Fulton County Election Official Admits Chain of Custody Documents Missing for Large Number of Absentee Ballots

This admission published today will likely help the lawsuit filed by Georgia plaintiff Garland Favorito who previously won a legal fight to audit 145,000 Atlanta area absentee ballots.  The county has appealed the judge’s ruling granting access, and filed a motion to dismiss the case (squashing the audit). The judge will hear arguments later this month.  Today they admit 24% of the absentee ballots (one in four) are missing chain of custody documents.

GEORGIA – In a stunning admission about the critical chain of custody documents for absentee ballots deposited into drop boxes in the November 3, 2020 election, a Fulton County election official told The Georgia Star News on Wednesday that “a few forms are missing” and that “some procedural paperwork may have been misplaced.”

A Star News analysis of drop box ballot transfer forms for absentee ballots deposited in drop boxes provided by Fulton County in response to an Open Records Request showed that 385 transfer forms out of an estimated 1,565 transfer forms Fulton County said should have been provided are missing – a number that is significantly greater than “a few” by any objective standard.

This is the first time that any election official at either the state or county level from a key battleground state has made an admission of significant error in election procedures for the November 3, 2020 election.

The admission of missing chain of custody documents by a Fulton County official is important for several reasons that cut to the very core of public confidence in the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. (read more)

[…]  “These absentee ballots are at the center of a lawsuit filed by Garland Favorito and eight other Georgia residents, who have sued Fulton County to produce these ballots for a forensic audit. Henry County Superior Court Judge Brian Amero ruled in May that this audit could proceed, but allowed the plaintiffs to review only the digital images of these 145,000 absentee ballots. . . An estimated 145,000 absentee ballots – between 75,000 and 78,000 of which were originally deposited in drop boxes and between 67,000 and 70,000 of which were sent via the United States Postal Service – were transferred from the centralized counting facility at the State Farm Arena in downtown Atlanta to the EPC [the Election Preparation Center warehouse located at 1365 English St. NW, Atlanta] at some point after the counting of votes for the November 3 election was completed.  (read more)