Top state officials confirm they have been subpoenaed by special grand jury in Trump election probe

ATLANTA — Channel 2 Action News has confirmed that the special grand jury investigating the 2020 election has sent out subpoenas to Georgia’s top election official.

The special grand jury is looking into whether former President Donald Trump -- or anyone -- tried to influence the outcome of the vote.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ office confirmed exclusively to Channel 2 Action News Thursday that testimony is scheduled to commence in June before the special grand jury selected earlier this month to investigate certain matters connected to the 2020 presidential vote in Georgia.

“You and your boss Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger have been subpoenaed, correct?” Channel 2 investigative reporter Mark Winne asked Gabriel Sterling with the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office.

“That’s correct,” Sterling told Winne.

“And your response?” Winne asked Sterling.

“You comply with subpoenas, you go in there you tell the truth, follow the law and that’s what this office always does and will continue to do,” Sterling said.

The investigative grand jury cannot bring criminal charges but instead can issue a report and vote on whether to recommend that another grand jury consider charges.

An official with Raffensperger’s office confirms that Raffensperger has been subpoenaed by the special Fulton County grand jury to appear in June as have several key current or former aides.

Sterling said he’s the Secretary of State’s COO and has already answered questions by the DA’s office about how an election works and other things.

“We knew this was coming. We knew it was part of the process,” Sterling said.

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The DA’s office said the special grand jury will investigate whether Trump broke state law when he asked Raffensperger to find enough votes to overturn Georgia’s presidential election results which went in favor of Joe Biden.

A late January 2020 WSBTV.com report referred to a statement released by Trump saying, in part:

“My phone call to the Secretary of State of Georgia was perfect. I knew there were large numbers of people on the line, including numerous lawyers for both sides. I didn’t say anything wrong in the call, made while I was President on behalf of the United States of America, to look into the massive voter fraud which took place in Georgia.”

“Mark, there wasn’t any massive voter fraud in Georgia. We looked into every single item that was brought up and we have small minor things you see in every election, every single time,” Sterling told Winne on Thursday.

The DA’s office said the special grand jury will also look at several other matters concerning the 2020 election besides the now-infamous phone call, one of them the seemingly sudden resignation of the Atlanta-based U.S. Attorney Bjay Pak in early January 2021.

Pak confirmed to Winne that he spoke to investigators from the DA’s office weeks ago about the circumstances surrounding his resignation as the top federal prosecutor in the Atlanta area amid controversy over the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.

He said that as a political appointee, he worked at the pleasure of the president, so he is not aware of how the circumstances of his departure from his U.S. attorney job could be a violation of state law but that he has cooperated with every agency wanting to know about it, answering all their questions.

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