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The January 6th Special Committee held their fourth hearing Tuesday that included harrowing testimony from 2020 election poll workers.
Two Black women, Wandrea Arshaye (“Shaye”) Moss and her mother Ruby Freeman, served as poll workers in Fulton, County, GA. Both risked their own health to serve their community in the middle of a raging pandemic. And both say the threats and intimidation from former Pres. Trump and his team have left them still fearing for their safety two years later.
“There is nowhere I feel safe,” Ruby Freeman testified. “Nowhere.”
“Do you know how it feels to have the President of the United States target you?” she asked. “The President of the United States is supposed to represent every American – not to target one.”
Freeman, who describes herself as “a small business owner, a mother and a proud American citizen,” gave painstakingly detail about how the attempt to overturn the 2020 election upended her life.
Her daughter, Shaye Moss, said her “life has been changed in every way because of [Trump’s] lies” and attacks on her and her mother.
“I don’t want anyone knowing my name,” Moss said, breaking down in emotion. “I don’t go to the grocery store anymore,” she continued, “I haven’t been anywhere – at all.”
Moss says her health and every aspect of her live “has been affected in a major way.”
Moss and Freeman were just two poll workers across the country who were targeted and attacked by Trump and his allies. They became the subject of conspiracy theories and characters in a false narrative of non-existent election fraud.
The same hateful anger that fueled the terror attack on the US Capitol was first aimed at them because of lies from the former president.
Republican Secretary of State recalls attacks and threats for refusing to overturn election
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger was also a target of attacks from Donald Trump during the election. Raffensberger, a Republican who voted for Trump, was responsible for overseeing the state’s vote count and election process. When it became clear that Trump would lose Georgia by just under 12,000 votes, the twice-impeached President and his team began pushing lies about voter fraud.
In his testimony before Congress, Raffensperger says his team “investigated every claim” and found no such widespread fraud.
Still, Trump continued to pressure him to either “find more votes” to help him win the state, or decertify the results.
When Raffensperger refused, Trump attacked him publicly. Raffensberger says he began receiving death threats and his wife began receiving “sexualized texts.”
He also recalled that “some people broke into my daughter-in-law’s home.”
“My son has passed and she’s a widow, and has two kids,” he continued. “We’re very concerned about her safety also.”
When asked why he didn’t just quit and let Trump have his way, Raffensperger responded “because I knew that we had followed the law. We had followed the Constitution.”
Arizona’s Republican Speaker of the House refused calls from Trump to help spread ‘Big Lie’
Rusty Bowers, the Republican speaker of the Arizona State House, also shared his experience pushing back against Trump’s lies.
Bowers was asked to use his role to decertify the results in Arizona. Even Congressman Andy Biggs reached out to Bowers asking him to “sign onto a letter and support the de-certification of the electors,” CBS News reported.
Bowers refused.
He also remembers receiving calls from Trump and Rudy Giuliani about “widespread fraud” in Arizona. Bowers testified he asked for evidence of fraud on multiple occasions, but never received it.
When the Trump team sought to use the State Capitol to push fraud conspiracy theories, Bowers refused.
“I did not feel that the evidence, granted in its absence, merited the hearing,” he said. “I did not want to be used as a pawn.”
Bowers says he and his family faced multiple threats for standing up to Trump. Violent Trump supporters showed up at his house on several occasions. He says the death threats and vitriol took a heavy toll on his daughter, who was terminally ill at the time.
The January 6th Select Committee announced Wednesday it would add more hearings to its calendar in July, citing “new evidence.” The next hearing will take place starting at 3PM ET on Thursday, June 23rd.
The Committee will release their final report this fall.
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