S9, Ep. 1: The January 2nd phone call

Breakdown

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Politics, News, True Crime

4.6 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 20 June 2022

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger was sitting in his kitchen on the afternoon of Jan. 2, 2021, when he received a phone call from the White House. President Donald Trump, his chief of staff and some of his lawyers were on the line. During the conversation, Trump told Raffensperger to “find” him 11,780 votes to overturn the election results. That was one more than the 11,779-vote margin that gave Georgia’s 16 electoral college votes to President Joe Biden and turned Georgia Democratic for the first time since 1992. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s award-winning Breakdown podcast returns for its ninth season — The Trump Grand Jury — to cover an investigation into that hourlong phone call as well as other events in Georgia that happened in the weeks following Election Day. Episode One explores what happened during the phone call between Trump and Raffensperger as well as another call made to Frances Watson, the Secretary of State’s lead elections investigator. Both conversations were recorded. The AJC’s legal affairs reporter, Bill Rankin, returns as the host of Season 9 of the Breakdown podcast. He is joined by senior reporter Tamar Hallerman, who covered the Trump White House when she was the newspaper’s Washington correspondent. You can download the Breakdown podcast from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher or your favorite podcasting platform. You can also stream it on your computer in the player above. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's worth knowing which really going on.
0:04.0	This is the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
0:07.0	It's about three o'clock on Saturday afternoon, January 2, 2021.
0:18.0	Georgia's Secretary of State Brad Rathansberger and his wife Trisha are at home, sitting at the kitchen counter.
0:24.0	For weeks, Rathansberger had endured withering criticism from fellow Republicans, including the president of the United States, for standing behind Georgia's 2020 election results.
0:36.0	The final tally after almost five million votes were cast, Joe Biden defeated President Donald Trump by 11,779 votes, or by a minuscule 0.23%.
0:50.0	It marked the first time Georgia had swung Democratic in a presidential election since 1992.
0:57.0	Earlier that morning, in an interview on Fox News, Rathansberger said he wasn't backing down.
1:03.0	And people can't handle the truth sometimes because they're very disappointed in the results.
1:07.0	I get that. I voted for President Trump also, but then to the day we did everything that we could, we did an audit of the race, President Trump still lost, then we did a full recount.
1:16.0	President Trump still lost, and so we have a safe, secure process. People have to realize that you need to get out and vote, and that's how you win elections.
1:24.0	President Trump was watching, and he didn't like what he was seeing.
1:28.0	His chief of staff, Mark Meadows, soon called the Secretary of State's office and set up a phone call from the White House.
1:34.0	Rathansberger took the call from his home, North of Atlanta.
1:38.0	What transpired over the hour-long conversation is now under investigation by a special purpose grand jury. We don't know how this will play out, but it's possible that grand juries work could lead to an indictment, meaning a former president could be facing criminal charges.
1:56.0	Welcome to Breakdown, the podcast from the Atlanta Journal Constitution that covers Georgia's most important cases.
2:03.0	I'm HAC's Legal Affairs reporter, Bill Rankin. This season I'm joined by Tamara Halerman. She covered the Trump administration when she was the HAC's Washington correspondent.
2:13.0	In this season, we're covering a special grand jury that will decide whether former president, Donald Trump, and his allies should face criminal charges.
2:21.0	This is Breakdown from the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
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