoric.While the committee cannot charge Trump with any crimes, the Justice Department is watching the panel’s work closely.Trump defended himself on social media, describing his phone call to Raffensperger as “perfect,” similar to the way he described his 2020 call with Ukraine President Volodomyr Zelenskyy that resulted in his first impeachment.The public testimony from Raffensperger came weeks after he appeared before a special grand jury in Georgia investigating whether Trump and others illegally tried to intervene in the state’s 2020 election, and after Raffensperger beat a Trump-backed challenger in last month’s primary election.He and Sterling, his chief operations officer, detailed their painstaking efforts to count the Georgia vote, investigating one false claim after another of fraud. After a hand recount of 5 million ballots, Biden's victory was unchanged.“The numbers don't lie,” said Raffensperger, who said that some 28,000 Georgia voters simply bypassed the presidential race but voted down ballot for others. “At the end of the day, President Trump came up short.”Bowers, the Arizona House speaker, walked through what started with a Trump phone call on a Sunday after he returned from church. The defeated president laid out his proposal to have the state replace its electors for Biden with others favoring Trump.“I said, ‘Look, you’re asking me to do something that is counter to my oath,’” Bowers testified.Bowers insisted on seeing Trump’s evidence of voter fraud, which he said Trump’s team never produced beyond vague allegations. He recalled Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani at one point told him, “‘We’ve got lots of theories, we just don’t have the evidence.’”Trump wanted Bowers to hold a hearing at the state Capitol, but the Republican leader said there was already a “circus” atmosphere over the election. The panel showed video footage of protesters at the Arizona statehouse including a key figure, the horned hat-wearing Jacob Chansley, who was later arrested at the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.Trump nevertheless pressed the Arizona official, including in a follow-up call, suggesting he expected a better response from a fellow Republican.But Bowers said that because of his faith, including a belief the U.S. Constitution is divinely inspired, what the president was asking him to do was “foreign to my very being.”Bowers called Trump’s effort a “tragic parody.”In in-person testimony, Moss, who had worked for Atlanta's Fulton County elections department since 2012, and her mother, Ruby Freeman, a temporary election worker who spoke earlier to the panel, gripped the audience with their accounts of the fallout from the smear campaign by Trump and Giuliani.“There is nowhere I feel safe. Nowhere," Freeman testified. “Do you know how it feels to have the president of the United States target you? The president of the United States is supposed to represent every American, not to target one. But he targeted me.”The select committee worked to untangle the elaborate “fake electors” scheme that sought to have representatives in as many as seven battlegrounds — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada and New Mexico — sign certificates stating that Trump, not Biden, had won their states.The committee showed a text message sent from an aide to Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., to an aide for Vice President Mike Pence the morning of Jan. 6 saying Johnson wanted to give Pence an “alternate slate of electors for MI and WI.”“Do not give that to him,” Pence aide Chris Hodgson replied. And Johnson didn't, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.Conservative law professor John Eastman, a lawyer for Trump, pushed the fake electors in the weeks after the election. Trump and Eastman convened hundreds of electors on a call on Jan. 2, 2021, encouraging them to send alternative slates from their states where Trump’s team was claiming fraud.The fake electors idea was designed to set up a challenge on Jan. 6, 2021, when Congress met in joint session, with Vice President Pence presiding in what is typically a ceremonial role to accept the states' vote tallies. But the effort collapsed, as Pence refused Trump’s repeated demands that he simply halt the certification of Biden’s win — a power he believed he did not possess in his role.That's the certification the Capitol mob tried to stop.At least 20 people in connection with the fake electors scheme were subpoenaed by the House panel. The committee says it will show that it has gathered enough evidence through its more than 1,000 interviews and tens of thousands of documents to connect the varying efforts to overturn the election directly to Trump.__Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington and Bob Christie in Phoenix contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON —

The panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the U.S. Capitol focused on Trump’s efforts to undo Joe Biden’s victory in a most local way — by leaning on officials in key battleground states to reject ballots outright or to submit alternative electors for the final tally in Congress.

The pressure, described as potentially illegal, was fueled by the president’s false claims of voter fraud which, the panel says, led directly to the deadly insurrection at the Capitol.

“A handful of election officials in several key states stood between Donald Trump and the upending of American democracy,” Chairman Bennie Thompson said, praising them as heroes and the “backbone of our democracy.”

The hearing was punctuated throughout with accounts of the personal attacks faced by state and local officials.

Arizona Republican House Speaker Rusty Bowers said he was subjected to a public smear campaign, including relentless bull-horn protests at his home and a pistol-wielding man taunting his family and neighbors.

Officials in Michigan, Pennsylvania and other states told similar stories of having their cellphone numbers and home addresses spread publicly after they refused Trump’s demands.

At one gripping moment, two Georgia election workers, a mother and daughter, testified that they lived in fear of saying their names aloud after Trump wrongly accused them of voter fraud.

“There were a lot of threats wishing death upon me,” said Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, a former state election worker.

