U.S. District Judge William Ray quashed a grand jury subpoena on Tuesday, ruling that the Department of Justice cannot obtain the names and personal contact information of thousands of 2020 election workers in Georgia’s Fulton County. The judge said the sweeping request was unreasonable and called its breadth “staggering.”
The Justice Department obtained the subpoena in April, seeking names and contact details for all county employees and volunteer poll workers involved in the 2020 election. President Donald Trump has claimed without evidence that widespread fraud in Fulton County, Georgia’s most populous Democratic stronghold, cost him victory in the state.
In his ruling, Ray wrote that “given the low need for the subpoenaed information and the highly burdensome nature of the disclosure of the same, the Subpoena is unreasonable and must be quashed.” The Trump-nominated judge emphasized that the grand jury process cannot be used for purposes unrelated to viable criminal indictments.
Fulton County fought the subpoena in court, arguing through attorney Kamal Ghali that the request was meant to “target, harass and punish the President’s perceived political opponents” and would “chill participation by election workers.” The county also stressed that the statute of limitations for any alleged election misconduct from 2020 has already expired.
Ray agreed with the county’s statute-of-limitations argument, writing that even if the records could identify workers who support fraud theories, “that information couldn’t be used to charge anyone” because the deadline for prosecution has passed. He noted that the subpoena seeks information about what happened during the 2020 election and its immediate aftermath, not about ongoing crimes.
The Justice Department argued the subpoena was a standard investigative step to identify people with “relevant knowledge” of potential crimes. DOJ lawyer William McComb said investigators needed the list to determine what charges could ultimately be brought. Ray rejected this reasoning, writing that the grand jury’s investigative power cannot be weaponized to collect personal data without legitimate law enforcement purpose.
The ruling comes months after the FBI seized hundreds of boxes of ballots and election documents from the Fulton County election hub during a January search warrant operation. In May, a separate federal judge denied the county’s request to have those physical ballots returned, allowing the Justice Department to keep them.
Ray concluded by warning that allowing such broad subpoenas would set a dangerous precedent. “Everyone, whether you support the President or you do not, or whether you believe the 2020 Election was fair or believe that it was not, should be concerned about the DOJ’s ability to utilize the power of the Grand Jury to appropriate your private information without a legitimate purpose,” he wrote.
Sources
- NBC News — Judge’s ruling on DOJ subpoena for Fulton County election worker names, quotes from the judge’s decision
- FOX 5 Atlanta — Details on the subpoena request, county’s legal arguments, and judge’s reasoning
- WSLS — Full text of Judge Ray’s ruling, including his concerns about grand jury misuse and statute of limitations
