Officials in Fulton County, Georgia, are accusing President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice of misleading a judge in order to secure a search warrant targeting 2020 election ballots — and they’re not mincing words.
According to reporting by CNN, county officials say the FBI’s warrant application contained “serious” omissions and failed to establish probable cause that any crime had been committed. Instead, they argue, the filing “does nothing more than describe the types of human errors that its own sources confirm occur in almost every election — without any intentional wrongdoing whatsoever.”
In other words: routine election hiccups, not criminal fraud.
Fulton County sharply criticized the FBI for failing to inform the magistrate judge that the alleged election “defects” cited in the warrant request had already been investigated. Local officials also faulted the bureau for omitting information that could undermine the credibility of witnesses relied upon in the federal probe.
Among those cited in the filing is Kurt Olsen, a 2020 election denier who was tasked by the White House with making the referral that launched the criminal investigation. County officials noted that Olsen has previously been sanctioned by multiple courts. They also argued that other witnesses referenced in the affidavit lacked expertise in election administration or based their claims on speculation rather than evidence.
The backdrop to all of this is Trump’s long-running claim that the 2020 election was rigged against him — a claim that has been repeatedly rejected by courts and independent investigations. Despite the absence of evidence supporting widespread fraud, the allegations have continued to fuel legal and political battles in Georgia and beyond.
An FBI agent signed an affidavit tying the search request to those election claims. In response, Fulton County submitted a declaration from election technology and security expert Ryan Macias, who blasted the federal filing as being filled with “gross mischaracterizations of the facts of how elections work and are directly at odds with the findings and conclusions of all of the prior investigations of the November 2020 election in Fulton County.”
The dispute now raises serious questions about whether federal investigators presented a complete and accurate picture to the judge who approved the warrant — and whether long-debunked election claims are once again driving official action.
