Trump says GA Election Board members are 'pit bulls' for 'victory,' but is that their job?

At a rally in Atlanta on Saturday , former President Donald Trump praised three members of the Georgia State Election Board as “pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency and victory.” Trump even shouted them out by name, saying they "are doing a great job."

It was a very specific hat tip from the Republican presidential nominee to three members of a generally obscure group of state officials who oversee elections in the key battleground state.

All three members of the board — Dr. Janice Johnston, Rick Jaffares and Janelle King — have, like Trump, questioned the results of the 2020 election. And the trio came under fire recently from a good government group for quietly holding a meeting without the other two members in an attempt to pass new election rules that would increase the number of partisan poll watchers.

“To the extent that Trump is that intimately aware of who is on the State Election Board and is championing them … that should raise the alarm bells for everybody, said Chioma Chukwu, the interim executive director of American Oversight, a nonprofit that pushes for government transparency. American Oversight said that partisan actors could use the proposed rule changes to sow chaos and confusion into the 2024 election.

Trump lost the 2020 election in Georgia by about 12,000 votes, and famously pressured Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, both Republicans, to help overturn the election. Neither agreed.

“In my opinion, they want us to lose,” Trump said of the two men at the Saturday rally. He also called Kemp “a bad guy” and “a disloyal guy.”

Legislature removed Raffensperger from State Election Board

The Republican Party, the Democratic Party, the Georgia Senate, the Georgia House of Representatives each appoint one of four-member Georgia State Election Board. The governor appoints the chair.

The majority that questions the 2020 election results came into power this year, when Jaffares and King joined Dr. Janice Johnston, a 2022 Republican Party appointee who advocated for another state investigation into the 2020 election.

The board is responsible for creating rules to administer the state’s elections, and for years was chaired by the secretary of state, who is elected. But months after the 2020 election, the Republican-majority state legislature passed a sweeping election overhaul law that implemented stricter new rules about voting and overhauled the board.

The law removed Raffensperger as the board’s chair, instead making the secretary of state an advisory member without voting power, and giving the legislature the power to appoint the chair. Raffensperger has been a target of Trump and his allies ever since Trump called him days after the election and asked him to "find" enough votes to declare him the winner, and Raffensperger declined. (He also defeated a Trump-backed challenger in the 2022 primary.)

The law also gave the Election Board more power, including the ability to suspend some local election administrators. Then, in 2024, the legislature passed and Kemp signed another election bill that removed the secretary of state altogether.

“Brad is directly accountable to the voters,” Jordan Fuchs, deputy secretary of state, said of Raffensperger in a statement to USA TODAY. “These unelected board members are not, which allows them to be politically leveraged and chased down by every wild internet conspiracy theory.”

Three Trumpian Republicans make up a majority

In January, the Georgia Senate, run by Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, confirmed Rick Jeffares as that body’s pick for the board. Jeffares posted memes shortly after the 2020 election “that suggested dead people had voted by mail, claimed the Democrats and China had colluded, and implied that Democrats had cheated,” according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution . (Jones, the lieutenant governor, served as a fake member of the Electoral College , as part of Trump's effort to overturn the election.)

In May, the state House of Representatives confirmed King to replace Ed Lindsey, a Republican who faced criticism on the right for his support for no-excuse absentee voting and his lobbying career . King proposed re-opening a state investigation of the 2020 election.

Three members hastily adopted new election rules

Jaffres, Johnston and King met in July and hastily passed two election-related rules, but withdrew them after American Oversight sued alleging the members violated the state’s Open Meetings Act.

One of the rules increased the number of partisan poll watchers to observe ballot counting, something that Chukwu of American Oversight said could increase the likelihood of intimidating election workers or having poll watchers observe personal information they’re not supposed to see.

The other required county election boards to post daily ballot counts on their websites, something that Chukwu said Raffensperger’s office already does.

“It’s unclear the purpose of duplicating efforts that already exist, other than to provide individuals, partisan operatives, the ability to have a laser-focus in jurisdictions where they can decide they want to challenge voter registrations and votes,” she said.

American Oversight alleged in its lawsuit the rules were unlawful because the members did not provide at least one week of advance notice; that the meeting did not involve a quorum of three people appearing in person because Johnston attended remotely; and did not provide teleconference access to the meeting for the general public.

Jeffares and Johnston didn't respond to requests for comment.

American Oversight also said the three Republican board members went ahead with the July 12 meeting despite advance guidance from the Georgia Attorney General's office that the meeting would likely violate Georgia law. Kara Murray, the state Attorney General's office communications director, told USA TODAY the office can't speak about communications with the board because it represents the election board and therefore is constrained by attorney-client privilege.

Janelle King, one of the board members Trump praised, told USA TODAY everything “was conducted within legal limits as long as the majority of the board agreed to participate.” However, “in the spirit of board unity,” they decided to redo the July 12 meeting and are now set to consider proposed rules Aug. 6.

Georgia Republican Party seeks involvement in the case

According to American Oversight’s lawsuit, Georgia Republican Party Chair Josh McKoon emailed the text of the two proposed rules to Jeffares on July 8. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution also reported it had documents showing McKoon sent Jeffares the proposed rules as well as talking points on why to adopt them.

The Georgia Republican Party asked a court July 25 to participate in American Oversight’s lawsuit against the board members, saying it also has an interest in how the litigation turns out.

Asked by USA TODAY if anyone from the Republican Party or Trump campaign tried to influence or pressure her to pass the rules, King replied, “Absolutely not!” and that she simply read the petitions and decided based on the facts and evidence.

Trump praised the Georgia State Elections Board

Trump declared at the Saturday Atlanta rally that the three Republican board members were "on fire" — riling some Democrats concerned about the integrity of the upcoming election.

"He's clearly in favor of their efforts to alter how elections are certified," Dave Hoffman, communications director for Georgia Democrats, told USA TODAY. He pointed to the state Republican Party's role in the proposed rules and talking points.

King said she didn't speak to anyone from the state party, the Trump campaign, or the Republican National Committee about the rules. Asked about Trump's praise for her, she said there is low confidence in elections across the political spectrum, and she wants to ensure Georgia voters can have confidence in the results.

The Georgia Republican Party said it was seeking to intervene in the American Oversight litigation to ensure Georgia elections "are devoid of any fraud, deceit, or abuse."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump says GA Election Board members are 'pit bulls' for 'victory,' but is that their job?