Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has previously warned that there are serious consequences for “those who are exploiting the emotions of many Trump supporters with fantastic claims, half-truths, [and] misinformation” — including the potential to undermine GOP candidates in the runoffs in the state next month that will determine control of the Senate.
On Tuesday, an official working under Raffensperger — the state’s voting system implementation manager Gabe Sterling — sounded an even more consequential alarm in an impassioned speech at the capitol in Atlanta, urging Trump to stop worshipping the false prophet of election fraud before his message results in disaster. “Someone’s gonna get shot,” said Sterling, who oversaw the recount in Georgia. “Someone’s gonna get killed.”
“I don’t have anything scripted,” Sterling said, before delivering an articulate call to Trump and his advisers. “The people around the president know better. Mr President, as the secretary said yesterday, people aren’t giving you the best advice of what’s actually going on the ground. It’s time to look forward. If you want to run for reelection in four years, fine do it. But everything we’re seeing right now, there’s not a path. Be the bigger man here and stop — step in, tell your supporters, ‘Don’t be violent don’t intimidate.’ All that’s wrong. It’s un-American.”
Brad Raffensperger’s wife is certainly aware of the intimidation that has come in the wake of Trump’s campaign to pressure state-level Republicans to accept conspiratorial election fraud claims. In the past month, Tricia Raffensperger has received texts that have said that her “husband deserves to face a firing squad,” that “your life depends on” the recount, and that the couple “should be put on trial for treason and face execution.”
