[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                HEARING ON THE JANUARY 6TH INVESTIGATION

=======================================================================


                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                          SELECT COMMITTEE TO
                      INVESTIGATE THE JANUARY 6TH
                             ATTACK ON THE
                         UNITED STATES CAPITOL

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                             JUNE 21, 2022

                               __________

                            Serial No. 117-5

                               __________

Printed for the use of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 
                6th Attack on the United States Capitol
                                     

[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
                                     

        Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov

                               __________
                               

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
49-352 PDF                     WASHINGTON : 2022                     
          
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                  
                            
 SELECT COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE THE JANUARY 6TH ATTACK ON THE UNITED 
                             STATES CAPITOL

               Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi, Chairman
                    Liz Cheney, Wyoming, Vice Chair
                        Zoe Lofgren, California
                       Adam B. Schiff, California
                        Pete Aguilar, California
                      Stephanie N. Murphy, Florida
                         Jamie Raskin, Maryland
                       Elaine G. Luria, Virginia
                        Adam Kinzinger, Illinois
                           
                           COMMITTEE STAFF

                    David B. Buckley, Staff Director
      Kristin L. Amerling, Deputy Staff Director and Chief Counsel
             Timothy J. Heaphy, Chief Investigative Counsel
                  Hope Goins, Counsel to the Chairman
                      Jamie Fleet, Senior Advisor
          Joseph B. Maher, Senior Counselor to the Vice Chair
               Timothy R. Mulvey, Communications Director
           Candyce Phoenix, Senior Counsel and Senior Advisor

Katherine B. Abrams, Staff           Thomas E. Joscelyn, Senior 
    Associate                            Professional Staff Member
Temidayo Aganga-Williams, Senior     Rebecca L. Knooihuizen, Financial 
    Investigative Counsel                Investigator
Alejandra Apecechea, Investigative   Casey E. Lucier, Investigative 
    Counsel                              Counsel
Lisa A. Bianco, Director of Member   Damon M. Marx, Professional Staff 
    Services and Security Manager        Member
Jerome P. Bjelopera, Investigator    Evan B. Mauldin, Chief Clerk
Bryan Bonner, Investigative Counsel  Yonatan L. Moskowitz, Senior 
Richard R. Bruno, Senior                 Counsel
    Administrative Assistant         Hannah G. Muldavin, Deputy 
Marcus Childress, Investigative          Communications Director
    Counsel                          Jonathan D. Murray, Professional 
John Marcus Clark, Security              Staff Member
    Director                         Jacob A. Nelson, Professional 
Jacqueline N. Colvett, Digital           Staff Member
    Director                         Elizabeth Obrand, Staff Associate
Heather I. Connelly, Professional    Raymond O'Mara, Director of 
    Staff Member                         External Affairs
Meghan E. Conroy, Investigator       Elyes Ouechtati, Technology 
Heather L. Crowell, Printer              Partner
    Proofreader                      Robin M. Peguero, Investigative 
William C. Danvers, Senior               Counsel
    Researcher                       Sandeep A. Prasanna, Investigative 
Soumyalatha O. Dayananda, Senior         Counsel
    Investigative Counsel            Barry Pump, Parliamentarian
Stephen W. DeVine, Senior Counsel    Sean M. Quinn, Investigative 
Lawrence J. Eagleburger,                 Counsel
    Professional Staff Member        Brittany M. J. Record, Senior 
Kevin S. Elliker, Investigative          Counsel
    Counsel                          Joshua D. Roselman, Investigative 
Margaret E. Emamzadeh, Staff             Counsel
    Associate                        James N. Sasso, Investigative 
Sadallah A. Farah, Professional          Counsel
    Staff Member                     Grant H. Saunders, Professional 
Daniel A. George, Senior                 Staff Member
    Investigative Counsel            Samantha O. Stiles, Chief 
Jacob H. Glick, Investigative            Administrative Officer
    Counsel                          Sean P. Tonolli, Senior 
Aaron S. Greene, Clerk                   Investigative Counsel
Marc S. Harris, Senior               David A. Weinberg, Senior 
    Investigative Counsel                Professional Staff Member
Alice K. Hayes, Clerk                Amanda S. Wick, Senior 
Quincy T. Henderson, Staff               Investigative Counsel
    Assistant                        Darrin L. Williams, Jr., Staff 
Camisha L. Johnson, Professional         Assistant
    Staff Member                     John F. Wood, Senior Investigative 
                                         Counsel
                                     Zachary S. Wood, Clerk
                       
                       CONTRACTORS & CONSULTANTS

                             Rawaa Alobaidi
                             Melinda Arons
                              Steve Baker
                            Elizabeth Bisbee
                              David Canady
                             John Coughlin
                             Aaron Dietzen
                              Gina Ferrise
                           Angel Goldsborough
                             James Goldston
                              Polly Grube
                          L. Christine Healey
                             Danny Holladay
                              Percy Howard
                              Dean Jackson
                           Stephanie J. Jones
                              Hyatt Mamoun
                               Mary Marsh
                               Todd Mason
                              Ryan Mayers
                              Jeff McBride
                               Fred Muram
                             Alex Newhouse
                              John Norton
                             Orlando Pinder
                               Owen Pratt
                              Dan Pryzgoda
                              Brian Sasser
                            William Scherer
                              Driss Sekkat
                              Chris Stuart
                            Preston Sullivan
                              Brian Young

                           Innovative Driven
                            
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

                               STATEMENTS

The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress 
  From the State of Mississippi, and Chairman, Select Committee 
  to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States 
  Capitol........................................................     1
The Honorable Liz Cheney, a Representative in Congress From the 
  State of Wyoming, and Vice Chair, Select Committee to 
  Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol     2
The Honorable Adam Schiff, a Representative in Congress From the 
  State of California............................................     4

                               WITNESSES
                                Panel I

Honorable Rusty Bowers, Speaker, Arizona House of Representatives     8
Mr. Brad Raffensperger, Georgia Secretary of State...............    19
Mr. Gabriel Sterling, Chief Operating Officer, Office of the 
  Georgia Secretary of State.....................................    20

                                Panel II

Ms. Wandrea Arshaye ``Shaye'' Moss, Former Registration Officer, 
  Fulton County Department of Registration and Elections, Fulton 
  County, Georgia................................................    31

 
                HEARING ON THE JANUARY 6TH INVESTIGATION

                              ----------                              


                         Tuesday, June 21, 2022

                     U.S. House of Representatives,
 Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on 
                                 the United States Capitol,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 1:01 p.m., in 
room 390, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Bennie G. Thompson 
[Chairman of the Committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Thompson, Cheney, Lofgren, Schiff, 
Aguilar, Murphy, Raskin, Luria, and Kinzinger.
    Chairman Thompson. The Select Committee to Investigate the 
January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol will be in 
order.
    Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare the 
Committee in recess at any point.
    Pursuant to House Deposition Authority Regulation 10, the 
Chair announces the Committee's approval to release the 
deposition material presented during today's hearing.
    Good afternoon. In our last hearing, we told the story of a 
scheme driven by Donald Trump to pressure former Vice President 
Mike Pence to illegally overturn the election results. We 
showed that, when the pressure campaign failed and Mike Pence 
fulfilled his Constitutional obligation, Donald Trump turned a 
violent mob loose on him. We showed that the mob came within 
roughly 40 feet of the Vice President.
    Today, we will show that what happened to Mike Pence wasn't 
an isolated part of Donald Trump's scheme to overturn the 
election. In fact, pressuring public servants into betraying 
their oath was a fundamental part of the playbook.
    A handful of election officials in several key States stood 
between Donald Trump and the upending of American democracy.
    As we began today, it is important to remember, when we 
count the votes for President, we count the votes State by 
State. For the most part, the candidates who win the popular 
vote in a State wins all the State's electoral college votes. 
Whoever wins a majority of the electoral college votes wins the 
Presidency.
    So, when Donald Trump tried to overturn the election 
results, he focused on just a few States. He wanted officials 
at the local and State level to say the vote was tainted by 
wide-spread fraud and throw out the results, even though, as we 
showed last week, there wasn't any voter fraud that could have 
overturned the election results.
    Like Mike Pence, these public servants wouldn't go along 
with Donald Trump's scheme. When they wouldn't embrace the Big 
Lie and substitute the will of the voters with Donald Trump's 
will to remain in power, Donald Trump worked to ensure they'd 
face the consequences. Threats to people's livelihood and 
lives. Threats of violence that Donald Trump knew about and 
amplified.
    In our other hearings, we can't just look backward at what 
happened in late 2020 and early 2021 because the danger hasn't 
gone away. Our democracy endured a mighty test on January 6th 
and in the days before. We say our institutions held. But what 
does that really mean? Democratic institutions aren't 
abstractions or ideas. They are local officials who oversee 
elections, secretaries of state, people in whom we have placed 
our trust that they will carry out their duties. But what if 
they don't?
    Two weeks ago, New Mexico held its primary elections. One 
county commission refused to certify the results, citing vague, 
unsupported claims dealing with Dominion voting machines. The 
courts stepped in, saying New Mexico law required the 
commission to certify the results.
    Two of the three members of the commission finally 
relented. One still refused, saying his vote, ``isn't based on 
any evidence. It's not based on any facts. It's only based on 
my gut feeling and my own intuition, and that's all I need.'' 
By the way, a few months ago, this county commissioner was 
found guilty of illegally entering the Capitol Grounds on 
January 6th.
    This story reminds us of a few things. First, as we have 
shown in our previous hearings, claims that wide-spread voter 
fraud tainted the 2020 Presidential election have always been a 
lie. Donald Trump knew they were a lie, and he kept amplifying 
them anyway.
    Everything we describe today, the relentless, destructive 
pressure campaign on State and local officials, was all based 
on a lie. Donald Trump knew it. He did it anyway.
    Second, the lie hasn't gone away. It is corrupting our 
democratic institutions. People who believe that lie are now 
seeking positions of public trust. As seen in New Mexico, their 
oath to the people they serve will take a backseat to their 
commitment to the Big Lie. If that happens, who will make sure 
our institutions don't break under the pressure? We won't have 
close calls. We will have a catastrophe.
    My distinguished colleague from California, Mr. Schiff, 
will present much of the Select Committee's findings on this 
matter. First, I am pleased to recognize our Vice Chair, Ms. 
Cheney of Wyoming, for any opening statement she would care to 
offer.
    Vice Chair Cheney. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Today we will begin examining President Trump's effort to 
overturn the election by exerting pressure on State officials 
and State legislatures.
    Donald Trump had a direct and personal role in this effort, 
as did Rudy Giuliani, as did John Eastman. In other words, the 
same people who were attempting to pressure Vice President Mike 
Pence to reject electoral votes illegally were also 
simultaneously working to reverse the outcome of the 2020 
election at the State level.
    Each of these efforts to overturn the election is 
independently serious. Each deserves attention, both by 
Congress and by our Department of Justice. But, as a Federal 
court has already indicated, these efforts were also part of a 
broader plan. All of this was done in preparation for January 
6th.
    I would note two points for particular focus today. First, 
today you will hear about calls made by President Trump to 
officials of Georgia and other States. As you listen to these 
tapes, keep in mind what Donald Trump already knew at the time 
he was making those calls. He had been told over and over again 
that his stolen election allegations were nonsense. For 
example, this is what former Attorney General Bill Barr said to 
President Trump about allegations in Georgia.

    Attorney General Barr. We took a look--a hard look--at this 
ourselves. And based on our review of it, including the interviews of 
the key witnesses, the Fulton County allegations were--had no merit. 
The ballots under the table were legitimate ballots. They weren't in a 
suitcase. They had been pre-opened for eventually feeding into the 
machine. All the stuff about the water leak and that there was some 
subterfuge involved--we felt there was some confusion, but there was no 
evidence of a subterfuge to create an opportunity to feed things into 
the count. And so, we didn't see any evidence of fraud in the Fulton 
County episode.

    Vice Chair Cheney. And Acting Deputy Attorney General 
Richard Donoghue told Donald Trump this.

    Acting Deputy Attorney General Donoghue. And I said something to 
the effect of, ``Sir, we've done dozens of investigations, hundreds of 
interviews. The major allegations are not supported by the evidence 
developed.''

    Vice Chair Cheney. Mr. Trump was told by his own advisors 
that he had no basis for his stolen election claims. Yet he 
continued to pressure State officials to change the election 
results.
    Second, you will hear about a number of threats and efforts 
to pressure State officials to reverse the election outcome. 
One of our witnesses today, Gabriel Sterling, explicitly warned 
President Trump about potential violence on December 1, 2020, 
more than a month before January 6th. You will see excerpts 
from that video repeatedly today.

    Mr. Sterling. It's all gone too far. All of it. Joe diGenova today 
asked for Chris Krebs, a patriot who ran CISA, to be shot. A 20-
something tech in Gwinnett County today has death threats and a noose 
put out saying he should be hung for treason because he was 
transferring a report on batches from an EMS to a county computer, so 
he could read it.
    It has to stop. Mr. President, you have not condemned these actions 
or this language. Senators, you have not condemned this language or 
these actions. This has to stop. We need you to step up, and if you're 
going to take a position of leadership, show some.
    My boss, Secretary Raffensperger--his address is out there. They 
have people doing caravans in front of their house. They've had people 
come on to their property . . . 
    It has to stop. This is elections. This is the backbone of 
democracy. And all of you who have not said a damn word are complicit 
in this.