Ross D. Franklin / AP File Photo

Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, R-Mesa, speaks on the floor of the House of Representatives at the Arizona Capitol on April 18, 2019, in Phoenix.

The public hearing, the fourth by the panel this month, stemmed from its yearlong investigation into Trump’s unprecedented attempt to remain in power, a sprawling scheme that the chairman of the Jan. 6 committee has likened to an “attempted coup.” The panel insisted that Trump's lies over the election threaten democracy to this day, as local officials face ongoing threats and challengers try to take over their jobs.

The committee's vice chair, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, implored Americans to pay attention to the evidence being presented, declaring, “Donald Trump didn’t care about the threats of violence. He did not condemn them, he made no effort to stop them.”

“We cannot let America become a nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence,” she said.

Other key witnesses included Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who testified about Trump’s phone call asking him to “find 11,780” votes that could flip his state to prevent Biden’s election victory, and his deputy Gabe Sterling, who became a notable figure during Georgia's long recount in 2020 when he urged Trump to tone down the rhetoric.

While the committee cannot charge Trump with any crimes, the Justice Department is watching the panel’s work closely.

Trump defended himself on social media, describing his phone call to Raffensperger as “perfect,” similar to the way he described his 2020 call with Ukraine President Volodomyr Zelenskyy that resulted in his first impeachment.

The public testimony from Raffensperger came weeks after he appeared before a special grand jury in Georgia investigating whether Trump and others illegally tried to intervene in the state’s 2020 election, and after Raffensperger beat a Trump-backed challenger in last month’s primary election.

He and Sterling, his chief operations officer, detailed their painstaking efforts to count the Georgia vote, investigating one false claim after another of fraud. After a hand recount of 5 million ballots, Biden's victory was unchanged.

“The numbers don't lie,” said Raffensperger, who said that some 28,000 Georgia voters simply bypassed the presidential race but voted down ballot for others. “At the end of the day, President Trump came up short.”

Ben Gray / AP File Photo

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, center, and his wife Tricia arrive for an election night party on May 24, 2022, in Peachtree Corners, Ga.

Bowers, the Arizona House speaker, walked through what started with a Trump phone call on a Sunday after he returned from church. The defeated president laid out his proposal to have the state replace its electors for Biden with others favoring Trump.

“I said, ‘Look, you’re asking me to do something that is counter to my oath,’” Bowers testified.

Bowers insisted on seeing Trump’s evidence of voter fraud, which he said Trump’s team never produced beyond vague allegations. He recalled Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani at one point told him, “‘We’ve got lots of theories, we just don’t have the evidence.’”

Trump wanted Bowers to hold a hearing at the state Capitol, but the Republican leader said there was already a “circus” atmosphere over the election. The panel showed video footage of protesters at the Arizona statehouse including a key figure, the horned hat-wearing Jacob Chansley, who was later arrested at the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Trump nevertheless pressed the Arizona official, including in a follow-up call, suggesting he expected a better response from a fellow Republican.

But Bowers said that because of his faith, including a belief the U.S. Constitution is divinely inspired, what the president was asking him to do was “foreign to my very being.”

Bowers called Trump’s effort a “tragic parody.”

In in-person testimony, Moss, who had worked for Atlanta's Fulton County elections department since 2012, and her mother, Ruby Freeman, a temporary election worker who spoke earlier to the panel, gripped the audience with their accounts of the fallout from the smear campaign by Trump and Giuliani.

“There is nowhere I feel safe. Nowhere," Freeman testified. “Do you know how it feels to have the president of the United States target you? The president of the United States is supposed to represent every American, not to target one. But he targeted me.”

The select committee worked to untangle the elaborate “fake electors” scheme that sought to have representatives in as many as seven battlegrounds — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada and New Mexico — sign certificates stating that Trump, not Biden, had won their states.

The committee showed a text message sent from an aide to Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., to an aide for Vice President Mike Pence the morning of Jan. 6 saying Johnson wanted to give Pence an “alternate slate of electors for MI and WI.”

“Do not give that to him,” Pence aide Chris Hodgson replied. And Johnson didn't, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.

Conservative law professor John Eastman, a lawyer for Trump, in the weeks after the election. Trump and Eastman convened hundreds of electors on a call on Jan. 2, 2021, encouraging them to send alternative slates from their states where Trump’s team was claiming fraud.

The fake electors idea was designed to set up a challenge on Jan. 6, 2021, when Congress met in joint session, with Vice President Pence presiding in what is typically a ceremonial role to accept the states' vote tallies. But the effort collapsed, as Pence refused Trump’s repeated demands that he simply halt the certification of Biden’s win — a power he believed he did not possess in his role.

That's the certification the Capitol mob tried to stop.

At least 20 people in connection with the fake electors scheme were subpoenaed by the House panel. The committee says it will show that it has gathered enough evidence through its more than 1,000 interviews and tens of thousands of documents to connect the varying efforts to overturn the election directly to Trump.

Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington and Bob Christie in Phoenix contributed to this report.

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