Fani Willis Dealt Blow by New Testimony

A former Georgia election official has said there were a series of errors in administering the 2020 election in the state, in what may present a challenge for Fani Willis, who is prosecuting Donald Trump over alleged election interference.

Mark Wingate, who served on the Fulton County Board of Registrations and Elections, gave testimony on Monday during the DC disbarment trial of Trump's former Department of Justice official Jeffrey Clark.

During that testimony, he was asked why he voted against certifying the 2020 election twice. He claimed there were missing custody documents, no surveillance tapes of drop boxes and a string of other errors.

There is no evidence there was election fraud in the 2020 elections and multiple investigations upheld the results. Newsweek contacted Willis by LinkedIn to comment on this story.

The Context

Trump and 18 others have been accused of trying to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia. He lost the state by some 12,000 votes.

Trump, the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee, has pleaded not guilty to all 10 charges against him and has repeatedly said the case is part of a political witch hunt against him. Last week, his attorney argued that the case should be dismissed on First Amendment grounds in a court hearing with Judge Scott McAfee, who last month dismissed six charges in the case, ruling that the prosecutors did not provide enough details about the alleged crimes.

What We Know

In 2019, a Georgia law passed requiring election officials to notify voters if their ballots were rejected to give them an opportunity to verify their identities. Absentee voters must use ID to vote in Georgia.

In his testimony, Wingate said there were more people on the voting roll in Fulton County than there were citizens of voting age. He also said chain of custody documents, which monitor the movement of absentee ballots, were not provided by the department.

"How can I trust as a board member to certify this election when I cannot receive even a sampling, anything at all, with regards to chain of custody document?" he said.

He said he requested surveillance tapes of drop boxes where people posted their ballots but they were not provided.

He said there were a "huge number" of absentee-by-mail ballots and that he was concerned about the functionality of the platform used to verify them.

Wingate previously stated in a July 2023 affidavit that there was no signature verification on absentee-by-mail ballot in the election and made other similar claims.

Views

Ex-Assistant U.S. Attorney Gene Rossi told Newsweek: "Whenever testimony or evidence is presented that challenges the competency and integrity of the voting process, we all suffer. No matter where we live. We expect and demand high standards to be followed by every election worker. Is that too much to ask?"

National security attorney Bradley Moss added "Cherry-picked information like this will no doubt be part of the defense Mr. Trump plans to try and present at trial, but, even if the court allows it in, at the end of the day the REPUBLICAN state officials have attested to the accuracy of the final vote count and will testify to that at the trial."

What's Next

Trump is appealing a decision to allow Willis to remain on the case after a relationship with her special prosecutor, Nathan Wade, was revealed. The Court of Appeals has 45 days to decide whether it will take up the matter.

If the case continues, Willis has asked that the trial begins in August.

Correction 4/3/24, 7:50 a.m. ET: This article was updated to correct a reference to Mark Wingate being a witness in Donald Trump's Georgia election interference case and to add additional information.

Update 4/3/24, 10:40 a.m. ET: This article was updated with comments from Bradley Moss.