Page:Final Report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.pdf/251

 suitcase and run through the machines several times, it was not true, that we had looked at it, we looked at the video, we interviewed the witnesses, and it was not true."

Likewise, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger told President Trump that his allegations about the video were false. During his January 2nd call with the President, Raffensperger explained that Giuliani's team "sliced and diced that video and took it out of context" and that "the events that transpired are nowhere near what was projected" once one looks at more complete footage. Raffensperger also explained to the President that his team "did an audit of that, and we proved conclusively that they were not scanned three times." Yet, when Raffensperger said he would send President Trump a link to the television segment, the President refused: "I don't care about the link. I don't need it."

The actual evidence contradicted all of President Trump's claims about what the Fulton County video depicted. For example, the chief investigator for Raffensperger's office explained in a December 6th court filing that "there were no mystery ballots that were brought in from an unknown location and hidden under tables" As the investigator noted, the security footage showed there was nothing under the table when it was brought into the room. Hours later, with reporters and observers present, the "video shows ballots that had already been opened but not counted placed in the boxes, sealed up, [and] stored under the table." This finding was affirmed by the FBI, DOJ, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which interviewed witnesses and reviewed the full video footage and machine data from the site.

The ballots in question were not double counted. This was confirmed by a full hand recount in November, as well as a subsequent review by investigators. They found that although one of the workers was shown in the video scanning certain batches multiple times, this was for a valid reason: her scanner kept jamming. The investigators confirmed from scanner logs, as well as the footage, that she only hit the "accept" button once per batch. Investigators also found that staff likely did not tell the observers to leave, let alone forcefully eject them from the facility.

Despite this conclusive evidence and testimony, President Trump continued to point to the Fulton County video as evidence of a grand conspiracy. On January 5th, for instance, President Trump's executive assistant emailed a document "from POTUS" to Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) that cited "Suitcase Gate" among the "worst fraud incidents" in Georgia.