    Vice Chair Cheney. The point is this: Donald Trump did not 
care about the threats of violence. He did not condemn them. He 
made no effort to stop them. He went forward with his fake 
allegations anyway.
    One more point: I would urge all of those watching today to 
focus on the evidence the Committee will present. Don't be 
distracted by politics. This is serious. We cannot let America 
become a Nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence.
    Finally, I want to thank our witnesses today, for all of 
your service to our country. Today all of America will hear 
about the selfless actions of these men and women who acted 
honorably to uphold the law, protect our freedom, and preserve 
our Constitution.
    Today, Mr. Chairman, we will all see an example of what 
truly makes America great.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. Without objection, the Chair recognizes 
the gentleman from California, Mr. Schiff, for an opening 
statement.
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Madam Vice Chair.
    On November 3, 2020, Donald Trump ran for reelection to the 
Office of the Presidency, and he lost. His opponent, Joe Biden, 
finished ahead in the key battleground States of Arizona, 
Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and elsewhere.
    Nevertheless, and for the first time in history, the losing 
Presidential candidate fought to hold on to power. As we have 
seen in previous hearings, he did so through a variety of 
means.
    On election day, he sought to stop the counting of the 
vote, knowing that the millions of absentee ballots elections 
officials would be counting on election day and thereafter 
would run strongly against him and deliver a victory to Joe 
Biden.
    Next, and when he could not stop the counting, he tried to 
stop State legislatures and Governors from certifying the 
results of the election. He went to court and filed dozens of 
frivolous lawsuits, making unsubstantiated claims of fraud.
    When that too failed, he mounted a pressure campaign 
directed at individual State legislators to try to get them to 
go back into session and either declare him the winner, 
decertify Joe Biden as the winner, or send two slates of 
electors to Congress, one for Biden and one for him, and 
pressure Vice President Pence to choose him as the winner.
    But the State legislatures wouldn't go along with this 
scheme, and neither would the Vice President. None of the 
legislatures agreed to go back into special session and declare 
him the winner. No legitimate State authority in the States 
Donald Trump lost would agree to appoint fake Trump electors 
and send them to Congress.
    But this didn't stop the Trump campaign either. They 
assembled groups of individuals in key battleground States and 
got them to call themselves electors, created phony 
certificates associated with these fake electors, and then 
transmitted these certificates to Washington and to the 
Congress to be counted during the joint session of Congress on 
January 6th.
    None of this worked. But, according to Federal District 
Judge David Carter, former President Trump and others likely 
violated multiple Federal laws by engaging in this scheme, 
including conspiracy to defraud the United States. You will 
hear evidence of the former President and his top advisers' 
direct involvement in key elements of this plot, or what Judge 
Carter called a ``coup in search of a legal theory.''
    For, as the judge explained, ``President Trump's pressure 
campaign to stop the electoral count did not end with Vice 
President Pence--it targeted every tier of federal and state 
elected officials. Convincing state legislatures,'' he said, 
``to certify competing electors was essential to stop the count 
and ensure President Trump's reelection.''
    As we have seen in our prior hearings, running through this 
scheme was a Big Lie that the election was plagued with massive 
fraud and somehow stolen.
    You will remember what the President's own Attorney 
General, Bill Barr, said he told the President about these 
claims of massive fraud affecting the outcome of the election.

    Attorney General Barr. And I told him that the stuff that his 
people were shoveling out to the public were bull--was bullshit. I mean 
that the claims of fraud were bullshit.

    Mr. Schiff. The President's lie was and is a dangerous 
cancer on the body politic. If you can convince Americans that 
they cannot trust their own elections, that any time they lose 
it is somehow illegitimate, then what is left but violence to 
determine who should govern?
    This brings us to the focus of today's hearing. When State 
elections officials refused to stop the count, Donald Trump and 
his campaign tried to put pressure on them. When State 
executive officials refused to certify him the winner of States 
he lost, he applied more pressure. When State legislatures 
refused to go back into session and appoint Trump electors, he 
amped up the pressure yet again. Anyone who got in the way of 
Donald Trump's continued hold on power after he lost the 
election was the subject of a dangerous and escalating campaign 
of pressure.
    This pressure campaign brought angry phone calls and texts, 
armed protests, intimidation, and, all too often, threats of 
violence and death. State legislators were singled out. So too 
were State-wide elections officials. Even local elections 
workers diligently doing their jobs were accused of being 
criminals and had their lives turned upside down.
    As we will show, the President's supporters heard the 
former President's claims of fraud and the false allegations he 
made against State and local officials as a call to action.

    Crowd. Stop-the-steal! Stop-the-steal! Stop-the-steal! [inaudible]
    Voice. You're a threat to democracy! [inaudible] You're a threat to 
free and honest elections.
    Voice. We love America. We love our rights and our freedoms. 
[inaudible]
    Voice. You are a tyrant. You are a felon. And you must turn 
yourself into authorities immediately. [inaudible]
    Michigan Secretary of State Benson. And then about 45 minutes 
later, we started to hear the noises outside my home, and that's when 
my stomach sunk. And I thought, ``It's me.'' And there--and then it's 
just--we don't know what's going on--the uncertainty of that was what--
was the fear. Like, are they coming with guns? Are they going to attack 
my house? I'm in here with my kid. You know, I'm trying to put him to 
bed. And so, it was--yeah, that was the scariest moment just not 
knowing what was going to happen.

    Mr. Schiff. This pressure campaign against State and local 
officials spanned numerous contested States, as you will see in 
this video produced by the Select Committee.

    Mr. Roselman. My name is Josh Roselman. I'm an investigative 
counsel for the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th 
Attack on the United States Capitol.
    Beginning in late-November 2020, the President and his lawyers 
started appearing before State legislators urging them to give their 
electoral votes to Trump even though he lost the popular vote.
    Mr. Giuliani. I represent President Trump along with Jenna Ellis. 
And this is our fourth or fifth hearing.
    President Trump. This election has to be turned around because we 
won Pennsylvania by a lot, and we won all of these swing States by a 
lot.
    Mr. Roselman. This was a strategy with both practical and legal 
elements. The Select Committee has obtained an email from just 2 days 
after the election in which a Trump campaign lawyer named Cleta 
Mitchell asked another Trump lawyer, John Eastman, to write a memo 
justifying the idea.
    Mr. George. When do you remember this coming up as an option in the 
post-election period for the first time?
    Ms. Mitchell. Right after the election. It might have been before 
the election.
    Mr. Roselman. Eastman prepared a memo attempting to justify this 
strategy, which was circulated to the Trump White House, Rudy 
Giuliani's legal team, and State legislators around the country. And he 
appeared before the Georgia State Legislature to advocate for it 
publicly.
    Mr. Eastman. You could also do what the Florida legislature was 
prepared to do, which is to adopt a slate of electors yourselves. And 
when you add in the mix of the significant statistical anomalies, and 
sworn affidavits, and video evidence of outright election fraud, I 
don't think it's just your authority to do that. But quite frankly, I 
think you have a duty to do that, to protect the integrity of the 
election here in Georgia.
    Mr. Roselman. But Republican officials in several States released 
public statements recognizing that President Trump's proposal was 
unlawful. For instance, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp called the proposal 
``unconstitutional,'' while Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers wrote 
that the idea would undermine the rule of law. The pressure campaign to 
get State legislators to go along with the scheme intensified when 
President Trump invited delegations from Michigan and Pennsylvania to 
the White House.
    Mr. Harris. Either you or Speaker Chatfield, did you make the point 
to the President that you were not going to do anything that violated 
Michigan law?
    Mr. Shirkey. I believe we did. Whether or not--was those exact 
words or not, we're--I think the words that I would have more likely 
used is, ``We are going to follow the law.''
    Mr. Roselman. Nevertheless, the pressure continued. The next day 
President Trump tweeted, ``Hopefully the Courts and/or Legislatures 
will have . . . the COURAGE to do what has to be done to maintain the 
integrity of our Elections, and the United States of America itself. 
THE WORLD IS WATCHING!!!'' He posted multiple messages on Facebook, 
listing the contact information for State officials and urging his 
supporters to contact them to, ``Demand a vote on decertification.'' In 
one of those posts, President Trump disclosed Mike Shirkey's personal 
phone number to his millions of followers.
    Mr. Shirkey. All I remember is receiving over--just shy of 4,000 
text messages over a short period of time calling to take action . . . 
    It was a loud noise--loud consistent cadence of, ``You know, we 
hear that--that the Trump folks are calling and asking for changes in 
the electors, and you guys can do this.'' Well, you know, they were--
they were believing things that were untrue.
    Mr. Roselman. These efforts also involved targeted outreach to 
State legislators----
    Ms. McCallum. Hi, Representative. My name is Angela McCallum. I'm 
calling from Trump campaign headquarters in Washington, DC. You do have 
the power to reclaim your authority and send a slate of electors that 
will support President Trump and Vice President Pence.
    Mr. Roselman [continuing]. From President Trump's lawyers and from 
Trump himself.
    President Trump. And I've become friendly with legislators that I 
didn't know 4 weeks ago.
    Mr. Roselman. Another legislator, Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan 
Cutler, received daily voicemails from Trump's lawyers in the last week 
of November.
    Mr. Giuliani. Mr. Speaker, this is Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis. 
We're calling you together because we'd like to discuss obviously the 
election.
    Ms. Ellis. Hello, Mr. Speaker. This is Jenna Ellis and I'm here 
with Mayor Giuliani.
    Mr. Giuliani. Hey, Bryan. It's Rudy. I really have something 
important to call to your attention that I think really changes things.
    Mr. Roselman. Cutler felt that the outreach was inappropriate and 
asked his lawyers to tell Rudy Giuliani to stop calling. But Giuliani 
continued to reach out.
    Mr. Giuliani. I understand that you don't want to talk to me now. I 
just want to bring some facts to your attention and talk to you as a 
fellow Republican.
    Mr. Roselman. On December 30th, Trump ally Steve Bannon announced a 
protest at Cutler's home.
    Mr. Bannon. We're getting on the road, and we're going down to 
Cutler. We're going to start going to offices. And if we have to, we're 
going to go to homes, and we're going to let them know what we think 
about them.
    Pennsylvania Speaker Cutler. There were multiple protests. I 
actually don't remember the exact number. There was at least three, I 
think, outside of either my district office or my home. And you're 
correct, my son--my then-15-year-old son was home by himself for the 
first one . . . 
    All of my personal information was doxxed on-line. It was my 
personal email, my personal cell phone, my home phone number. In fact, 
we had to disconnect our home phone for about 3 days because it would 
ring all hours of the night and would fill up with messages.
    Voice. Bryan Cutler, we are outside.
    Voice. Clerks facing felony charges in Michigan. Poll watchers 
denied access in Pennsylvania----
    Mr. Roselman. These ads were another element in the effort. The 
Trump campaign spent millions of dollars running ads on-line and on 
television.
    Voice. The evidence is overwhelming. Call your Governor and 
legislators. Demand they inspect the machines and hear the evidence.
    Mr. Roselman. Public pressure on State officials often grew 
dangerous in the lead-up to January 6th.
    Crowd. Let-us-in. Let-us-in. Let-us-in. Let-us-in.
    Crowd. Special session. Special session. Special session.
    Mr. Alexander. We'll light the whole shit on fire.
    Mr. Fuentes. What are we going to do? What can you and I do to a 
State legislator besides kill him? Although, we should not do that. I'm 
not advising that, but I mean, what else can you do? Right?
    Voice. The punishment for treason is death.

