Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s top election official and a Republican candidate for governor, defended the state’s elections on Tuesday at a sprawling county warehouse near Atlanta where F.B.I. agents earlier this year seized ballots from the 2020 presidential race.
Mr. Raffensperger became a target of his own party after he rejected President Trump’s efforts to overturn his defeat in Georgia that year to Joseph R. Biden Jr. On Tuesday, he appeared to be sending a pointed message about the security of Georgia elections.
“I’m proud of the people we have,” he said, complimenting election workers in Fulton County in particular, whom Mr. Trump has repeatedly accused without evidence of rigging the 2020 result against him.
Mr. Raffensperger is hoping to squeak into a runoff against the billionaire businessman Rick Jackson or Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones. Mr. Jackson has said the 2020 election was “ridiculous” and “our people let us down.”
Mr. Jones has embraced Mr. Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election from the start. He served as one of G.O.P.’s alternate electors that year, voting to certify the presidential election for Mr. Trump even though Mr. Biden had won.
www.nytimes.com