GOP Senate Field Backs Election Conspiracy Theory as Fulton County Sham Audit Looms

As a faction of Georgia Republicans argues for an “audit” of roughly 147,000 Fulton County absentee ballots, every Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Georgia (both potential and declared) is backing an embarrassing Arizona-modeled effort to “use high-powered microscopes on absentee ballots” and feed into dangerous, debunked conspiracy theories popularized by the former president.

“Georgia’s GOP Senate candidates are standing shoulder to shoulder with election conspiracy theorists trying to invalidate the will of Georgia’s voters months after the election,” said Dan Gottlieb, spokesman for the Democratic Party of Georgia. “As Georgia’s Republican Senate candidates bend over backward to indulge Donald Trump’s lies, it’s clear that not one of them is focused on the issues that actually matter to working Georgians, and not one has the backbone to call this ‘audit’ what it truly is — an embarrassing sham that endangers our democracy.”

This is the latest in a string of national GOP efforts to find non-existent fraud in the 2020 presidential election, indulge Donald Trump’s dangerous fantasies, and undermine the will of Georgia’s voters last November. Read some highlights on the pending Fulton County “audit” below:

Judge to hear motions to toss Georgia ballot review case

Kate Brumback, AP News

The ballot review effort in Georgia is one of several around the country pushed by supporters of former President Donald Trump and others who allege fraud during the 2020 election. State and federal authorities have repeatedly said there was no evidence of widespread fraud in the election.

There is no chance of this lawsuit changing Georgia’s election results, which were certified months ago. After the initial tally and before certification, the state did a full hand recount of the presidential race to satisfy a new audit requirement in state law. Another recount, in which the ballots were run through scanners to be tallied again, was done at the request of Trump’s campaign after he lost the state by a narrow margin to Democrat Joe Biden.

Trump was furious about his loss by about 12,000 votes in Georgia, long a reliably red state. He and his allies harshly criticized top Republican elected officials in the state for not acting to overturn his loss. They also focused their attention on overwhelmingly Democratic Fulton County, which includes most of Atlanta, making repeated claims of widespread election fraud.

Garland Favorito, a longtime critic of Georgia’s election systems who has promoted conspiracy theories about the 9/11 terror attacks and about former President Bill Clinton, is spearheading the Georgia lawsuit. 

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