    Mr. Schiff. The State pressure campaign and the danger it 
posed to State officials and to State capitols around the 
Nation was a dangerous precursor to the violence we saw on 
January 6th at the U.S. Capitol.
    Today, you will hear from Rusty Bowers, the Republican 
speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives. He will tell 
us about his conversations with the President, Rudy Giuliani, 
and John Eastman, and what the President's team asked of him, 
and how his oath of office would not permit it.
    You will then hear from Brad Raffensperger, the Republican 
Secretary of State of Georgia, who Trump directed to ``find 
11,780 votes'' that did not exist but just the exact number of 
votes needed to overtake Joe Biden.
    You will also hear from Gabriel Sterling, his chief 
operating officer, about the spurious claims of fraud in the 
elections in Georgia and who, responding to a cascading set of 
threats to his elections team, warned the President to stop, 
that someone was going to get killed.
    You will hear from Wandrea ``Shaye'' Moss, a former local 
elections worker in Fulton County, Georgia, about how all the 
lies about the election impacted the lives of real people who 
administer our elections and still do.
    You will hear what they experienced when the most powerful 
man in the world, the President of the United States, sought to 
cling to power after being voted out of office by the American 
people.
    The system held, but barely. The system held because people 
of courage, Republicans and Democrats, like the witnesses you 
will hear today, put their oath to the country and Constitution 
above any other consideration. They did their jobs, as we must 
do ours.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. I now welcome our first panel of 
witnesses. We are joined today by a distinguished legislator 
from Arizona, Rusty Bowers, who is the Republican speaker of 
the Arizona House of Representatives.
    Mr. Bowers was first elected to the State legislature in 
1993 and has served as speaker since 2019.
    Welcome, Speaker Bowers.
    Brad Raffensperger is the 29th secretary of state of 
Georgia, serving in this role since 2019. As an elected 
official and a Republican, Secretary Raffensperger is 
responsible for supervising elections in Georgia and 
maintaining the State's public records.
    Welcome, Mr. Secretary.
    Gabriel Sterling is the chief operating officer in the 
Georgia Secretary of State's Office. Mr. Sterling was the 
State-wide voting systems implementation manager for the 2020 
election in Georgia, responsible for leading the secretary of 
state's response to the COVID pandemic and rolling out 
modernized voting equipment.
    I will swear in our witnesses.
    The witnesses will please stand and raise their right 
hands.
    [Witnesses sworn.]
    Thank you. Please be seated.
    Let the record reflect that the witnesses answered in the 
affirmative.
    Speaker Bowers, thank you for being with us today. You are 
the speaker of the Arizona house and a self-described 
conservative Republican. You campaigned for President Trump and 
with him during the 2020 election.
    Is it fair to say that you wanted Donald Trump to win a 
second term in office?
    Mr. Bowers. Yes, sir.
    Chairman Thompson. Please.
    Mr. Bowers. Yes, sir. Thank you.
    Chairman Thompson. Is it your understanding that President 
Biden was the winner of the popular vote in Arizona in 2020?
    Mr. Bowers. Yes, sir.
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you.
    Pursuant to section 5(c)(8) of House Resolution 503, the 
Chair recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. Schiff, for 
questions.
    Mr. Schiff. Speaker Bowers, thank you for being with us 
today. Before we begin with the questions that I have prepared 
for you, I wanted to ask you about a statement that former 
President Trump issued, which I received just prior to the 
hearing. Have you had a chance to review that statement?
    Mr. Bowers. My counsel called from Arizona and read it to 
me. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. In that statement--I won't read it in its 
entirety--former President Trump begins by calling you a RINO, 
Republican in name only. He then references a conversation in 
November 2020 in which he claims that you told him that the 
election was rigged and that he had won Arizona.
    To quote the former President, ``During the conversation, 
he told me the election was rigged and that I won Arizona.''
    Did you have such a conversation with the President?
    Mr. Bowers. I did have a conversation with the President. 
That certainly isn't it. There were parts of it that are true, 
but there are parts that are not, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. The part that I read you. Is that false?
    Mr. Bowers. Anywhere, anyone, any time has said that I said 
the election was rigged, that would not be true.
    Mr. Schiff. When the former President in his statement 
today claimed that you told him that he won Arizona, is that 
also false?
    Mr. Bowers. That is also false.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Bowers, I understand that, after the 
election--and I don't know whether this is the conversation the 
former President is referring to--but, after the election, you 
received a phone call from President Trump and Rudy Giuliani, 
in which they discussed the results of the Presidential 
election in Arizona. If you would, tell us about that call and 
whether the former President or Mr. Giuliani raised allegations 
of election fraud.
    Mr. Bowers. Thank you. My wife and I had returned from 
attending our church meetings. It was on a Sunday. We were 
still in the driveway, and I had received a call from a 
colleague telling me that the White House was trying to get in 
touch with her and I, and that she said: ``Please, if you get a 
call, let's try to take this together.''
    Immediately, I saw that the White House on my Bluetooth was 
calling, and I took the call and was asked by the, I would 
presume, the operator at the White House if I would hold for 
the President, which I did. And Mr. Giuliani came on first, and 
niceties. Then Mr. Trump, President Trump, then-President 
Trump, came on, and we initiated a conversation.
    Mr. Schiff. During that conversation, did you ask Mr. 
Giuliani for proof of these allegations of fraud that he was 
making?
    Mr. Bowers. On multiple occasions, yes.
    Mr. Schiff. When you asked him for evidence of this fraud, 
what did he say?
    Mr. Bowers. He said that they did have proof. I asked him: 
``Do you have names?''
    For example, we have 200,000 illegal immigrants, some large 
number, 5,000 or 6,000 dead people, et cetera.
    I said: ``Do you have their names?''
    ``Yes.''
    ``Will you give them to me?''
    ``Yes.''
    The President interrupted and said: ``Give the man what he 
needs, Rudy.''
    He said: ``I will.''
    That happened on at least two occasions, that interchange 
in the conversation.
    Mr. Schiff. So, Mr. Giuliani was claiming in the call that 
there were hundreds of thousands of undocumented people and 
thousands of dead people who had purportedly voted in the 
election?
    Mr. Bowers. Yes.
    Mr. Schiff. You asked him for evidence of that?
    Mr. Bowers. I did.
    Mr. Schiff. Did you ever receive from him that evidence 
either during the call, after the call, or to this day?
    Mr. Bowers. Never.
    Mr. Schiff. What was the ask during this call? He was 
making these allegations of fraud, but he had something or a 
couple things that they wanted you do. What were those?
    Mr. Bowers. The ones I remember were, first, that we would 
hold, that I would allow an official committee at the capitol 
so that they could hear this evidence and that we could take 
action thereafter.
    I refused. I said, up to that time, the circus--I called it 
a circus--had been brewing with lots of demonstrations, both at 
the counting center, at the capitol, and other places, and I 
didn't want to have that in the house. I did not feel that the 
evidence, granted in its absence, merited a hearing. I didn't 
want to be used as a pawn if there was some other need that the 
committee hearing would fulfill. So, that was the first ask, 
that we hold an official committee hearing.
    Mr. Schiff. What was his second ask?
    Mr. Bowers. I said: To what end? To what end, the hearing?
    He said: ``Well, we have heard by an official high up in 
the Republican legislature that there is a legal theory or a 
legal ability in Arizona that you can remove the electors of 
President Biden and replace them. And we would like to have the 
legitimate opportunity through the committee to come to that 
end and remove that.''
    And I said: That is totally new to me. I have never heard 
of any such thing.
    And he pressed that point.
    And I said: ``Look, you are asking me do something that is 
counter to my oath when I swore to the Constitution to uphold 
it, and I also swore to the constitution and the laws of the 
State of Arizona. This is totally foreign as an idea or a 
theory to me, and I would never do anything of such magnitude 
without deep consultation with qualified attorneys.''
    And I said: ``I have got some good attorneys, and I am 
going to give you their names. But you are asking me do 
something against my oath, and I will not break my oath.''
    I think that was up to that point.
    Mr. Schiff. During the conversation--and you heard, I 
think, when we played a snippet of Mr. Giuliani calling other 
State legislators and saying he was calling as essentially a 
fellow Republican--did he make a similar appeal to you or bring 
up the fact that you shared a similar party?
    Mr. Bowers. Whether it was in that call or in a later 
meeting, he did bring that up more than once.
    Mr. Schiff. How would he bring that up?
    Mr. Bowers. He would say: ``Aren't we all Republicans here? 
I would think we would get a better reception. I mean, I would 
think you would listen a little more open to my suggestions--
that we are all Republicans.''
    Mr. Schiff. This evidence that you asked him for that would 
justify this extraordinary step, I think you said they never 
produced. Why did you feel, either in the absence of that 
evidence or with it, what they were asking you to do would 
violate your oath to the Constitution?
    Mr. Bowers. First of all, when the people--and in Arizona, 
I believe it is some 40-plus years earlier, the legislature had 
established the manner of electing our officials or the 
electors for the Presidential race.
    Once it was given to the people, as in Bush v. Gore, 
illustrated by the Supreme Court, it becomes a fundamental 
right of the people. So, as far as I was concerned, for someone 
to ask me in--I will call it a paucity. There was no evidence 
being presented of any strength. Evidence can be hearsay 
evidence. It is still evidence, but it is still hearsay. But 
strong judicial-quality evidence, anything that would say to 
me, you have a doubt, deny your oath. I will not do that. On 
more than one occasion throughout all this, that has been 
brought up. It is a tenet of my faith that the Constitution is 
divinely inspired, one of my most basic foundational beliefs.
    So, for me to do that because somebody just asked me to is 
foreign to my very being. I will not do it.
    Mr. Schiff. During that conversation, Speaker Bowers, did 
you ask him if what he was proposing had ever been done before?
    Mr. Bowers. I did.
    Mr. Schiff. What did he say?
    Mr. Bowers. He said: Well, I am not familiar with Arizona 
law or any other laws, but I don't think so.
    That also was brought up in other conversations, both with 
him and with John Eastman and others.
    Mr. Schiff. Speaker Bowers, I understand that, a week after 
that call, Mr. Giuliani appeared with others associated with 
President Trump's effort to overturn the result of the election 
at a purported legislative hearing in a hotel ballroom in 
Phoenix. Was this an official hearing of the State legislature?
    Mr. Bowers. It was not.
    Mr. Schiff. Why was it not a real or official hearing of 
the legislature?
    Mr. Bowers. A legislator can hold a group meeting; he can 
call it a hearing. But, when they asked me to have an official 
hearing, we establish it by protocols, public notice, et 
cetera. It is typically held at the capitol, but it doesn't 
need to be. We can authorize a hearing off-campus.
    In this case, I had been asked on several occasions to 
allow a hearing. I denied it but said, ``You are free to hold a 
meeting, any meeting you want,'' to the person who asked, and 
which he ultimately did. I think he was a little frustrated, 
but he ultimately did.
    Mr. Schiff. This meeting was the same day, I believe, that 
the Governor of Arizona, Doug Ducey, certified Biden as the 
winner of the Presidential election in Arizona.
    Did you meet with Mr. Giuliani and his associates while 
they were in Phoenix sometime after that purported legislative 
hearing at the hotel?
    Mr. Bowers. Yes, I did, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. At that meeting, did Mr. Giuliani raise any 
specific allegations of election fraud again?
    Mr. Bowers. His initial comments were, again, the litany of 
groups of illegal individuals or people deceased, et cetera. He 
had brought that up. I wasn't alone in that meeting. There were 
others. Other members of the senate aggressively questioned 
him. Then I proceeded to question him on the proof that he was 
going to bring me, et cetera. But he did bring those up, yes.
    Mr. Schiff. These other legislators were also Republican 
members of the senate?
    Mr. Bowers. They were. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. Did they also press him for proof of those 
allegations?
    Mr. Bowers. They pressed him very strongly, two of them 
especially, very strongly.
    Mr. Schiff. At some point, did Mr. Giuliani ask one of the 
other attorneys on his team to help him out with the evidence?
    Mr. Bowers. He did. He asked Jenna Ellis, who was sitting 
to his right. One thing was that it was more to the point of, 
was there sufficient evidence or action that we could justify 
the recalling of the electors? But, at that part of the 
conversation, I know he referred to someone else. But he did 
ask, ``Do we have the proof,'' to Jenna, Ms. Ellis, and she 
said, ``Yes.''
    And I said: ``I want the names. Do you have the names?''
    ``Yes.''
    ``Do you have how they voted?''
    ``We have all the information.''
    I said: ``Can you get to me that information? Did you bring 
it with you?''
    She said: ``No.''
    Both Mr. Giuliani asked her and I asked generally if they 
had brought it with them.
    She said: ``No. It is not with me, but we can get it to 
you.''
    I said, ``Then you didn't bring me the evidence,'' which 
was repeated in different iterations for some period of time.
    Mr. Schiff. At some point, did one of them make a comment 
that they didn't have evidence, but they had a lot of theories?
    Mr. Bowers. That was Mr. Giuliani.
    Mr. Schiff. What exactly did he say, and how did that come 
up?
    Mr. Bowers. My recollection, he said: ``We've got lots of 
theories; we just don't have the evidence.''
    I don't know if that was a gaffe, or maybe he didn't think 
through what he said. But both myself and others in my group, 
the three in my group, and my counsel both remembered that 
specifically. Afterwards, we kind-of laughed about it.
    Mr. Schiff. Getting back to the ask in that phone call that 
preceded this meeting, he wanted you to have the legislature 
dismiss the Biden electors and replace them with Trump electors 
on the basis of these theories of fraud?
    Mr. Bowers. He did not say it in those exact words, but he 
did say that Arizona law, according to what he understood, that 
that would be allowed and that we needed to come into session 
to take care of that, which initiated a discussion about, 
again, what I can legally and not legally do. I can't go into 
session in Arizona unilaterally or on my sole prerogative.
    Mr. Schiff. This meeting or at any later time, did anyone 
provide you with evidence of election fraud sufficient to 
affect the outcome of the Presidential election in Arizona?
    Mr. Bowers. No one provided me ever such evidence.
    Mr. Schiff. The Select Committee has uncovered evidence in 
the course of our investigation that at ``stop the steal'' 
protests at State capitols across the country, there were 
individuals with ties to the groups or parties involved in the 
January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol. One of those incursions 
took place in the Arizona House of Representatives building as 
you can see in this footage.
    [Arizona State Capitol video footage shown.]
    Mr. Schiff. This is previously undisclosed video of 
protestors illegally entering and refusing to leave the 
building. One of the individuals prominently shown in this 
video is Jacob Chansley. Perhaps better known as the ``QAnon 
Shaman,'' this rioter entered the Capitol on January 6th, was 
photographed leaving a threatening note on the dais in the U.S. 
Senate Chamber, and was ultimately sentenced to 41 months in 
prison after pleading guilty to obstruction of an official 
proceeding.
    Other protesters who occupied the Arizona House of 
Representatives building included Proud Boys, while men armed 
with rifles stood just outside the entrance.
    I understand these protestors were calling for you by name, 
Speaker Bowers. Is that correct?
    Mr. Bowers. That is correct.
    Mr. Schiff. Speaker Bowers, did the President call you 
again later in December?
    Mr. Bowers. He did, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. Did you tell the President in that second call 
that you supported him, that you voted for him, but that you 
were not going to do anything illegal for him?
    Mr. Bowers. I did, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. Nevertheless, his lawyer, John Eastman, called 
you some days later on January 4, 2021. He did have a very 
specific ask that would have required you to do just what you 
had already told the President you wouldn't do, something that 
would violate your oath. Is that correct?
    Mr. Bowers. That is correct. It wasn't just me. I had my 
counsel and others on the call.
    Mr. Schiff. What did Dr. Eastman want you to do?
    Mr. Bowers. That we would in fact vote, take a vote to 
overthrow--or I shouldn't say overthrow--that we would 
decertify the electors because we had plenary authority to do 
so. He cited Article II, section 1--I think it is clause 2--and 
said that, in his opinion, that gave us the authority if there 
was--I don't recall him saying sufficient evidence, but there 
was some call or some strong reason to do so that we--or 
justification to do so, that we could do that, and that he was 
asking that we--his suggestion was that we would do it.
    And I said: ``Again, I took an oath. For me to take that--
to do what you do would be counter to my oath.''
    I don't recall if it was in that conversation clearly that 
we talked more about the oath, but I said: ``What would you 
have me do?''
    He said: ``Just do it and let the courts sort it out.''
    I said: ``You are asking me to do something that has never 
been done in history--the history of the United States--and I 
am going to put my State through that without sufficient proof, 
and that is going to be good enough with me, that I would put 
us through that, my State, that I swore to uphold both in 
Constitution and in law? No, sir.''
    He said: Well, my suggestion would be just do it and let 
the courts figure it all out.
    He didn't use that exact phrase, but that is what his 
meaning was. I declined, and I believe that was close to the 
end of our phone call.
    Mr. Schiff. Again, this took place after you had recently 
spoken with President Trump and told him that you wouldn't do 
anything illegal for him. Is that right?
    Mr. Bowers. It wasn't days after--obviously, it was days 
after, but a few days had gone by.
    Mr. Schiff. But you had told President Trump you would not 
do anything illegal for him.
    Mr. Bowers. I did, both times.
    Mr. Schiff. You told Dr. Eastman that you did not believe 
there was legal support to justify what he was asking, but he 
still wanted you do it and effectively let the courts work it 
out.
    Mr. Bowers. I have been warned: Don't say things you think 
maybe he said. But I do remember him saying that the authority 
of the legislature was plenary and that you can do it.
    I said: ``Then you should know that I can't even call the 
legislature into session without a two-thirds majority vote. We 
are only 30 plus 1. There is no way that could happen.''
    Mr. Schiff. But, in your view, what he was asking you to do 
would have violated your oath to the Constitution, both the 
United States Constitution and the constitution of the State of 
Arizona?
    Mr. Bowers. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. Did you also receive a call from U.S. 
Representative Andy Biggs of Arizona on the morning of January 
6th?
    Mr. Bowers. I did.
    Mr. Schiff. What did Mr. Biggs ask you to do?
    Mr. Bowers. I believe that was the day that the vote was 
occurring to each State to have certification or to declare the 
certification of the electors. He asked if I would sign on both 
to a letter that had been sent from my State and/or that I 
would support the decertification of the electors. I said I 
would not.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Speaker, on December 4, 2020, shortly after 
your meeting with Rudy Giuliani and other allies of President 
Trump, you released a statement publicly addressing ``calls for 
the legislature to overturn the 2020 certified election 
results.'' The statement is very straightforward in explaining 
the ``breathtaking request,'' made by representatives of 
President Trump, ``that the Arizona legislature overturn the 
certified results of last month's election and deliver the 
State's electoral college votes to President Trump.'' Why did 
you believe, as you wrote in this statement, that the rule of 
law forbid you from doing what President Trump and his allies 
wanted you to do?
    Mr. Bowers. Representative--I am sorry; I should be saying, 
Mr. Chairman and Representative Schiff--there is two sides to 
the answer. One is, what am I allowed to do, and what am I 
forbidden to do? We have no legal pathway, both in State law 
nor, to my knowledge, in Federal law, for us to execute such a 
request. I am not allowed to walk or act beyond my authority. 
If I am not specifically authorized as a legislator--as a 
legislature--then I cannot act. To the point of calling us into 
session, some say that just a few legislators have plenary 
authority, and that has come as part of all of this discussion, 
I will call it.
    So, to not have authority and be forbidden to act beyond my 
authority on both counts, I am not authorized to take such 
action, and that would deny my oath.
    Mr. Schiff. In your statement, you included excerpts from 
President Ronald Reagan's inaugural address in 1981. The newly 
inaugurated President told the country, ``The orderly transfer 
of authority as called for in the Constitution routinely takes 
place, as it has for almost two centuries, and few of us stop 
to think how unique we really are. In the eyes of many in the 
world, this every-4-year ceremony we accept as normal is 
nothing less than a miracle.''
    Tell us, if you would, Mr. Speaker, why did you include 
President Reagan's words in your public statement?
    Mr. Bowers. Mr. Chairman, Representative Schiff, because I 
have a lot of admiration for Ronald Reagan. I had the 
opportunity of going to his home with one other person and 
walking through. I have a lot of admiration for him.
    When he pointed out, which is--I have lived in another 
country for a period of time and have visited a few countries. 
During election times, the fact that we allow an election, 
support an election, and stand behind an election, even in the 
past when there have been serious questions about the election, 
and then move on, without disturbance and with acceptance; that 
we choose--we choose--to follow the outcome of the will of the 
people, that will--it means a lot to me, and I know it meant a 
lot to him, and so we included that.
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Speaker Bowers.
    I now want to look even more deeply at the fake electors 
scheme. Every 4 years, citizens from all over the United States 
go to the polls to elect their President. Under our 
Constitution, when we cast our votes for President, we are 
actually voting to send electors pledged to our preferred 
candidate to the electoral college.
    In December, the electors in each State meet, cast their 
votes, and send those votes to Washington. There is only one 
legitimate slate of electors from each State. On the 6th day of 
January, Congress meets in a joint session to count those 
votes, and the winner of the electoral college vote becomes the 
President.
    In this next segment, you will hear how President Trump and 
his campaign were directly involved in advancing and 
coordinating the plot to replace legitimate Biden electors with 
fake electors not chosen by the voters. You will hear how this 
campaign convinced these fake electors to cast and submit their 
votes through fake certificates telling them that their votes 
would only be used in the event that President Trump won his 
legal challenges. Yet, when the President lost those legal 
challenges, when courts rejected them as frivolous and without 
merit, the fake elector scheme continued.
    At this point, President Trump's own lawyers, so-called 
``Team Normal,'' walked away rather than participate in the 
planning. His own White House Counsel's Office said that the 
plan was not legally sound. Let's play the following video 
produced by the Select Committee.

