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FBI agents on Wednesday seized ballot boxes and other records related to Georgia’s 2020 election from Fulton County’s elections hub outside Atlanta, according to county officials and a warrant cover sheet shared with them. Fulton County, which votes heavily Democratic, has been the focus of repeated claims by President Donald Trump and his allies that voter fraud in the county cost him the state in 2020. Federal authorities have not publicly explained the purpose of the search and seizure, and the warrant itself was under seal.
Fulton County Chairman Robb Pitts said he learned just after noon Wednesday that federal agents were at the county’s elections hub. Pitts said the agents initially targeted the county elections office, but had to leave and return with a new warrant because the documents are formally in the custody of the county court clerk, not the elections office. County attorneys reviewed the paperwork provided by the agents and advised it was in the county’s best interest to comply with the search, Pitts said.
Pitts said county leaders were kept in the dark during the operation. “I was not even allowed where they were,” Pitts said. “I could peek in, but I wasn’t even allowed in the area to see what they were taking.” Fulton County election board Chair Sherri Allen said she spoke to the agents about arranging a way to transfer documents while keeping copies, but that request was denied. Allen said she was not sure what was taken.
Allen and Pitts said a warrant cover sheet provided to the county included a list of items the agents were seeking. The cover sheet named records tied to the 2020 general election in Fulton County, including “all ballots,” tabulator tapes from scanners that tally votes, electronic ballot images created when ballots were counted and then recounted, and all voter rolls.
The search came against the backdrop of Trump’s long-running grievance over the 2020 election results in Georgia, including his assertions without evidence of widespread voter fraud in the state. It also raised questions about whether the federal government was acting on information tied to probable cause of a specific crime, given that the warrant was under seal and federal authorities had not offered an explanation. Even as federal magistrate judges authorize such searches, the record submitted to the court and the basis for probable cause were not immediately clear.
High-profile federal figures appeared onsite but did not publicly speak about the visit. FBI Co-Deputy Director Andrew Bailey and U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard were seen at the Fulton County elections hub, but neither offered a public statement about what they were doing there. Gabbard’s presence prompted additional scrutiny because she is not part of the FBI or federal law enforcement.
In response to questions about Gabbard’s role, a senior administration official said in a statement that she “has a pivotal role in election security and protecting the integrity of our elections against interference, including operations targeting voting systems, databases, and election infrastructure.” U.S. Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said that if Gabbard believes a foreign intelligence service tried to swing the election, she would be obligated to inform the intelligence committee. Warner also suggested at a hearing Thursday that her appearance could be “a domestic political stunt designed to legitimize conspiracy theories that undermine our democracy.”
The attorney identified on the warrant cover sheet for the government was Thomas Albus, the interim U.S. attorney in the eastern district of Missouri, rather than the U.S. attorney based in Atlanta. The Justice Department did not comment on the case or explain why a Missouri-based prosecutor was listed as leading it.
Reactions from elected officials split along party lines. Democratic officials condemned the search as an attack on democracy and a distraction, and some said it could be aimed at sowing distrust ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Rep. Saira Draper said on the floor of the state House that once authorities investigate Fulton County, they would “say they found something suspicious,” adding that it “doesn’t have to be real” if the goal is to create a pretext for future political action.
Republican leaders defended the search. State Rep. Victor Anderson, a Republican who chairs the House Governmental Affairs Committee, said he urged against overreaction. “I have faith in our justice system,” Anderson said, arguing that what lawmakers saw was “the lawful execution of a lawfully obtained federal search warrant that was signed by U.S. magistrate court judge.”
Fulton County also has a history of election administration problems going back years, including issues that surfaced in the 2020 election cycle, with long lines, slow reporting, and disruptions worsened by the coronavirus pandemic. After that election, an independent monitor hired under an agreement between the county and the State Election Board documented “sloppy processes” and “systemic disorganization” but found no evidence of illegality or fraud. Following later performance reviews and monitoring efforts, the State Election Board voted in 2023 not to take over the county’s elections, and a monitoring team last year found the elections “organized and orderly,” county leaders said.
County leaders said the operational picture has changed since 2020. They said the election board has new members, most of the elections department leadership has been replaced, and election operations are now centralized at the hub in Union City rather than spread across multiple locations. A series of developments has left Fulton officials pointing to newer practices as federal agents’ seizure drew renewed attention to the county’s election systems and records.
The Associated Press reported that its writers Eric Tucker and David Klepper in Washington and Jeff Amy and Charlotte Kramon in Atlanta contributed to the story.