Judge allows Trump co-defendant to continue to fight for 500,000 ballots from Fulton County to argue debunked fraud claims
By Nick Valencia and Jason Morris, CNN
(CNN) — A Fulton County judge will allow a co-defendant of Donald Trump in the Georgia election subversion case to continue his effort to access thousands of 2020 ballots to argue debunked voter fraud theories.
Harrison Floyd, who led the organization Black Voices for Trump in 2020, argued during a hearing Tuesday that he should not have been charged in the racketeering case because his concerns about voter fraud and questions about the election results were legitimate.
Trump lost to President Joe Biden in Georgia by more than 12,000 votes.
Floyd’s attorneys are pushing to access more than 500,000 ballots from Fulton County, claiming they intend to produce “evidence” that thousands of votes were improperly excluded from the final vote tally.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee asked Floyd’s attorneys on Tuesday to file additional information to the court in the coming weeks, including the scope of the expert review of the 2020 votes that they’re seeking. McAfee also said he plans to have another hearing within the next two months to discuss the next steps in Floyd’s attempt to access the ballots.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, found no evidence of fraud in the 2020 election after overseeing three separate counts of the ballots, conducting many other reviews of the process, and investigating more than 250 claims of voter fraud.
Floyd is one of 15 remaining defendants, including Trump, facing charges related to efforts by the former president and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia.
A Maryland resident, Floyd has been charged with three counts in Georgia, including racketeering, conspiracy to commit solicitation of false statements and writings, and influencing witnesses.
Chad Alexis, senior assistant attorney for Fulton County, pushed back on 2020 voter-fraud arguments from Floyd’s attorneys. Alexis also said the process of producing the ballots would take “thousands of hours” and that this is a busy presidential election year during which the county needs “all hands-on deck.”
“The county shouldn’t have to bear the burden of manpower,” Alexis argued.
The Fulton County racketeering case against Trump has effectively been at a standstill.
A Georgia appeals court is revisiting the question of whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and her office should be removed from prosecuting the case because of her romantic relationship with her former lead prosecutor Nathan Wade.
And a legal argument before the Supreme Court over whether Trump has immunity from prosecution also remains an issue in the Georgia case. The high court is expected to issue a decision this summer.
The-CNN-Wire
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