    Ms. Lucier. My name is Casey Lucier. I'm an investigative counsel 
for the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on 
the United States Capitol.
    On November 18th, a lawyer working with the Trump campaign, named 
Kenneth Chesebro, wrote a memo arguing that the Trump campaign should 
organize its own electors in the swing States that President Trump had 
lost. The Select Committee received testimony that those close to 
President Trump began planning to organize fake electors for Trump in 
States that Biden won in the weeks after the election.
    Mr. George. Who do you remember being involved in those early 
discussions around the Thanksgiving time regarding having alternate 
electors meet?
    Ms. Hutchinson. Mr. Giuliani, several of Mr. Giuliani's associates, 
Mr. Meadows, Members of Congress, although it's difficult to 
distinguish if the Members I'm thinking of were involved during 
Thanksgiving or if they're involved as we progressed through December.
    Ms. Lucier. At the President's direct request, the RNC assisted the 
campaign in coordinating this effort.
    Mr. Wood. What did the President say when he called you?
    Ms. McDaniel. Essentially, he turned the call over to Mr. Eastman 
who then proceeded to talk about the importance of the RNC helping the 
campaign gather these contingent electors in case any of the legal 
challenges that were on-going changed the result of any of the States. 
I think more just helping them reach out and assemble them. But that--
my understanding is the campaign did take the lead, and we just were 
helping them in that--in that role.
    Ms. Lucier. As President Trump and his supporters continued to lose 
lawsuits, some campaign lawyers became convinced that convening 
electors in States that Trump lost was no longer appropriate.
    Mr. Justin Clark. I just remember--I either replied or called 
somebody--saying, Unless we have litigation pending this, like, in 
these States, like, I don't think this is appropriate or, you know, 
this isn't the right thing to do. I don't remember how I phrased it, 
but I got into a little bit of a back-and-forth and I think it was with 
Ken Chesebro, where I said, All right, you know, you just get after it, 
like, I'm out.
    Mr. Morgan. At that point, I had Josh Finley email Mr. Chesebro 
politely to say, ``This is your task. You are responsible for the 
electoral college issues moving forward.'' . . . 
    And this was my way of taking that responsibility to zero.
    Ms. Lucier. The Committee learned the White House Counsel's Office 
also felt the plan was potentially illegal.
    Mr. George. And so, to be clear, did you hear the White House 
Counsel's Office say that this plan to have alternate electors meet and 
cast votes for Donald Trump in States that he had lost was not legally 
sound?
    Ms. Hutchinson. Yes, sir.
    Mr. George. And who was present for that meeting that you remember?
    Ms. Hutchinson. It was in our offices. Mr. Meadows, Mr. Giuliani, 
and a few of Mr. Giuliani's associates.
    Ms. Lucier. The Select Committee interviewed several of the 
individual fake electors as well as Trump campaign staff who helped 
organize the effort.
    Mr. Sinners. We were just, you know, kind-of--kind-of useful idiots 
or rubes at that point. You know, a strong part of me really feels that 
it's just, kind-of, as the road continued and as that was failure, 
failure, failure that that got formulated as what we have on the table. 
Let's just do it.
    Ms. Lucier. And now, after what we've told you today about the 
Select Committee's investigation, about the conclusion of the 
professional lawyers on the campaign staff--Justin Clark, Matt Morgan, 
and Josh Finley--about their unwillingness to participate in the 
convening of these electors, how does that contribute to your 
understanding of these issues?
    Mr. Sinners. I'm angry. I'm angry because I think--I think in a 
sense, you know, no one really cared if--if people were potentially 
putting themselves in jeopardy.
    Ms. Lucier. Would you have not wanted to participate in this any 
further as well?
    Mr. Sinners. I absolutely would not have had I known that the three 
main lawyers for the campaign that I'd spoken to in the past and were 
leading up were not on board. Yeah.
    Mr. Hitt. I was told that these would only count if a court ruled 
in our favor. So, that would have been using our electors--well, it 
would have been using our electors in ways that we weren't told about, 
and we wouldn't have supported.
    Ms. Lucier. Documents obtained by the Select Committee indicate 
that instructions were given to the electors in several States that 
they needed to cast their ballots in ``complete secrecy.'' Because this 
scheme involved fake electors, those participating in certain States 
had no way to comply with State election laws, like where the electors 
were supposed to meet. One group of fake electors even considered 
hiding overnight to ensure that they could access the State capitol as 
required in Michigan.
    Mr. George. Did Mr. Norton say who he was working with at all on 
this effort to have electors meet?
    Ms. Cox. He said he was working with the President's campaign . . . 

    He told me that the Michigan Republican electors were planning to 
meet in the capitol and hide overnight, so that they could fulfill the 
role of casting their vote in--per law--in the Michigan chambers. And I 
told him in no uncertain terms that that was insane and inappropriate.
    Ms. Lucier. In one State, the fake electors even asked for a 
promise that the campaign would pay their legal fees if they got sued 
or charged with a crime.
    Ultimately, fake electors did meet on December 14, 2020, in 
Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada, and 
Wisconsin. At the request of the Trump campaign, the electors from 
these battleground States signed documents falsely asserting that they 
were the ``duly elected electors,'' from their State and submitted them 
to the National Archives and to Vice President Pence in his capacity as 
President of the Senate.
    Here is what some of the fake electors' certificates look like as 
compared to the real ones. But these ballots had no legal effect. In an 
email produced to the Select Committee, Dr. Eastman told a Trump 
campaign representative that it did not matter that the electors had 
not been approved by a State authority.
    ``The fact that we have multiple slates of electors demonstrates 
the uncertainty of either. That should be enough.'' He urged that Pence 
``act boldly and be challenged.'' Documents produced to the Select 
Committee show that the Trump campaign took steps to ensure that the 
physical copies of the fake electors' electoral votes from two States 
were delivered to Washington for January 6th.
    Text messages exchanged between Republican Party officials in 
Wisconsin showed that on January 4th, the Trump campaign asked for 
someone to fly their fake electors' documents to Washington. A staffer 
for Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson texted a staffer for Vice President 
Pence just minutes before the beginning of the joint session. This 
staffer stated that Senator Johnson wished to hand-deliver to the Vice 
President the fake electors' votes from Michigan and Wisconsin. The 
Vice President's aide unambiguously instructed them not to deliver the 
fake votes to the Vice President.
    Even though the fake electors' slates were transmitted to Congress 
and the Executive branch, the Vice President held firm in his position 
that his role was to count lawfully submitted electoral votes.
    Vice President Pence. Joseph R. Biden, Jr., of the State of 
Delaware has received 306 votes. Donald J. Trump of the State of 
Florida has received 232 votes.
    Ms. Lucier.  . . . Which is what he did when the joint session 
resumed on January 6th after the attack on the Capitol.

