Fulton seeks to block federal subpoena targeting 2020 election workers

Fulton County officials are racing to block a federal subpoena seeking personal information about thousands of election staffers, poll workers and volunteers who helped administer the November 2020 election.

In a 27-page motion filed Monday, the Fulton County Board of Elections casts the subpoena as an unprecedented and politically motivated maneuver and accuses the Justice Department of weaponizing a federal grand jury to revive debunked claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

The Justice Department subpoena, dated April 17 but disclosed in court Monday, commands the board’s custodian of records to appear in U.S. District Court in Atlanta on Tuesday with rosters of election staff members.

It seeks the names, duties, home addresses, email addresses and personal phone numbers of people involved in the 2020 election in Georgia’s most populous county, long a focus of President Donald Trump’s false claims of widespread election fraud.

Fulton County Commission Chair Robb Pitts said in an interview that it’s an ongoing effort to “intimidate workers in our county, to discourage people from voting.”

He added that the county is prepared to fight the effort “with every possible resource.”

Dan Bishop, U.S. attorney for North Carolina’s Middle District, wrote in a letter attached to the subpoena that the information was needed for an ongoing federal investigation that could later be used in trial.

Fulton’s attorneys argue the demand could sweep up nearly 3,000 county employees, temporary poll workers and volunteers. They contend that it is burdensome and untethered to any legitimate criminal investigation.

The subpoena comes after federal agents descended on Fulton County’s election operations center in a Jan. 28 raid, seizing hundreds of boxes of ballots and other documents. The 600,000-square-foot elections hub in south Fulton is used for voting and county election board meetings.

The county has been at the epicenter of false claims of wrongdoing since Trump’s narrow loss to Democrat Joe Biden, ranging from allegations of uncreased absentee ballots to claims that election workers scanned fraudulent votes at State Farm Arena.

Trump and his allies have frequently pulled on threads of truth and presented them as evidence of malfeasance without always seeking the full picture. Multiple recounts, investigations and court cases have dismissed the claims as baseless, but Trump and his loyalists continued to push unproven claims.

FBI Director Kash Patel has said the FBI has evidence to show the 2020 election was rigged.