Judge's ruling in Georgia election case is latest setback for Trump DOJ
The judge blocked a subpoena, saying the information it sought was "staggering."
A federal judge on Tuesday quashed a DOJ subpoena seeking the names and personal information of Fulton County's 2020 election workers, marking the latest in a string of rulings limiting what some judges have characterized as the Trump administration's abuse of prosecutorial or investigative powers.
In the ruling, U.S. District Judge William M. Ray II called the April subpoena "staggering," noting that it sought the names, residential addresses, personal telephone numbers and other personal identifying information from essentially every person in the county who worked on the 2020 election, as part of the Trump administration's ongoing election probe.
"For reasons explained hereinbelow, the Court agrees with Fulton County that, in pursuing the Subpoena, the DOJ is engaged in an "arbitrary fishing expedition," such that the Subpoena is unreasonable and must be quashed," the ruling said.
Judge Ray, who was nominated by President Donald Trump, took issues with other elements of the subpoena, including the statute of limitations, which he said would largely be five years for crimes related to the 2020 election and thus expired.
"Without a showing that the subpoenaed information will result in a prosecutable crime, the Court finds the DOJ's need for the subpoenaed information to be questionable, at best," the judge's ruling said.
Judge Ray also said the subpoena would effectively "chill" efforts to recruit poll workers in the future.
"Those who work to run elections ... should be valued and are necessary for successful elections in Fulton County going forward," the ruling said.
A Justice Department spokesperson, responding to the ruling, said, "The district court's ruling that the probable expiration of statutes of limitations prevents the grand jury from investigating the 2020 election in Georgia is at odds with numerous holdings of the Supreme Court. Because the court's order jeopardizes both the historic purview of the grand jury and a long-delayed assessment of 2020 election processes, the Department is considering all options to challenge."
FBI agents in January seized 700 boxes containing ballots and other materials associated with the 2020 election from Fulton County's Elections Hub and Operations Center after obtaining a search warrant. President Trump has repeatedly made baseless claims that there was voter fraud in the 2020 election, specifically in Georgia, despite Georgia officials auditing and certifying the results and courts rejecting numerous lawsuits challenging the election's outcome.
The Trump administration sent the subpoena for the information on election workers in April, and Fulton County officials in May sought to quash it, arguing it was an attempt to "target, harass, and punish the President's perceived political opponents..
The ruling is the latest instance of judges taking deliberate steps to curtail what some see as an abuse of prosecutorial power on the part of the administration.
Just last month, a federal judge in Minnesota issued a similar order quashing multiple DOJ subpoenas sent to Gov. Tim Walz and other state officials tied to a DOJ investigation purportedly examining their degree of cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.
In March, the chief judge of D.C.'s district court also quashed subpoenas sent to then-Fed Chairman Jay Powell after determining the probe was based on no evidence and appeared purely rooted in President Trump's personal animus towards Powell.
Other similar instances of judicial pushback include the dismissal of the criminal cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James after a federal judge found the Trump-appointed prosecutor who charged them was unlawfully appointed.
The administration has also said it will appeal a ruling from May by a federal judge in Tennessee that threw out the criminal human smuggling case against wrongly deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia on the grounds he was unfairly prosecuted by the administration.
However, the DOJ in recent months was given some leeway in Fulton County by a separate Trump-appointed federal judge who allowed them to continue holding onto ballots from the 2020 election that the FBI seized in the unusual search where then-DNI Tulsi Gabbard was present.