    Mr. Schiff. What we just heard in that video was an aide to 
the White House Chief of Staff telling this Committee that the 
White House Counsel's Office felt that this ``fake electors'' 
plan was not legally sound.
    Nevertheless, the Trump campaign went forward with the 
scheme anyway.
    Speaker Bowers, were you aware that fake electors had met 
in Phoenix on December 14th and purported to cast electoral 
votes for President Trump?
    Mr. Bowers. I was not.
    Mr. Schiff. When you learned that these electors had met 
and sent their electoral votes to Washington, what did you 
think?
    Mr. Bowers. Well, I thought of the book ``The Gang That 
Couldn't Shoot Straight.'' I just thought, this is a tragic 
parody.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Bowers, I understand that as you flew from 
Phoenix to Washington yesterday you reflected upon some 
passages from a personal journal that you were keeping in 
December 2020 while all of this was taking place.
    With your permission, I am wondering if you would be 
willing to share one passage in particular with us?
    Mr. Bowers. Thank you very much.
    ``It is painful to have friends who have been such a help 
to me turn on me with such rancor. I may, in the eyes of men, 
not hold correct opinions or act according to their vision or 
convictions, but I do not take this current situation in a 
light manner, a fearful manner, or a vengeful manner. I do not 
want to be a winner by cheating.
    ``I will not play with laws I swore allegiance to, with any 
contrived desire toward deflection of my deep foundational 
desire to follow God's will as I believe He led my conscience 
to embrace. How else will I ever approach Him in the wilderness 
of life, knowing that I ask of this guidance only to show 
myself a coward in defending the course He led me to take?''
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Those are powerful 
words.
    I understand that taking the courageous positions that you 
did following the 2020 election in defense of the rule of law 
and protecting the voters of Arizona resulted in you and your 
family being subjected to protests and terrible threats.
    Can you tell us how this impacted you and your family?
    Mr. Bowers. Well, as others in the videos have mentioned, 
we received, my secretaries would say, in excess of 20,000 
emails and tens of thousands of voicemails and texts, which 
saturated our offices, and we were unable to work, or at least 
communicate.
    But at home, up till even recently, it is the new pattern, 
or a pattern, in our lives to worry what will happen on 
Saturdays, because we have various groups come by, and they 
have had video-panel trucks with videos of me proclaiming me to 
be a pedophile and a pervert and a corrupt politician, and 
blaring loudspeakers in my neighborhood, and leaving literature 
both on my property and arguing and threatening with neighbors 
and with myself.
    I don't know if I should name groups, but there was one 
gentleman that had the three bars on his chest, and he had a 
pistol and was threatening at my neighbor--not with the pistol 
but just vocally. When I saw the gun, I knew I had to get 
close.
    At the same time, on some of these, we had a daughter who 
was gravely ill, who was upset by what was happening outside. 
And my wife is a valiant person, very, very strong, quiet, very 
strong woman.
    So, it was disturbing. It was disturbing.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank you for your 
service to the State of Arizona and to the country.
    Mr. Chairman, at this point, I think it would be 
appropriate to take a short recess. Accordingly, I reserve the 
balance of my time.
    Chairman Thompson. The Chair requests that those in the 
hearing room remain seated until the Capitol Police have 
escorted Members and witnesses from the room.
    Pursuant to the order of the Committee of today, the Chair 
declares the Committee in recess for a period of approximately 
10 minutes.
    [Accordingly, at 2:11 p.m., the Committee recessed until 
2:25 p.m., when it was called to order by the Chairman.]
    Chairman Thompson. President Trump's pressure campaign 
against State officials existed in all the key battleground 
States that he lost, but the former President had a particular 
obsession with Georgia.
    Here is the President on the afternoon of January 6th after 
his own Attorney General warned him that the claims you are 
about to hear are patently false.

    President Trump. They should find those votes. They should 
absolutely find that. Just over 11,000 votes, that's all we need. They 
defrauded us out of a win in Georgia, and we're not going to forget it.

    Chairman Thompson. So, the State of Georgia is where we 
will turn our attention to next.
    I want to emphasize that our investigation into these 
issues is still on-going. As I stated in our last hearing, if 
you have relevant information or documentary evidence to share 
with the Select Committee, we welcome your cooperation. But we 
will share some of our findings with you today.
    Secretary Raffensperger, thank you for being here today.
    You have been a public servant in Georgia since 2015, 
serving first as a member of the Georgia House of 
Representatives and then, since January 2019, as Georgia's 
secretary of state.
    As a self-described conservative Republican, is it fair to 
say that you wanted President Trump to win the 2020 election?
    Mr. Raffensperger. Yes, it is.
    Chairman Thompson. Mr. Secretary, many witnesses have told 
the Select Committee that election day, November 3, 2020, was a 
largely uneventful day in their home States.
    In spite of the challenges of conducting an election during 
a pandemic, you wrote in The Washington Post that the election 
was ``successful.''
    Tell us, what was your impression of how election day had 
proceeded in Georgia?
    Mr. Raffensperger. On election day in November, our 
election went remarkably smooth.
    In fact, we meet at the GEMA headquarters--that is the 
Georgia Emergency Management Association meeting location--but 
we were following wait times in line. In the afternoon, our 
average wait time was 3 minutes State-wide that we were 
recording for various precincts. It actually got down to 2 
minutes.
    At the end of the day, we felt that we had a successful 
election from the standpoint of the administration and the 
operation of the election.
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you.
    The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. 
Schiff.
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Secretary Raffensperger, did Joe Biden win the 2020 
Presidential election in Georgia and by what margin?
    Mr. Raffensperger. President Biden carried the State of 
Georgia by approximately 12,000 votes.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, as I understand it, your office 
took several steps to ensure the accuracy of the vote count in 
Georgia, reviewing the vote count in at least three different 
ways. These steps included a machine recount, a forensic audit, 
and full hand recount of every one of the 5 million ballots 
cast.
    Did these efforts, including a recount of literally every 
ballot cast in the State of Georgia, confirm the result?
    Mr. Raffensperger. Yes, they did.
    We counted the ballots where the first tabulation would be 
scanned.
    Then, when we did our 100 percent hand audit of all 5 
million ballots in the State of Georgia--all cast in place, all 
absentee ballots--they were all hand recounted, and they came 
remarkably close to the first count.
    Then, upon the election being certified, President Trump, 
because he was within a half-percent, could ask for a recount. 
Then we recounted them again through the scanners, and we got 
remarkably the same count.
    Three counts, all remarkably close, which showed that 
President Trump did come up short.
    Mr. Schiff. Nevertheless, as you will see, the President 
and his allies began making numerous false allegations of voter 
fraud--false allegations that you and Mr. Sterling, among 
others, had to address.
    Mr. Sterling, thank you also for being here today.
    Following the 2020 election, in addition to your normal 
duties, I understand that you became a spokesperson to try to 
combat disinformation about the election and the danger it was 
creating for elections officials, among others.
    In a December 1 press conference, you addressed some of 
your remarks directly to President Trump. Let's take a look at 
what you said that day.

    Mr. Sterling. Mr. President, it looks like you likely lost the 
State of Georgia. We're investigating. There's always a possibility--I 
get it, and you have the rights to go to the courts. What you don't 
have the ability to do, and you need to step up and say this, is stop 
inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence.
    Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to get shot, someone's 
going to get killed, and it's not right. I--I--it's not right.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Sterling, what prompted you to make these 
remarks?
    Mr. Sterling. Mr. Schiff, we had had a previously scheduled 
press conference that day, as we were in the habit of doing, 
trying to be as transparent as we could about the election and 
the counts going on.
    A little after lunch that day, lunchtime, I received a call 
from the project manager from Dominion Voting Systems, who was 
oddly audibly shaken. She is not the kind of person I would 
assume would be that way. She has a master's from MIT, a 
graduate of the Naval Academy, and was very much on the ball 
and pretty unflappable.
    She informed me about a young contractor they had who had 
been receiving threats from a video had been posted by some 
QAnon supporters. At that point, we had been sort-of steeping 
in this kind of stuff, so it was around us all the time, so I 
didn't take note of it more than adding to the pile of other 
stuff we were having to deal with.
    I did pull up Twitter, and I scrolled through it, and I saw 
the young man's name. It was a particular tweet that, for lack 
of a better word, was the straw that broke the camel's back. It 
had a young man's name. It was a very unique name. I believe it 
was a first-generation American. It said--had his name--``You 
committed treason. May God have mercy on your soul,'' with a 
slowly twisting GIF of a noose.
    For lack of a better word, I lost it. I just got irate. My 
boss was with me at the time, Deputy Secretary Jordan Fuchs, 
and she could tell that I was angry. I tend to turn red from 
here up when that happens, and that happened at that time. She 
called Secretary Raffensperger to say, ``We are seeing these 
kind of threats, and Gabe thinks we need to say something about 
it.'' The Secretary said, ``Yes.''
    That is what prompted me to do what I did. I lost my 
temper, but it seemed necessary at the time, because it was 
just getting worse. I could not tell you why that particular 
one was the one that put me over the edge, but it did.
    Mr. Schiff. Now, after you made this plea to the President, 
did Donald Trump urge his supporters to avoid the use of 
violence?
    Mr. Sterling. Not to my knowledge.
    Mr. Schiff. Now, as we know, the President was aware of 
your speech, because he tweeted about it later that day. Let's 
take a look at what the President said.
    In the tweet, Donald Trump claims that there was, ``massive 
voter fraud in Georgia.''
    Mr. Sterling, that was just plain false, wasn't it?
    Mr. Sterling. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. Nevertheless, the very next day, on December 
2nd, President Trump released a lengthy video again making 
false claims of election fraud in Georgia.
    Let's take a look at what he said this time.

    President Trump. They found thousands and thousands of votes that 
were out of whack--all against me.

    Mr. Schiff. In fact, the day after Donald Trump released 
that video--so, now we are talking just 2 days after the 
emotional warning that you gave that someone is going to get 
killed--representatives of President Trump appeared in Georgia, 
including Rudy Giuliani, and launched a new conspiracy theory 
that would take on a life of its own and threaten the lives of 
several innocent election workers.
    This story falsely alleges that, sometime during election 
night, election workers at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, 
Georgia, kicked out poll observers. After the observers left, 
the story goes, these workers pulled so-called ``suitcases of 
ballots'' from under a table and ran those ballots through 
counting machines multiple times.
    Completely without evidence, President Trump and his allies 
claimed that these suitcases contained as many as 18,000 
ballots, all for Joe Biden.
    None of this was true.
    But Rudy Giuliani appeared before a committee of the 
Georgia State Senate and played a surveillance video from State 
Farm Arena, falsely claiming that it showed this conspiracy 
taking place.
    Here is sample of what Mr. Giuliani had to say during that 
hearing.

    Mr. Giuliani. And when you look at what you saw on the video, which 
to me was a smoking gun, powerful smoking gun, well, I don't--don't 
have to be a genius to figure out what happened. And I--I don't have to 
be a genius to figure out that those votes are not legitimate votes. 
You don't put legitimate votes under a table----
    Voice. No.
    Mr. Giuliani [continuing]. Wait until you throw the opposition out 
and, in the middle of the night, count them. We would have to be fools 
to think that.

    Mr. Schiff. President Trump's campaign amplified Giuliani's 
false testimony in a tweet pushing out the video footage.
    Giuliani likewise pushed out his testimony on social media. 
As you can see in this tweet, Mr. Giuliani wrote that it was, 
``now beyond doubt,'' that Fulton County Democrats had stolen 
the election.
    Later in this hearing, we will hear directly from one of 
the election workers in this video about the effect these lies 
had on her and on her family.
    Mr. Sterling, did the investigators in your office review 
the entire surveillance tape from the State Farm Arena on 
election night?
    Mr. Sterling. They actually reviewed approximately 48 
hours, going over the time period where action was taking place 
at the counting center at State Farm Arena.
    Mr. Schiff. What did the tape actually show?
    Mr. Sterling. Depending on which time you want to start--
because, as was mentioned, this conspiracy theory took on a 
life of its own, where they conflated a water main break that 
wasn't a water main break, and throwing observers out, and a 
series of other things.
    What it actually showed was Fulton County election workers 
engaging in normal ballot processing.
    One of the specific things--one of the things that was very 
frustrating was the so-called ``suitcases of ballots'' from 
under the table. If you watched the entirety of the video, you 
saw that these were election workers who were under the 
impression they were going to get to go home around 10, 10:30. 
People are putting on their coats; they are putting ballots 
that are prepared to be scanned into ballot carriers that are 
then sealed with tamper-proof seals so that, you know, they are 
not messed with.
    It is an interesting thing, because you watch all of--there 
are four screens of the video, and, as you are watching it, you 
can see the election monitors in the corner with the press as 
they are taking these ballot carriers and putting them under 
the table. You see it there. One of the other hidden ones, if 
you looked at the actual tape, was on the outside of the table. 
Just from the camera angle, you couldn't see it originally.
    This goes under the ``no good deed goes unpunished.''
    We were told at--we were at GEMA, as the secretary pointed 
out--and we were told that it looked like they were shutting 
down the Fulton County counting. The secretary expressed some 
displeasure at that because we wanted everybody to keep 
counting so we could get to the results and know what was 
happening.
    So, our elections director called their elections director, 
who was at another election because this was election day; 
there was two different places where ballot things were being 
done by the Fulton County office. So, he called the elections 
director for Fulton, then called Ralph Jones, who was at the 
State Farm Arena, and said, ``What the heck are you doing? Go 
ahead and stay.''
    As you watch the video itself, you see him take the phone 
call as people are putting things away and getting ready to 
leave. You can tell, for about 15, 20 seconds, he does not want 
to tell these people they have to stay. He walks over, he 
thinks about it for a second, you see him come back to the 
corner of a desk and kind-of slumps his shoulders and says, 
``Okay, y'all, we gotta keep on counting.'' Then you see them 
take their coats off, get the ballots out.
    Then a secondary thing that you will see on there is, you 
will have people who are counting ballots who, a batch will go 
through, they will take them off and run that through again.
    What happens there is a standard operating procedure if 
there is a mis-scan, if there is a misalignment, if it doesn't 
read right. These are high-speed, high-capacity scanners, so 3 
or 4 will go through. After a mis-scan, you have to delete that 
batch and put it back through again.
    By going through the hand tally, as the secretary pointed 
out, we showed that if there had been multiple ballots scanned 
without a corresponding physical ballot, your counts would have 
been a lot higher than the ballots themselves.
    By doing the hand tally, we saw two specific numbers that 
were met. The hand tally got us to a .1053 percent off of the 
total votes cast and .0099 percent on the margin, which is 
essentially dead-on accurate. Most academic studies say on a 
hand tally you will have between 1 and 2 percent, but because 
we use ballot-marking devices, where it is very clear what the 
voter intended, it made it a lot easier for us to conduct that 
hand count and show that none of that was true.
    Mr. Schiff. Now, I understand that when you reviewed these 
tapes and did the analysis, it disproved this conspiracy 
theory, but you still had to take a lot of steps to try to make 
sure the public knew the truth about these allegations, and you 
did frequent briefings for the press.
    Let's take a look at one of those press briefings, Mr. 
Sterling, that you held on December 7th to make the point that 
you just did today.

