A few weeks after Election Day 2020, as Donald Trump peddled the Big Lie about his defeat, election officials in Georgia were inundated with violent threats. Gabriel Sterling, the Republican who served as the state’s voting system implementation manager, pleaded with the outgoing president and his allies to stop.
In a public message to Trump, Sterling concluded, “Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed. And it’s not right.”
It was a reminder that in Georgia, Trump’s election lies actually put people in danger. The more the former president pushed ridiculous claims about his defeat, the more state officials found themselves in harm’s way.
Thirteen months later, Trump is facing a criminal investigation in Georgia, where Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is scrutinizing the former president’s efforts to overturn the election results he didn’t like. Indeed, just last week, Willis was granted a special grand jury to proceed with the probe, prompting Trump to issue some borderline-hysterical statements about the investigation.
Over the weekend, as we discussed earlier, the Republican went even further, suggesting Willis and other law enforcement officials who’ve taken an interest in Trump’s alleged misconduct are horrible villains.
“They’re trying to put me in jail,” he said. “These prosecutors are vicious, horrible people. They’re racists and they’re very sick. They’re mentally sick…. If these radical, vicious, racist prosecutors do anything wrong or illegal, I hope we are going to have in this country the biggest protests we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere.”
According to a new report from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, it was a day later when Willis reached out to the FBI.
In a Sunday letter to J.C. Hacker, the head of the bureau’s Atlanta field office, Willis requested that the FBI conduct a risk assessment of the Fulton County Courthouse and Government Center and provide other protective resources such as federal agents and intelligence as her office ramps up its probe of Trump’s actions as Georgia’s 2020 election results were being finalized. “Security concerns were escalated this weekend by the rhetoric of former President Trump at a public event in Conroe, Texas that was broadcast and covered by national media outlets and shared widely on social media,” Willis said in her letter to Hacker. “His statements were undoubtedly watched by millions.” She added, “My staff and I will not be influenced or intimidated by anyone as this investigation moves forward. I have an obligation to ensure that those who work in and visit the Fulton County Courthouse, the adjoining Fulton County Government Center and surrounding areas are safe.” Willis requested that the bureau’s protective resources include “intelligence and federal agents.” Watch this space.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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