Former U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler on Wednesday wrote a letter to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr and asked that Carr investigate Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and whether Raffensperger abused his office during recent elections.
Loeffler, in her letter, also said Raffensperger violated the state constitution to further his own political self-interests.
Loeffler chairs the group Greater Georgia. According to Greater Georgia’s website, group members support, among other things, individual liberties, lower taxes, and educational choice.
Loeffler published a press release on Greater Georgia’s website Wednesday alleging that Raffensperger changed the state’s elections in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. She said Raffensperger’s office mass mailed unsolicited absentee ballot requests, entered into a consent decree without the state legislature’s knowledge, and accepted millions of dollars in outside money. The former senator also alleged that Raffensperger didn’t resolve hundreds of open investigations stemming from recent primary and general elections.
“Secretary Raffensperger politicized and minimized voters’ legitimate concerns about changes to Georgia’s elections, which were related to the pandemic and legal settlements, failed to complete investigations and provide timely information, and engaged in political matters during an election,” Loffler wrote.
“This request is not about the outcome of an election, but about the loss of confidence in our elections and the importance of holding elected officials accountable for upholding the law and carrying out their constitutional duties. If voters don’t trust the electoral process and their elected officials, we risk sustained damage to voter participation in our state. We saw the impact of reduced faith in elections in the Senate runoffs, when over 339,000 Republican voters who voted in November did not vote in January. Voting rights are not a partisan issue, and the loss of electoral confidence disenfranchises voters of any political affiliation.”
Citing the Georgia Constitution, Carr spokeswoman Katie Byrd told The Georgia Star News in an email Wednesday that, the Department of Law is the lawyer for the state’s executive branch of government — which includes the secretary of state’s office.
“As such, we cannot investigate our own client on these particular matters,” Byrd said.
“We’ve forwarded the letter to our client for their review and appropriate response.”
In a statement, Raffensperger said the following:
“Kelly Loeffler’s failure to convince anyone she actually was a Trump supporter is the reason Georgia doesn’t have a Republican Senator or the United States a Republican Senate. The letter and the allegations in it are laughable.”
Loeffler, in her letter, said Georgians deserve answers.
“Failure to acknowledge these issues and irregularities will lead to a continued loss of trust in our elections. For that trust to be restored, there must be accountability from Secretary Raffensperger in his role managing our elections, and whether he has served his own self-interest by attempting to protect his own political career,” Loeffler wrote to Carr.
“Accordingly, we respectfully request an investigation into whether Secretary Raffensperger’s actions were lawful and consistent with his fiduciary and statutory obligations to Georgia’s citizenry as a statewide elected official under the Georgia Constitution and law.”
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Background Photo “Georgia Capitol” by Autiger. CC BY-SA 2.0.