    Mr. Sterling.  . . . move on to what I'm going to call, 
``Disinformation Monday.'' Out of the gate, many of you all saw the 
videotape from State Farm Arena. I spent hours with our POST-certified 
investigators. Justin Gray from WSB spent hours with us going over this 
video to explain to people that what you saw--the ``secret suitcases'' 
of magic ballots--were actually ballots that had been packed into those 
absentee ballot carriers by the workers in plain view of the monitors 
and the press . . . 
    And what's really frustrating is the President's attorneys had this 
same videotape. They saw the exact same things the rest of us could 
see. And they chose to mislead State senators and the public about what 
was on that video. I'm quite sure that they will not characterize the 
video if they try to enter into evidence because that is the kind of 
thing that can lead to sanctions because it's obviously untrue.
    They knew it was untrue, and they continue to do things like this.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Sterling, despite the efforts by your 
office to combat this misinformation by speaking out publicly 
and through local media, you were unable to match the reach of 
President Trump's platform and social media megaphone spreading 
these false conspiracy theories.
    What was it like to compete with a President who had the 
biggest bully pulpit in the world to push out these false 
claims?
    Mr. Sterling. For lack of a better word, it was 
frustrating. But oftentimes I felt our information was getting 
out but that there was a reticence of people, who needed to 
believe it, to believe it because the President of the United 
States, whom many looked up to and respected, was telling them 
it wasn't true, despite the facts.
    I have characterized it at one point, it was kind-of like a 
shovel trying to empty the ocean. Yes, it was frustrating. I 
even have, you know, family members who I had to argue with 
about some of these things. I would show them things--and the 
problem you have is, you are getting to people's hearts.
    I remember this one specific--an attorney that we know that 
we showed and walked him through: This wasn't true, ``Okay, I 
get that,'' this wasn't true, ``Okay, I get that,'' this wasn't 
true--five or six things, but at the end he goes, ``I just know 
in my heart they cheated.''
    So, once you get past the heart, the facts don't matter as 
much. Our job, from our point of view, was to get the facts 
out, do our job, tell the truth, follow the Constitution, 
follow the law, and defend the institutions. The institutions 
held.
    Mr. Schiff. Let's take a look at what you were competing 
with. This is the former President speaking in Georgia on 
December 5th.

    President Trump. But it's a fraud. It's overwhelming. And again, 
I'm going to ask you to look up at that very, very powerful and very 
expensive screen.
    Voice. Hidden cases of possible ballots are rolled out from under a 
table. Four people under a cloud of suspicion . . . 
    President Trump. So, if you just take the crime of what those 
Democrat workers were doing--and by the way, there was no water main 
break. You know, they said there--there was no water main break. That's 
ten times more than I need to win this State. Ten times more. That's 
ten times, maybe more than that, but it's ten times more because we 
lost by a very close number.

    Mr. Schiff. In this Committee's hearing last Monday, we 
heard from senior Federal law enforcement officials--from the 
senior-most Federal law enforcement official in Atlanta at the 
time, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District BJay Pak, as well 
as former Attorney General Bill Barr. They both testified that 
the allegations were thoroughly investigated and found to have 
no merit.
    Here is U.S. Attorney Pak.

    Mr. Pak. In particular to Attorney General Barr, I told him that we 
looked into it. We've done several things, including interviewing the 
witnesses. I listened to the tapes and reviewed the videotape myself 
and that there was nothing there. Giuliani was wrong in representing 
that this was a suitcase full of ballots.

    Mr. Schiff. Here is what Attorney General Bill Barr had to 
say about the same allegations.

    Attorney General Barr. Took a look--hard look--at this ourselves. 
And based on our review of it, including the interviews of the key 
witnesses, the Fulton County allegations were--had no merit.

    Mr. Schiff. We also have testimony from senior Department 
of Justice officials establishing that they specifically told 
President Trump that these allegations had been thoroughly 
investigated and were completely without merit.
    Here is Acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue 
describing a phone conversation in which he specifically told 
President Trump that these allegations were false.

    Acting Deputy Attorney General Donoghue. The President kept 
fixating on this suitcase that supposedly had fraudulent ballots and 
that the suitcase was rolled out from under the table. And I said, 
``No, sir. There is no suitcase. You can watch that video over and 
over. There is no suitcase. There is a wheeled bin where they carry the 
ballots.''

    Mr. Schiff. `` . . . where they carry the ballots.''
    No matter how many times senior Department of Justice 
officials, including his own Attorney General, told the 
President that these allegations were not true, President Trump 
kept promoting these lies and putting pressure on State 
officials to accept them.
    On January 2nd, the President had a lengthy telephone 
conversation with Secretary Raffensperger. Prior to the 
President's call, though, I want to share a bit of important 
context.
    First, the White House, including the former President's 
Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, repeatedly called or texted the 
secretary's office some 18 times in order to set up this call. 
They were quite persistent.
    Second, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows took the extraordinary 
step of showing up at a signature audit site in Georgia, where 
he met with Secretary Raffensperger's chief investigator, 
Frances Watson, who was supervising that audit process.
    Behind me is a photograph from that visit.
    Third, the day after Meadows's Georgia visit, he set up a 
call between President Trump and Frances Watson. On the call 
between President Trump and Georgia investigator Frances 
Watson, the former President continued to push the false claim 
that he had won the State of Georgia.
    Let's listen to that part of the conversation.

    President Trump. You know, it's just--you have the most important 
job in the country right now, because if we win Georgia--first of all, 
if we win, you're gonna have two wins. They're not going to win right 
now, you know. They're down because the people of Georgia are so angry 
at what happened to me. They know I won--won by hundreds of thousands 
of votes. It wasn't close.

    Mr. Schiff. In this next clip, he told the State law 
enforcement official that she would be praised if she found the 
``right answer.''

    President Trump. Hopefully, you know, I will--when--when the right 
answer comes out, you'll be praised. I mean, I don't know why, you 
know, they made it so hard. And you--they will be praised. People will 
say, ``Great,'' because that's what it's about: That ability to check 
and to--and to make it right. Because everyone knows it's wrong. 
There's just no way.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Raffensperger, I know you weren't on this 
call but that you have listened to it. President Trump didn't 
win by hundreds of thousands of votes in Georgia, did he?
    Mr. Raffensperger. No, he did not.
    I have been traveling through the State of Georgia for a 
year now, and, simply put, in a nutshell, what happened in the 
fall of 2020 is that 28,000 Georgians skipped the Presidential 
race and yet they voted down-ballot in other races. The 
Republican Congressmen ended up getting 33,000 more votes than 
President Trump. That is why President Trump came up short.
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
    The President, on this call, doesn't stop here. Let's 
listen to another part of the conversation between President 
Trump and Ms. Watson.

    President Trump. Anyway, but whatever you can do, Frances, it would 
be--it's a great thing. It's an important thing for the country. So 
important. You have no idea, it's so important----
    Ms. Watson. Well, Mr.----
    President Trump [continuing]. And I very much appreciate it.

    Mr. Schiff. ``Whatever you can do, Frances.'' This is the 
President of the United States calling an investigator looking 
into the election in which he is a candidate and asking her to 
do ``whatever you can do.''
    Mr. Secretary, he placed this call to your chief 
investigator on December 23, 2020. The Select Committee has 
received text messages indicating that Mark Meadows wanted to 
send some of the investigators in her office, in the words of 
one White House aide, ``a shitload of POTUS stuff,'' including 
``coins, actual autographed MAGA hats, et cetera.'' White House 
staff intervened to make sure that didn't happen.
    It was clear at the time of this call that the former 
President had his sights set on January 6th. Listen to this 
portion, when he told Frances Watson about a ``very important 
date.''

    President Trump. Do you think you'll be working after Christmas to 
keep it going fast? Because, you know, we have that date of the 6th, 
which is a very important date.

    Mr. Schiff. That important date, of course, was the joint 
session of Congress, where Georgia's electoral votes would be 
counted for Joe Biden.
    A little over a week after this call to Frances Watson, the 
President was finally able to speak with you, Secretary 
Raffensperger.
    Bear in mind as we discuss this call today that, by this 
point in time, early January, the election in Georgia had 
already been certified, but, perhaps more important, the 
President of the United States had already been told repeatedly 
by his own top Justice Department officials that the claims he 
was about to make to you about massive fraud in Georgia were 
completely false.
    Mr. Secretary, the call between you and the President 
lasted 67 minutes--over an hour. We obviously can't listen to 
the entire recording here today, although it is available on 
the Select Committee's website. But we will listen to selected 
excerpts of it now so that we can get your insights.
    Let's begin with the President raising the thoroughly 
debunked allegations of suitcases of ballots.

    President Trump. They weren't in an official voter box. They were 
in what looked to be suitcases or trunks, suitcases, but they weren't 
in--in voter boxes.
    The minimum number it could be, because we watched it and they--
they watched it and certified in slow motion, instant replay, if you 
can believe it. But it had slow motion, and it was magnified many times 
over. And the minimum it was, was 18,000 ballots, all for Biden.

    Mr. Schiff. These are the allegations that the Department 
of Justice, the Attorney General, the Georgia Bureau of 
Investigation, and your office had all said were false. Is that 
right?
    Mr. Raffensperger. Correct.
    Even more importantly, when BJay Pak resigned as U.S. 
attorney of the Northern District, President Trump appointed as 
acting U.S. attorney of the Northern District Bobby Christine. 
Bobby Christine looked at that, and he was quoted in the AJC 
that he found nothing, and he dismissed that case early also.
    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
    The President references suitcases or trunks. Mr. Sterling, 
were the objects seen in these videos suitcases or trunks, or 
were they just the ordinary containers that are used by 
election workers?
    Mr. Sterling. They are standard ballot carriers that allow 
for seals to be put on them so they are tamper-proof.
    Mr. Schiff. Finally, the President claims that there was a 
minimum of 18,000 ballots somehow smuggled in, all for Biden. I 
take it, gentlemen, that was also categorically false?
    Mr. Sterling. (A), there is no physical way you can know 
who those ballots are for.
    But, secondarily, Fulton County for years has been an issue 
in our State when it comes to elections. They had a very 
difficult time during the primary, in large part because of 
COVID. So, we had put them under a consent decree the secretary 
negotiated where we had a monitor on-site, and his name is 
Carter Jones.
    He took a notation. He had gone from State Farm to the 
English Street warehouse to look at election day activities, 
but before he left the State Farm Arena, he noted how many 
ballots had been counted on each one of the machines. When he 
came back after we found out they were working again, he took 
note again when they closed.
    I believe the final number was something around 8,900 total 
ballots were scanned from the time he left to the time--about 
12:30 or 1 o'clock in the morning, so way below 18,000.
    Mr. Schiff. Let's play the next clip.

    President Trump. I heard it was close, so I said, ``There's no 
way.'' But they dropped a lot of votes in there late at night. You know 
that, Brad.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, did somebody drop a lot of votes 
there late at night?
    Mr. Raffensperger. No. I believe that the President was 
referring to some of the counties when they would upload. But 
the ballots had all been accepted, and had to be accepted by 
State law, by 7 p.m. So, there were no additional ballots 
accepted after 7 p.m.
    Mr. Schiff. Let's play the next clip, in which the 
President makes claims about so-called ``dead voters.''

    President Trump. The other thing, dead people. So, dead people 
voted. And I think the--the number is close to 5,000 people. And they 
went to obituaries. They went to all sorts of methods to come up with 
an accurate number. And a minimum is close to about 5,000 voters.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, did your office investigate 
whether those allegations were accurate? Did 5,000 dead people 
in Georgia vote?
    Mr. Raffensperger. No, it is not accurate. Actually, in 
their lawsuits, they allege 10,315 dead people.
    We had found 2 dead people when I wrote my letter to 
Congress that is dated January 6th, and subsequent to that we 
found 2 more. That is--1, 2, 3--4 people, not 4,000, but just a 
total of 4, not 10,000, not 5,000.
    Mr. Schiff. Let's play the next clip.

    President Trump. And there's nothing wrong with saying that, you 
know, that you've recalculated because it's 2,236 in absentee ballots. 
I mean, they're all exact numbers that were--were done by accounting 
firms, law firms, et cetera. And even if you cut them in half, cut them 
in half, and cut them in half again, it's more votes than we need.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, is there any way that you could 
have lawfully changed the result in the State of Georgia and 
somehow explained it away as a recalculation?
    Mr. Raffensperger. No. The numbers are the numbers, and 
numbers don't lie.
    We had many allegations, and we investigated every single 
one of them. In fact, I challenged my team, did we miss 
anything?
    They said that there was over 66,000 underage voters. We 
found that there was actually zero. You can register to vote in 
Georgia when you are 17\1/2\. You have to be 18 by election 
day. We checked that out, every single voter.
    They said that there was 2,423 nonregistered voters. There 
were zero.
    They said that there was 2,056 felons. We identified less 
than 74 or less that were actually still on felony sentence.
    Every single allegation we checked, we ran down the rabbit 
trail to make sure that our numbers were accurate.
    Mr. Schiff. So, there is no way you could have recalculated 
except by fudging the numbers?
    Mr. Raffensperger. The numbers were the numbers. We could 
not recalculate because we had made sure that we had checked 
every single allegation. We had many investigations; we had 
nearly 300 from the 2020 election.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, you tried to push back when the 
President made these unsupported claims, whether they were 
about suitcases or ballots or that Biden votes were counted 
three times.
    Let's play the next clip.

    Secretary of State Raffensperger. Mr. President, they did not put 
that. We--we--we did an audit of that, and we proved conclusively that 
they were not scanned three times . . . 
    Yes, Mr. President, we'll send you the link from WSB----
    President Trump. I don't care about a link. I don't need it. I have 
a much better--we're gonna have a much better link.

