WASHINGTON — Georgia prosecutors investigating former President Donald Trump for his efforts to overturn his loss in the Peach State have new evidence connecting Trump’s allies with a 2021 voting system breach, according to multiple reports.
The prosecutors have text messages and emails that directly tie Trump’s allies to the voting system breach, suggesting the breach was a direct top-down push from Trump’s campaign in his attempts to overturn the 2020 election, CNN reported. The evidence contradicts the possibility the breach was conducted by local supporters of the former president, unaffiliated with top officials.
“Just landed back in DC with the Mayor huge things starting to come together!” read one text message on Jan. 1, 2021, obtained by CNN, appearing to reference former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s former personal attorney. “Most immediately, we were just granted access – by written invitation! – to Coffee County’s systems. Yay!”
The written invitation originated from Misty Hampton, a former Coffee County elections official. Hampton falsely claimed that the county’s voting machines could swap ballots in favor of another candidate, according to the Guardian.
That invitation was then circulated by Katherine Friess, an attorney who worked with Trump’s circle, which included Giuliani. The invitation also was sent to members of Sullivan Strickler, a firm Trump’s team employed to attempt to find evidence of voter fraud in Georgia, according to the reports.
Death threats, extremists … and worry:Why Trump’s looming Georgia indictment is different
As Trump and his team scrambled to back up their claims of election fraud, Coffee County was singled out in draft executive orders presented to Trump in mid-December aimed at seizing voting machines, according to CNN.
Another local election official, Cathy Latham, also appeared to help unauthorized Trump allies access the voting systems, according to the Guardian.
Latham, one of Georgia’s “fake electors” in another Trump attempt to overturn the election, was seen in surveillance video to have data experts from Sullivan Strickler in the Coffee County election office. Those experts made copies of the election systems, according to the Guardian.
Giuliani’s attorney, Robert Costello, dismissed the notion he could have been involved in the scheme, telling CNN “Rudy Giuliani had nothing to do with this.”
USA TODAY has reached out to lawyers representing Trump. The Fulton County District Attorney’s office in Georgia declined to comment.
Trump, who already faces three indictments, including a federal indictment over alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election, could face a fourth indictment in the coming days. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is set to begin presenting her case before a Georgia grand jury investigating the former president this week.
The Georgia case would zero in on Trump’s specific efforts to overturn his loss in the state in 2020. A key center point in the investigation is likely a phone call Trump made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in which he appeared to threaten him with a criminal charge and asking him to “find 11,780” votes.
