Senator Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and Senator David Perdue (R-GA), wave during a campaign event on the Olde Blind Dog Irish Pub, in Milton, Georgia, December 21, 2020.
Al Drago | Reuters
The complete special grand jury report that led to the criminal indictment of former President Donald Trump and 18 others for attempting to overturn his 2020 Georgia election loss beneficial also charging two former U.S. senators from the state, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, and current U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
Neither of those three current and former Republican lawmakers were indicted last month by the regular Fulton County Superior Court grand jury that charged Trump and the opposite defendants.
The complete 25-page report of the special grand jury, which finished its investigative work last winter, was released Friday morning.
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) looks on during a news conference calling to designate Russia as state sponsor of terrorism, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, U.S., September 14, 2022.
Tom Brenner | Reuters
The special panel had the ability to subpoena evidence and testimony from witnesses but didn’t have the authority to issue indictments.
Nevertheless, along with the three senators, the special grand jury also had beneficial indictments be issued against 18 other individuals who were ultimately not charged by the regular grand jury last month, along with the individuals who did find yourself being indicted.
Those beneficial for indictment, but not charged, included former Trump national security advisor Michael Flynn, Trump advisor and lawyer Boris Epshteyn, and campaign lawyer Cleta Mitchell, in keeping with the report.
The special grand jury beneficial that Graham, Perdue and Loeffler, together with others, ought to be indicted for crimes related to “the national effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, focused on efforts in Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and the District of Columbia.”
Each Perdue and Loeffler, who were sitting senators on the time of the 2020 election, were defeated in early 2021 runoff elections by Democrats, Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.
Trump’s continued false claims of election fraud within the 2020 presidential contest were seen as aspects that led to the defeat of each Perdue and Loeffler, and Democrats taking majority control of the Senate in 2021.
Graham, a staunch Trump ally, is understood to have called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger after the November 2020 election to ask about absentee ballots in that contest.
Graham told reporters in South Carolina later Friday, “So at the top of the day, nothing happened. What I did was consistent with my job as being United States senator, chairman of the Judiciary Committee.”
“We’re opening up Pandora’s box,” Graham added. “I feel the system on this country is getting off the rails. And we now have to watch out not to make use of the legal system as a political tool.”
Flynn’s lawyer Jesse Binnall in a press release said, “Today’s report reveals much more corruption by a politically-motivated prosecutor with one goal: to take down President Trump and his associates, and interfere within the 2024 election.”
“This baseless witch hunt is not based on the facts, or the law, or reality,” Binnall said.
A footnote within the special grand jury report says that one juror voted against recommending indictments against Perdue and Loeffler on a racketeering conspiracy charge because they believed that the then-senators’ “statements following the November 2020 election, while pandering to their political base, didn’t give rise to their being guilty of a criminal conspiracy.”
The special grand jury was utilized by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis over seven months since 2022 to assemble evidence and take testimony in her investigation of Trump and his allies in that election reversal effort.
Trump and his co-defendants were indicted by an everyday grand jury in Fulton County Superior Court last month on charges alleging a broad-ranging election conspiracy.
Previously unsealed sections of the special grand jury’s report said that members of the panel believed that a few of the 75 witnesses it heard testimony from had perjured themselves.
Trump and the opposite defendants within the case have pleaded not guilty.
Individually, Trump is charged in federal court in Washington, D.C., with crimes related to his bid to reverse the national victory of President Joe Biden within the 2020 election. Trump has pleaded not guilty to those charges.
Trump is currently the front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination within the upcoming election, teeing up a possible rematch in 2024.
In a social media post Friday, Trump wrote: “The Georgia Grand Jury report has just been released. It has ZERO credibility and badly taints Fani Willis and this whole political Witch Hunt.”
“Essentially, they desired to indict anybody who happened to be respiratory on the time,” Trump wrote within the Truth Social post. “It totally undermines the credibility of the findings, and badly hurts the Great State of Georgia, whose wonderful and patriotic people will not be completely satisfied with this charade of an uncontrolled ‘prosecutor’ doing the work of, and for, the DOJ. ELECTION INTERFERENCE!”
Correction: Raphael Warnock is a Democratic senator from Georgia. An earlier version misspelled his name.