    Mr. Schiff. You told the President you would send him a 
link from WSB, which I understand is a local television station 
that had an unedited video from the State Farm Arena, but the 
President wasn't interested in that. He said he had a ``much 
better link.''
    Mr. Secretary, at the time that you were on the call with 
the President, as we have shown, both the FBI and the Georgia 
Bureau of Investigation had proven these claims to be nonsense. 
You told him about these investigations on the phone.
    Let's listen to what President Trump had to say about the 
State and Federal law enforcement officers who investigated 
these false claims.

    President Trump. There's no way they could--then they're 
incompetent. They're either dishonest----
    Ms. Mitchell. Well, what did they find?
    President Trump. Then there's only two answers: dishonesty or 
incompetence. There's just no way. Look, there's no way.

    Mr. Schiff. But the President didn't stop at insinuating 
that law enforcement officers were either dishonest or 
incompetent. He went on to suggest that you could be subject to 
criminal liability for your role in the matter.
    Before I play that portion of the conversation, I would 
like to show you something that the President retweeted a 
couple weeks before your call with him.
    Here is the President retweeting a post from one of his 
allies, a lawyer who was later sanctioned by a judge in 
Michigan for making false claims of election fraud. Let's take 
a look at that tweet.
    The tweet read, ``President Trump @realDonaldTrump is a 
genuinely good man. He does not really like to fire people. I 
bet he dislikes putting people in jail, especially 
``Republicans.'' He gave @BrianKempGA & @GASecofState every 
chance to get it right. They refused. They will soon be going 
to jail.''
    So, on your call, this was not the first time the President 
was suggesting you might be criminally liable. With that, let's 
listen to this portion of the call.

    President Trump. I think you're going to find that they are 
shredding ballots because they have to get rid of the ballots because 
the ballots are unsigned, the ballots are--are corrupt, and they're 
brand-new and they don't have seals and there's a whole thing with the 
ballots. But the ballots are corrupt and you're going to find that they 
are--which is totally illegal.
    It's--it's more illegal for you than it is for them because you 
know what they did, and you're not reporting it. That's a--you know, 
that's a criminal--that's a criminal offense. And you know, you can't 
let that happen. That's--that's a big risk to you and to Ryan, your 
lawyer. And that's a big risk.

    Mr. Schiff. Secretary Raffensperger, after making a false 
claim about shredding of ballots, the President suggested that 
you may be committing a crime by not going along with his 
claims of election fraud.
    After suggesting that you might have criminal exposure, 
President Trump makes his most explicit ask of the call. Let's 
play a part of that conversation.

    President Trump. So, look, all I want to do is this: I just want to 
find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the 
State.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, was the President here asking 
you for exactly what he wanted--one more vote than his 
opponent?
    Mr. Raffensperger. What I knew is that we didn't have any 
votes to find. We had continued to look. We investigated, like 
I just shared the numbers with you. There were no votes to 
find. That was an accurate count that had been certified. As 
our general counsel said, there was no shredding of ballots.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, after making this request, the 
President then goes back to the danger of having you deny these 
allegations of fraud.
    Let's listen to that part of the clip.

    President Trump. And I watched you this morning and you said, 
``Well, there was no criminality,'' but I mean, all of this stuff is--
is very dangerous stuff. When you talk about ``no criminality,'' I 
think it's very dangerous for you to say that.

    Mr. Schiff. Secretary Raffensperger, you wrote about this 
in your book, and you said, ``I felt then and still believe 
today that this was a threat. Others obviously thought so, too, 
because some of Trump's more radical followers have responded 
as if it was their duty to carry out this threat.''
    Please tell us what you, your wife, even your daughter-in-
law experienced regarding threats from Trump's more radical 
followers.
    Mr. Raffensperger. Well, after the election, my email, my 
cell phone was doxxed, and so I was getting texts all over the 
country. Then eventually my wife started getting a text, and 
hers typically came in as sexualized texts, which were 
disgusting.
    You have to understand that Trish and I, we met in high 
school. We have been married over 40 years now. So, they 
started going after her, I think, just to probably put pressure 
on me: ``Why don't you just quit; walk away?'' So, that 
happened.
    Then some people broke into my daughter-in-law's home. My 
son has passed, and she is a widow and has two kids. So, we are 
very concerned about her safety also.
    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, why didn't you just quit and 
walk away?
    Mr. Raffensperger. Because I knew that we had followed the 
law and we had followed the Constitution. I think sometimes 
moments require you to stand up and just take the shots. You 
are doing your job. That is all we did.
    You know, we just followed the law, and we followed the 
Constitution, and, at the end of the day, President Trump came 
up short. But I had to be faithful to the Constitution. That is 
what I swore an oath to do.
    Mr. Schiff. During the remainder of the call, the former 
President continued to press you to find the remaining votes 
that would ensure his victory in Georgia. Let's listen to a 
little more.

    President Trump. Why wouldn't you want to find the right answer, 
Brad, instead of keep saying that the numbers are right?
    So, look, can you get together tomorrow? And Brad, we just want the 
truth. It's simple. And--and everyone's going to look very good if the 
truth comes out. It's okay. It takes a little while, but let the truth 
come out. And the truth--the real truth is, I won by 400,000 votes, at 
least.
    So--so what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 
votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break.

    Mr. Schiff. Four days after the President's call to 
Secretary Raffensperger was January 6th. The President whipped 
up the crowd in front of the Ellipse, once again promoting the 
allegation that Secretary Raffensperger and the President's own 
Attorney General had told him was false.
    Here he is on the Ellipse.

    President Trump. In Fulton County, Republican poll watchers were 
ejected, in some cases physically, from the room under the false 
pretense of a pipe burst--water main burst. Everybody leave. Which we 
now know was a total lie. Then election officials pulled boxes--
Democrats--and suitcases of ballots out from under a table--you all it 
saw on television--totally fraudulent, and illegally scanned them for 
nearly 2 hours, totally unsupervised. Tens of thousands of votes. This 
act coincided with a mysterious vote dump of up to 100,000 votes for 
Joe Biden, almost none for Trump. Oh, that sounds fair. That was at 
1:34 a.m.

    Mr. Schiff. Mr. Secretary, Mr. Sterling, I want to thank 
you for your service to the State of Georgia and to the 
country.
    Speaker Bowers, likewise, I want to thank you for your 
service to the State of Arizona and to the country.
    You have served not only your home States but our Nation 
and our democracy.
    Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you, Mr. Schiff.
    I thank the witnesses for joining us today. You are now 
dismissed.
    I now welcome our final witness this afternoon, Wandrea 
``Shaye'' Moss.
    Ms. Moss worked in the Department of Registration and 
Elections in Fulton County, Georgia, from 2017 until 2022. In 
that job, Ms. Moss handled voter applications and absentee-
ballot requests and also helped to process the vote count for 
several elections.
    In December 2020, Ms. Moss and her mother, Ms. Ruby 
Freeman, became the target of nasty lies spread by President 
Trump and his allies as they sought to overturn the election 
results in Georgia.
    Ms. Moss and her mother, Ms. Freeman, are two of the unsung 
heroes in this country, doing the hard work of keeping our 
democracy functioning for every American.
    Ms. Moss, welcome. Thank you for your service, and I thank 
you for being here today.
    I will now swear you in. Please stand.
    [Witness sworn.]
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you. Please be seated.
    Let the record reflect that the witness answered in the 
affirmative.
    Ms. Moss, thank you very much for being here today.
    I understand that you are here along with your mother 
today. Would you like to introduce your mama?
    Ms. Moss. Yes. My mama.
    Chairman Thompson. Hi, ma.
    Ms. Moss, today we will be asking you about some of the 
threats that you received following the 2020 election.
    Since you have been an election worker for over 10 years, I 
wanted to ask you, in your decade of service, had you ever 
experienced threats like these before?
    Ms. Moss. No.
    Chairman Thompson. Don't be nervous. Just--I understand.
    So--and I want to make sure that the record reflects that 
you have done it for quite a while and you have never received 
a threat and your answer was, ``No.''
    Ms. Moss. Correct.
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you.
    Pursuant to section 5(c)(8) of House Resolution 503, the 
Chair recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. Schiff, for 
questions.
    Mr. Schiff. Good afternoon, Ms. Moss. Thank you for being 
here.
    I understand that you were employed by the Fulton County 
Registration and Elections Department for more than 10 years, 
and I understand that you loved that job.
    Please tell us what made you so fond of the work that you 
did.
    Ms. Moss. Well, I have always been told by my grandmother 
how important it is to vote and how people before me, a lot of 
people, older people in my family did not have that right.
    So, what I loved most about my job were the older voters. 
Younger people could usually do everything from their phone or 
go on-line, but the older voters like to call, they like to 
talk to you, they like to get my card, they like to know that 
every election I am here.
    Like, even college students. A lot of parents trust in me 
to make sure their child does not have to drive home. They will 
get an absentee ballot; they can vote.
    I really found pleasure in that. I liked being the one 
that--you know, if someone can't navigate My Voter Page or, you 
know, they want a new precinct card and they don't have a copy 
machine or a computer or all of that, I could put it in the 
mail for them.
    I was excited always about sending out all the absentee 
ballots for the elderly, disabled people. I even remember 
driving to a hospital to give someone her absentee application. 
That is what I loved the most.
    Mr. Schiff. So, you really enjoyed helping people vote and 
participate, and that was something, the right to vote, that 
your grandmother taught you was precious.
    Ms. Moss. Yes.
    Mr. Schiff. Well, I know the events that we are here to 
talk about today are incredibly difficult to relive.
    Your proud service as an election worker took a dramatic 
turn on the day that Rudy Giuliani publicized a video of you 
and your mother counting ballots on election night.
    President Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and others claimed, on the 
basis of this video, that you and your mother were somehow 
involved in a plot to kick out observers, bring suitcases of 
false ballots for Biden into the arena, and then run them 
through the machines multiple times.
    None of that was true, was it?
    Ms. Moss. None of it.
    Mr. Schiff. I would like to show you some of the statements 
that Rudy Giuliani made in a second hearing before the Georgia 
State legislators a week after that video clip from State Farm 
Arena was first circulated by Mr. Giuliani and President Trump.
    I want to advise viewers that these statements are 
completely false and also deeply disturbing.

    Mr. Giuliani. Tape earlier in the day of Ruby Freeman and Shaye 
Freeman Moss and one other gentleman quite obviously surreptitiously 
passing around USB ports as if they are vials of heroin or cocaine. I 
mean, it's our--it's obvious to anyone who's a criminal investigator or 
prosecutor they are engaged in surreptitious illegal activity again 
that day, and that's a week ago, and they're still walking around 
Georgia lying.
    They should have been--they should have been--should have been 
questioned already. Their places of work, their homes, should have been 
searched for evidence of ballots, for evidence of USB ports, for 
evidence of voter fraud.

    Mr. Schiff. That video was from Rudy Giuliani's appearance 
at a Georgia State house hearing on December 10.
    How did you become aware--how did you first become aware 
that Rudy Giuliani, the President's lawyer, was accusing you 
and your mother of a crime?
    Ms. Moss. I was at work, like always. The former chief, Mr. 
Jones, asked me to come to his office. When I went to his 
office, the former director, Mr. Barron, was in there, and they 
showed me a video on their computer.
    It was just, like, a very short clip of us working at State 
Farm. It had someone on the video, like, talking over the 
video, just saying that we were doing things that we weren't 
supposed to do, just lying throughout the video.
    That is when I first found out about it.
    Mr. Schiff. Were there social media posts that they showed 
you responding to those false claims?
    Ms. Moss. Well, when I saw the video, of course the first 
thing that I said was, like, ``Why? Why are they doing this? 
What's going on?''
    They, you know, just told me that Trump and his allies were 
not satisfied with the outcome of the election, and they were 
getting a lot of threats and being harassed on-line, and asked 
me, you know, have I been receiving anything, and I need to 
check on my mom.
    I told them--you know, I was like, ``Where? Where have 
they--you know, where have you been getting these threats? I 
don't believe I have any.'' Mr. Jones told me, like, they are 
attacking his Facebook. I don't really use Facebook. I have 
one. So, I went to the Facebook app.
    I am just kind-of panicky at this point because this has 
never happened to me, and my mom is involved. I am, like, her 
only child.
    So, I am just asking him, like, ``Well, where are the 
messages? All I see is the feed. Like, how do you get to the 
messages?'' He said, ``It's another icon on your phone that 
says Messenger.''
    I went to that icon, and it was just a lot of horrible 
things there.
    Mr. Schiff. Those horrible things, did they include 
threats?
    Ms. Moss. Yes, a lot of threats, wishing death upon me, 
telling me that, you know, I will be in jail with my mother, 
and saying things like, ``Be glad it's 2020 and not 1920.'' 
That is--yes.
    Mr. Schiff. Were a lot of these threats and vile comments 
racist in nature?
    Ms. Moss. A lot of them were racist. A lot of them were 
just hateful. But, yes, sir.
    Mr. Schiff. In one of the videos we just watched, Mr. 
Giuliani accused you and your mother of passing some sort of 
USB drive to each other. What was your mom actually handing you 
on that video?
    Ms. Moss. A ginger mint.
    Mr. Schiff. It wasn't just Rudy Giuliani; we heard 
President Trump make these false allegations repeatedly during 
his call with Secretary Raffensperger.
    Let's listen to a portion of what he had to say about you 
and your mother.

    President Trump. We had at least 18,000. That's on tape. We had 
them counted very painstakingly. 18,000 voters having to do with Ruby 
Freeman. That's--she's a vote scammer, a professional vote scammer and 
hustler.

