The Federal Bureau of Investigation raid last week on the Fulton County election office in Georgia was the culmination of a standoff over access to 2020 election records that stretched back more than a year, according to an analysis of events leading up to the search.
The year-plus dispute began as a disagreement between the Georgia State Election Board and Fulton County election officials over the availability and completeness of voting records from the 2020 presidential election, including absentee ballot documents and related data. The state board issued subpoenas in 2024 and 2025 seeking ballot images, signature envelopes, and other records tied to alleged anomalies in vote tabulation and storage, the Daily Signal noted.
Fulton County election officials have disputed allegations that records were missing or mishandled, and some portions of the requested data remained under seal in state court, delaying state investigations. In late October 2025, the state board issued a second subpoena for materials, and in December, state officials acknowledged that more than 130 tabulator tapes documenting early in-person votes lacked required signatures by election workers.
In January, a Georgia organization known as the Election Oversight Group released a 236-page report regarding the 2020 ballot count in Fulton County.
This week, the report attracted national attention when the Election Integrity Network published a three-page summary in relation to the FBI raid, the outlet reported.
According to the Election Oversight report, a total of 148,319 absentee ballots were counted for the 2020 General Election in Fulton County. However, only 125,784 voters were recorded as having cast an absentee ballot. This discrepancy suggests that the county counted 22,000 more absentee ballots than the number of voters who are documented to have voted.
The Election Oversight report highlights that on November 3, 2020, approximately 74,000 absentee ballots were cast by the time the polls closed. Four days later, an additional 148,000 absentee ballots were reported. The findings indicate that only 16,032 ballot images have a corresponding unique “fingerprint” authentication file, while 132,286 of the authentication files were deleted, the outlet said.
“The information in this report documents in one place, in a comprehensive manner and exacting detail, the complete mess of an election that took place in Georgia in November 2020,” Cleta Mitchell, chairwoman of the Election Integrity Network, told The Daily Signal.
“While Fulton County is ground zero for essentially ignoring as many legal requirements as they possibly could, Fulton County is hardly alone in its election malfeasance,” Mitchell added.
The State Election Board, meanwhile, issued its first subpoena in November 2024, alleging that documents were missing for thousands of votes during the recount of the 2020 presidential election. The letter to Fulton County noted “unexplained anomalies in vote tabulation and storage related to the 2020 election.”
“Our subpoenas are still open. The board’s official stance was to take custody of those documents,” Janice Johnston, vice chairwoman of the State Elections Board, told The Daily Signal.
In October 2025, the state board issued a second subpoena requesting all used and void ballots, ballot stubs, signature envelopes, and corresponding digital files of the envelopes from the 2020 election in the county.
During a state board meeting on December 9, a Fulton County official revealed that more than 130 tabulator tapes—which are receipt-like documents containing vote tabulation information—were not signed by election workers as required by state law. These tapes documented approximately 315,000 early in-person votes from the 2020 election.
Amid continuing disputes, the Georgia board asked the U.S. Department of Justice for assistance in July 2025 “to effect compliance with voting transparency.” Attorney General Pam Bondi later issued a letter demanding that Fulton County turn over all documents responsive to the state subpoenas. Federal officials ultimately filed a civil rights complaint in December 2025, and a judge cleared the way for the state board to obtain records.
On Jan. 28, the FBI executed a court-authorized search warrant at the Fulton County Election Hub and Operations Center in Union City, removing materials tied to the 2020 election as federal agents pursued the records amid the long-running dispute.