Dysfunction and chaos at the Georgia State Election Board
Led by election conspiracy theorists, the board takes aim at specious fraud claims in Atlanta, and gives the floor to a fan of neo-Nazis.
You won’t find what you’re about to read anywhere else. Elections in Georgia are under serious threat from some of the most aggressive election denial activists and public officials in the country. To support my work holding them accountable, please consider a paid subscription to American Doom. - jg
The Georgia State Election Board met this week to have a serious discussion about many important matters affecting… — Wait, no they didn’t.
At their meeting on Wednesday, SEB members Janelle King and Dr. Janice Johnston attacked board chair John Fervier over a long-disputed case dealing with double-counted ballots in Fulton County that had no impact on the 2020 election. Then, Johnston went on a rant about the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, noting that the newspaper’s print subscriptions had fallen in recent years.
She then had an AJC the reporter step to the microphone as she pressed him on questions like, “who is your copy editor?”
Johnston said that she was “all about transparency,” then continued to complain about another AJC story that detailed how she had just settled a lawsuit over Johnston’s practice of hiding communications and preventing access to meetings that dealt with matters impacting millions of Georgia voters.
Johnson was also incensed at the reporter for detailing how she was raising money for her legal defense online with the help of the prominent Georgia election denier Salleigh Grubbs.
Following Wednesday’s chaotic meeting, the SEB held a special called meeting on Zoom on Thursday. During the meeting, Johnston inadvertently revealed more of her ties to hardcore election denial activists when her phone announced she was receiving a call from Mark Davis, an election conspiracy theorist who claims he has been in contact with the Department of Justice regarding debunked fraud claims in Georgia.
She told American Doom that the call was “personal,” adding that “it must be tough to be paranoid” and insulting the Guardian, one of the many publications for which I write. She did not answer my many questions about her communications with the Justice Department. More on that below.
All of the dysfunction and chaos on display over the last two days was in support of conspiracy theories about the 2020 election — and efforts to restrict Georgians’ access to voting, as well as sow doubt in next year’s crucial mid-term elections.
Maybe you’re not from Georgia, or maybe you haven’t read my years’ worth of reporting and commentary on the SEB, but here’s why you should still care: the meetings held over the last two days were the most chaotic and dysfunctional I’ve seen in five years watching this board, and they’re indicative of the chaos to come next year as Republicans across the country seek to question the validity of the midterm elections that will determine the balance of power in Washington.
Republicans like King, Johnston and Julie Adams are at work in virtually every state, sowing this chaos, which will affect not just your ability to vote but whether that vote is properly counted.
These efforts come in conjunction with those at the Justice Department. I’ll have more on that in stories coming soon for the Guardian and Zeteo. But first, let’s get into what happened this week in Georgia.
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At this week’s meetings, King and Johnston led the charge in propping up conspiracy theorists espousing fraud claims. They also forced the Fulton County election board to hold an extra meeting following a special election for a seat in the Georgia legislature. They carried out this second task in conjunction with Julie Adams, a Fulton County election board member who is deeply involved in Georgia’s election denial movement.
Adams wants more time to review post-election documents ahead of certifying the results of the special election so that she can hunt for evidence of fraud.
Adams has been on this crusade for some time, suing for the right to refuse to certify election results last year with the help of the Trump-aligned group, America First Legal, as I reported for Rolling Stone last year. Back then, she joined election denial officials in other swing states in refusing to certify election results based on her unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud, another big story of mine from last year that first exposed the crucial issue of certification.
Adams clearly plans to continue to refuse to certify election results unless she is completely satisfied that no fraud has occurred.
This means having access to an ever-increasing list of materials and documents regarding election results down to the precinct level. From there, Adams and other election deniers who serve on county election boards throughout Georgia want to review those materials to find fraud.
Courts have already ruled that this is not within the bounds of county election board members like Adams, but they persist nonetheless. Adams and others believe that what courts have ruled is the “ministerial” task of certification actually allows them to endlessly investigate specious fraud claims and hold up the approval of election results that they simply don’t like — i.e. Republicans losing.
Similarly, Johnston and King — who were appointed to their seats on the SEB by Republicans in the Georgia legislature — believe it’s their responsibility to investigate every conspiracy, rumor and insane fraud claim that is brought before them. But they only investigate claims that come from people like Davis, a political consultant of sorts who claims that hundreds of thousands of voters in Georgia have illegally voted because they didn’t properly update their home addresses after moving.
Johnston, King, and Republican lawmakers who recently held a series of public hearings on elections throughout Georgia regularly invite election conspiracists like Davis to present their highly questionable findings.
Another conspiracy theorist who is regularly invited to make presentations on Georgia elections is Garland Favorito, who was at Wednesday’s meeting thanks to an invite from Johnston and King. During the presentation, Favorito once again falsely claimed that Georgia’s voting machines can be hacked, allowing bad actors to manipulate individual votes. He received no pushback from Johnston and King.
Favorito is one of the most prominent election deniers, self-identified “experts,” and conspiracy theorists who Republicans like King and Johnston invite to speak at the SEB. They do so despite the fact that Favorito is quite obviously an unhinged conspiracy theorist. That information is readily available thanks to Favorito’s self-published book, A Nation Betrayed.
The book lays out Favorito’s political awakening in the 1990s. Central to this origin story is the conspiracy theory of global Jewish media domination. Favorito writes that he learned of Jewish dominance of the mainstream media thanks to a pamphlet distributed by the neo-Nazi organization, the National Alliance.
“So why do we never hear of Israeli involvement in 9/11?” Favorito writes in the book. “The answer is, Israelis strongly influence our national news media.”
There’s no excuse for Johnston and King to not know about Favorito’s background in consuming white supremacist literature in the 1990s, or the various other insane conspiracies he discusses at length in his book. That’s because the book has been discussed in election circles in Georgia for years.
If that weren’t enough, a man showed up at Wednesday’s meeting with a copy of Favorito’s book to describe the section on Jewish media domination.
“Two full pages of this book is just [Favorito] sharing a list of Jews who work in the media that he copied from a neo-Nazi publication, and later today, he has the floor for a special presentation,” the man said. “I encourage you to keep this book in mind when assessing [Favorito’s] credibility both today and in the future.”
“Alright, thank you — glad that’s over with,” said James Mills, the SEB’s executive director.
A former Georgia legislator and parole board chair, Mills has been in his position since May. He has no previous experience administering elections. After hearing about Favorito’s book, its reference to conspiracy theories about globalism and Jews, and the citation of the neo-Nazi group, the National Alliance, Mills thought it important to discuss “context.”
“I think any of us could take out of context, something that any of us have said at any point in our life and misrepresent the other,” he said. “It’s been my life experience that, if you stay focused on the subject matter at hand — that’s what we have to stay focused on — but people try to create smokescreens about what’s not really being discussed.”
I reached out to Mills for comment to see how Favorito’s ties to a neo-Nazi group could be considered a “smokescreen.” I’ll let you know when I hear back from him.
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