    Mr. Schiff. Donald Trump attacked you and your mother, 
using her name, 18 times on that call--18 times.
    Ms. Moss, can you describe what you experienced listening 
to former President Trump attack you and your mother in a call 
with the Georgia secretary of state?
    Ms. Moss. I felt horrible. I felt like it was all my fault, 
like if I would have never decided to be an elections worker--
like, I could have done anything else, but that is what I 
decided to do, and now people are lying and spreading rumors 
and lies and attacking my mom. I am her only child. Going to my 
grandmother's house--I am her only grandchild. And my kid. It 
is just--I felt so bad.
    I just felt bad for my mom, and I felt horrible for picking 
this job and being the one that always wants to help and always 
there, never missing out one election. I just felt like it was 
my fault for putting my family in this situation.
    Mr. Schiff. Well, it wasn't your fault.
    Your mother was kind enough to come speak with us earlier. 
Let's listen to her story in her words.

    Ms. Freeman. My name is Ruby Freeman. I've always believed it when 
God says that He'll make your name great, but this is not the way it 
was supposed to be. I could have never imagined the events that 
followed the Presidential election 2020. For my entire professional 
life, I was Lady Ruby. My community in Georgia, where I was born and 
lived my whole life, knew me as Lady Ruby.
    I built my own business around that name, LaRuby's Unique 
Treasures, a pop-up shop catering to ladies with unique fashions. I 
wore a shirt that proudly proclaimed that I was, and I am, Lady Ruby.
    Actually, I had that shirt on--I had that shirt in every color. I 
wore that shirt on election day 2020. I haven't worn it since, and I'll 
never wear it again.
    Now I won't even introduce myself by my name anymore. I get nervous 
when I bump into someone I know in the grocery store who says my name. 
I'm worried about who's listening. I get nervous when I have to give my 
name for food orders. I'm always concerned of who's around me. I've 
lost my name, and I've lost my reputation.
    I've lost my sense of security, all because a group of people, 
starting with Number 45 and his ally, Rudy Giuliani, decided to 
scapegoat me and my daughter Shaye--to push their own lies about how 
the Presidential election was stolen.

    Mr. Schiff. Ms. Moss, how has this experience of being 
targeted by the former President and his allies affected your 
life?
    Ms. Moss. It has turned my life upside down. I no longer 
give out my business cards. I don't transfer calls. I don't 
want anyone knowing my name. I don't want to go anywhere with 
my mom because she might yell my name out over the grocery 
aisle or something. I don't go to the grocery store at all. I 
haven't been anywhere at all. I have gained about 60 pounds.
    I just don't do nothing anymore. I don't want to go 
anywhere. I second-guess everything that I do. It has affected 
my life in a major way, in every way, all because of lies, of 
me doing my job, same thing I have been doing forever.
    Mr. Schiff. Your mother also told the Select Committee 
about how she had to leave her own home for her safety and go 
into hiding after the FBI told her that it would not be safe 
for her there before January 6th and until the inauguration.
    Let's listen to a clip of her story in her own words.

    Ms. Freeman. Around the week of January 6th, the FBI informed me 
that I needed to leave my home for safety. And I left my home for 
safety around that time.
    Ms. Lucier. Understood. How--how long did you stay out, did you, 
you know, remain outside of your home for your own safety?
    Ms. Freeman. I--I stayed away from my home for approximately 2 
months . . . 
    It was horrible. I felt homeless. I felt, you know, I can't 
believe--I can't believe this person has caused this much damage to me 
and my family. To have to leave my home that I've lived there for 21 
years. And, you know, I'm having to have my neighbors watch out for me. 
You know, and I have to go and stay with somebody.
    It was hard. It was horrible.
    Ms. Lucier. And your conversation with the FBI about needing to 
leave your home for your own safety or perhaps recommending it. Do you 
remember was there a specific threat that prompted that or was it the 
accumulation of threats that you had received?
    Ms. Freeman. What prompted it was--was getting ready to--January 
6th was about to come. And they did not want me to be at home because 
of all the threats and everything that I had gotten. They didn't want 
me to be there in fear of, you know, that people were coming to my 
home. And I had a lot of that, so they didn't want me to be there just 
in case something happened.
    I asked, ``How long am I going to have to be gone?'' They said, 
``At least until the inauguration.''

    Mr. Schiff. Ms. Moss, I understand that people once showed 
up at your grandmother's house. Tell us about that experience.
    Ms. Moss. I received a call from my grandmother. This woman 
is my everything. I have never even heard her or seen her cry 
ever in my life. She called me, screaming at the top of her 
lungs, like, ``Shaye, Shaye, oh my God, Shaye,'' just freaking 
me out, saying that there were people at her home, and they, 
you know, they knocked on the door. Of course, she opened it 
and was seeing who was there, who it was. They just started 
pushing their way through, claiming that they were coming in to 
make a citizen's arrest. They needed to find me and my mom; 
they knew we were there. She was just screaming and didn't know 
what to do.
    I wasn't there, so, you know, I just felt so helpless and 
so horrible for her. She was just screaming. I told her to 
close the door; don't open the door for anyone. You know, she's 
a 70-something--I won't say--year-old woman, and she doesn't 
like having restrictions. She wants to answer the door. She 
likes to get her steps in walking around the neighborhood. I 
had to tell her, like: You can't do that. You have to be safe.
    You know, she would tell me that, at night, people would 
just continuously send pizzas over and over to her home, you 
know. They were expecting her to pay for these large amounts of 
pizzas. She went through a lot that she didn't have to. Once 
again, it made me just feel horrible.
    Mr. Schiff. In addition to the personal impact this 
experience has had on you and your family, one of the things 
that I find most disturbing is how these lies discourage long-
time election workers from continuing to do this important 
work. Tell us, if you would, of the other election workers 
shown in that State Farm Arena video and their supervisors, how 
many are still election workers in Fulton County?
    Ms. Moss. There is no permanent election worker or 
supervisor in that video that is still there.
    Mr. Schiff. Did you end up leaving your position as well?
    Ms. Moss. Yes, I left.
    Mr. Schiff. Ms. Moss, I want to thank you for coming in to 
speak with us and to thank you for service to our democracy. 
What we have just played is a truly horrible and appalling 
sample, but just a sample of the things that were said about 
you and your mother following the election.
    I want to say how very sorry I think we all are for what 
you have gone through, and, tragically, you are not alone. 
Other election workers around the country have also been the 
subject of lies and threats. No election worker should be 
subject to such heinous treatment just for doing their job.
    With your permission, I would like to give mother the last 
word.
    Ms. Moss. Yes.
    Mr. Schiff. We are just going to play the tape.

    Ms. Freeman. There is nowhere I feel safe. Nowhere. Do you know how 
it feels to have the President of the United States to target you? The 
President of the United States is supposed to represent every American, 
not to target one. But he targeted me, Lady Rudy, a small business 
owner, a mother, a proud American citizen who stand up to help Fulton 
County run an election in the middle of the pandemic.

    Mr. Schiff. Thank you, Ms. Moss.
    Thank you, Ms. Freeman, or, as America now knows her, Lady 
Ruby, for your service to Fulton County, Georgia, our country, 
and our democracy.
    Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. Thank you, Mr. Schiff.
    Ms. Moss.
    Ms. Moss. Yes, sir.
    Chairman Thompson. I want to thank you for sharing with us 
the very troubling story of what you and your mother 
experienced. The harassment of election workers like you for 
simply doing your duty as public servants poses a threat to our 
democratic process.
    Your testimony is an important contribution to the work of 
our Committee and serves as a reminder to all of us that the 
safety of local election officials is vital to ensuring that 
our elections are always free and fair.
    I want to thank our witnesses for joining us today. The 
Members of the Select Committee may have additional questions 
for today's witnesses. We ask that you respond expeditiously in 
writing to those questions.
    Without objection, Members will be permitted 10 business 
days to submit statements for the record, including opening 
remarks and additional questions for the witnesses.
    Without objection, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California, Mr. Schiff, for a closing statement.
    Mr. Schiff. For more than 200 years, our democracy has been 
distinguished by the peaceful transfer of power. When an 
American raises their right-hand and takes the Presidential 
oath of office, they are transformed from an ordinary citizen 
into the most powerful person in the world, the President.
    This is an awesome power to acquire. It is even more 
awesome when it is handed on peacefully.
    When George Washington relinquished the Office of the 
Presidency, it set a precedent that served as a beacon for 
other nations struggling against tyranny.
    When Ronald Reagan described it as a kind of miracle in the 
eyes of the world, he was exactly right. Other countries use 
violence to seize and hold power, but not in the United States, 
not in America.
    When Donald Trump used the power of the Presidency to try 
to stay in office after losing the election to Joe Biden, he 
broke that sacred and centuries-old covenant. Whether his 
actions were criminal will ultimately be for others to decide. 
But what he did was without a doubt un-Constitutional. It was 
unpatriotic, and it was fundamentally un-American. When he used 
the power of his Presidency to put the enormous pressure on 
State, local, and local elections officials, and his own Vice 
President, it became downright dangerous. On January 6th, that 
pressure became deadly.
    Ruby Freeman said that the President is supposed to protect 
every American, not target them. She is right. If the most 
powerful person in the world can bring the full weight of the 
Presidency down on an ordinary citizen, who was merely doing 
her job, with a lie as big and heavy as a mountain, who among 
us is safe? None of us is. None of us.
    In city councils and town councils, on school boards and 
election boards, from the Congress to the courts, dedicated 
public servants are leaving their posts because of death 
threats to them and to their families. This is not who we are. 
It must not become who we are.
    Our democracy held because courageous people like those you 
heard from today put their oath to the Constitution above their 
loyalty to one man or to one party. The system held, but 
barely. The question remains, will it hold again?
    If we are able to communicate anything during these 
hearings, I hope it is this: We have been blessed beyond 
measure to live in the world's greatest democracy. That is a 
legacy to be proud of and to cherish, but it is not one to be 
taken for granted. That we have lived in a democracy for more 
than 200 years does not mean we shall do so tomorrow.
    We must reject violence. We must embrace our Constitution 
with the reverence it deserves, take our oath of office and 
duties as citizens seriously, informed by the knowledge of 
right and wrong, and armed with no more than the power of our 
ideas and the truth carry on this venerable experiment in self-
governance.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. Without objection, the Chair recognizes 
the gentlewoman from Wyoming, Ms. Cheney, for a closing 
statement.
    Vice Chair Cheney. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Lady Ruby and Shaye, thank you for your courage. Thank you 
for your strength. Thank you for being here today. It means so 
much for everyone to hear your story. So, thank you for that.
    We have had tremendous testimony today. We have been 
reminded that we are a Nation of laws. We have been reminded by 
you and by Speaker Bowers and Secretary of State Raffensperger 
and Mr. Sterling that our institutions don't defend themselves; 
individuals do that.
    We are reminded that it takes public servants. It takes 
people who have made a commitment to our system to defend our 
system.
    We also have been reminded what it means to take an oath 
under God to the Constitution, and what it means to defend the 
Constitution. We were reminded by Speaker Bowers that our 
Constitution is indeed a divinely-inspired document.
    So, it has been an honor to spend time with you and with 
our previous witnesses here today.
    To date, more than 30 witnesses called before this 
Committee have not done what you have done but have invoked 
their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination: Roger 
Stone took the Fifth. General Michael Flynn took the Fifth. 
John Eastman took the Fifth.
    Others, like Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, simply refuse 
to comply with lawful subpoenas, and they have been indicted.
    Mark Meadows has hidden behind President Trump's claims of 
executive privilege and immunity from subpoenas. We are engaged 
now in litigation with Mr. Meadows.
    The American people in our hearings have heard from Bill 
Barr, Jeff Rosen, Richard Donoghue, and many others who stood 
up and did what is right. They will hear more of that testimony 
soon.
    But the American people have not yet heard from Mr. Trump's 
former White House Counsel, Pat Cipollone. Our Committee is 
certain that Donald Trump does not want Mr. Cipollone to 
testify here. Indeed, our evidence shows that Mr. Cipollone and 
his office tried to do what was right. They tried to stop a 
number of President Trump's plans for January 6th.
    Today, and in our coming hearings, you will hear testimony 
from other Trump White House staff explaining what Mr. 
Cipollone said and did, including on January 6th.
    But we think the American people deserve to hear from Mr. 
Cipollone personally. He should appear before this Committee, 
and we are working to secure his testimony.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Chairman Thompson. People answer the call to public service 
in such different ways. Some run for office. Some volunteer to 
make sure their neighbors can get to their voting locations. 
Some work at polling sites to help election day go smoothly. 
Some look into problems to guarantee our elections are secure 
and accurate, just to name a few.
    As I mentioned at the start of this hearing, when we talk 
about our democratic institutions, we are talking about these 
individuals and many others who do these jobs across the 
country. They represent the backbone of our democracy at its 
most important moments: When the citizens cast their votes and 
when those votes are counted.
    We have heard the stories of their courage. They have 
earned the thanks of a grateful Nation.
    But, for Donald Trump, these witnesses and others like them 
were another roadblock to his attempt to cling to power.
    On Thursday, we will hear about another part of that 
scheme, his attempt to corrupt the country's top law 
enforcement body, the Justice Department, to support his 
attempt to overturn the election.
    Just as we heard today that Donald Trump was deeply 
involved in a scheme to pressure State officials to overturn 
the election results, we will hear on Thursday that Donald 
Trump was also the driving force behind an effort to corrupt 
the Justice Department. Listen to this clip from the former 
Acting Deputy Attorney General, Richard Donoghue.

    Former Acting Deputy Attorney General Donoghue. The President said, 
``Suppose I do this. Suppose I replace him,'' Jeff Rosen, ``with him,'' 
Jeff Clark. ``What do you do?'' And I said, ``Sir, I would resign 
immediately. There is no way I'm serving 1 minute under this guy.'' 
Jeff Clark.

    Chairman Thompson. You will hear from Mr. Donoghue in 
person on Thursday, as my colleague, Mr. Kinzinger, presents 
details about this plan.
    The Chair requests those in the hearing room remain seated 
until the Capitol Police have escorted Members from the room.
    Without objection, the Committee stands adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 3:39 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]

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