Fulton County to challenge FBI seizure of 2020 election materials

Fulton County officials said they will file a motion in federal court challenging the legality of an FBI search warrant and the seizure of 2020 election materials taken from the Fulton County Elections Hub and Operations Center in Union City on Jan. 28.

County leaders said federal agents removed original ballots, voter rolls, ballot images and other records tied to the 2020 presidential election. Officials described the haul as "hundreds of boxes" of materials; other counts put the total at 700 boxes. A warrant obtained by county personnel listed broad categories of ballots, including absentee ballots, provisional ballots, in-person election day ballots, emergency ballots, damaged or destroyed ballots, duplicated ballots and "any ballot that was used to cast a vote."

Commissioner Marvin Arrington Jr. framed the county's challenge around security and verification problems created by the federal action. "They got copies of our voter rolls and all the original ballots," he said. "Now we cannot verify that we've received everything back because there was no chain-of-custody inventory taken at the time the records were seized." Arrington said he has asked the county attorney to pursue "any and all steps available to fight this criminal search warrant."

The motion is expected to be filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, at the Russell Federal Building. County attorneys plan to ask the court to order the return of the ballots, to keep the records in Georgia under seal and to require a forensic accounting of the materials taken, officials said. County leaders also emphasized a need to safeguard sensitive voter information contained among the seized records.

Federal officials said the evidence would be taken to an FBI records facility in Virginia. A former Justice Department official who discussed the action on a cable interview described the operation as the collection of judge-authorized evidence: "The FBI and the DOJ went in and collected numerous pieces of evidence that the judge authorized us to collect, and what we’re going to do next is go through the voluminous amounts of information collected and continue our investigation. At this point, there’s not much more I can say publicly," he said.

The filing follows a separate Justice Department civil motion filed last month seeking access to Fulton County's 2020 ballots and voting records. Fulton County's clerk of courts has moved to dismiss that civil action, arguing the records are sealed under state law and that the federal government has not shown a legitimate need for them. County officials corrected earlier wording in public statements to clarify they intend to file a motion challenging the criminal search and seizure, not a separate lawsuit.

The raid and expected court challenge have drawn sharp political response. Democratic leaders criticized the federal action and questioned the need to revisit a 2020 outcome that has been audited and recounted. Local officials called the seizure unprecedented and raised alarms about federal overreach and the potential to erode public confidence in elections.

Legal experts say the Northern District filings will focus on the sufficiency of the warrant and whether proper evidence procedures were followed during the seizure. If the court finds procedural defects, judges can order return of property or require remedial steps such as a documented inventory and forensic accounting. The case is likely to move quickly given the sensitivity of the materials and the county's stated demand that ballots be kept in-state and under seal while disputes proceed.