State Election Board Clears Fulton County “Ballot Suitcase” Investigation; Report Finds No Evidence of Conspiracy, No Fraud

On Tuesday, the State Election Board dismissed case SEB2020-059, a long-running investigation into alleged malfeasance during the 2020 election at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Over the course of the investigation, it was confirmed that numerous allegations made against the Fulton County Department of Registration and Elections, and specifically, two election workers, were false and unsubstantiated.

“We remain diligent and dedicated to looking into real claims of voter fraud,” said Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. “We are glad the state election board finally put this issue to rest. False claims and knowingly false allegations made against these election workers have done tremendous harm. Election workers deserve our praise for being on the front lines.”

The investigation, which included Secretary of State Investigators, and Special Agents with both GBI and FBI revealed “there was no evidence of any type of fraud as alleged.” Through the course of the investigation, “three law enforcement agencies reviewed the entire unedited video footage of the events in question surrounding [the two election workers] at State Farm Arena,” and additionally, reviewed social media posts allegedly made by a Fulton County election worker stating they engaged in election fraud, which was found to created by a third party who “admitted he created a fake account and confirmed the content that was posted on the account was fake.” Ultimately, “all allegations made against [the two election workers] were unsubstantiated and found to have no merit.”

State Election Board Member Ed Lindsey requested a letter sent to the two election workers, “because of what [these election workers] have gone through with certain false claims, I’d like to ask that [the state election board] writes a letter affirmatively telling them that the matter has been dismissed.”

Last year, One America News Network agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by the two workers accused of malfeasance, paying a settlement and issuing an on-air retraction of the allegations they amplified. A defamation claim against Rudy Giuliani, who initially aired these claims before the Georgia Senate, is still pending in court.

The full investigative report can be found here.

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Georgia is recognized as a national leader in elections. It was the first state in the country to implement the trifecta of automatic voter registration, at least 17 days of early voting (which has been called the “gold standard”), and no-excuse absentee voting. Georgia continues to set records for voter turnout and election participation, seeing the largest increase in average turnout of any other state in the 2018 midterm election and record turnout in 2020, and 2022. 2022 achieved the largest single day of in-person early voting turnout in Georgia midterm history utilizing Georgia’s secure, paper ballot voting system. Most recently, Georgia ranked #1 for Election Integrity by the Heritage Foundation, a top ranking for Voter Accessibility by the Center for Election Innovation & Research, and tied for number one in Election Administration by the Bipartisan Policy Center.