Stuck In 2020: A Fulton County Commissioner Risked Jail to Protect 2020 Elections

Feb 2, 2026 10:18 PM EST, Mon

The FBI seized Fulton County’s ballots after relentless MAGA attacks

Every American who believes in democracy and free and fair elections should be afraid at what the Trump administration is doing in Georgia.

Feb. 2, 2026, 5:48 PM EST By Dana Barrett, Fulton County (Ga.) Commissioner

When Americans are being killed in broad daylight by immigration agents and the Department of Justice continues to withhold millions of records related to Jeffrey Epstein, the FBI raiding Fulton County, Georgia’s election hub, last week and seizing 7 boxes of documents related to the 2020 elections might seem like just a distraction. The reality is much scarier than that and it’s not about 2020.

As much as Trump obsesses about losing Georgia — and the presidency — to Joe Biden in 2020, and as much as he blames voters in Fulton County for his loss, Wednesday’s raid wasn’t about any past election in Georgia. It was about future elections in a critical swing state.

I was inside the elections hub when the second warrant arrived.

I serve as a Fulton County commissioner and was inside the elections hub Wednesday when the second warrant arrived. As I watched 25 FBI agents swarm the building as if geared up for a fight, it was abundantly clear what was going on; Trump and his cronies want you to believe there is some new evidence of foul play in the 2020 elections in Fulton County that would disqualify us from running our own elections in 2026 and beyond. There isn’t.

The 2020 election in Fulton County has been investigated over and over again — audits and hearings have confirmed that the correct results were certified. Any irregularities that occurred were minor, within the normal margins of error, and would not have changed the fact that Trump lost. And Biden, who won that election, has already served his term and moved on.

There are plenty of reasons to believe Wednesday’s raid in Fulton County was about the Trump administration and MAGA Republicans attempting to control the outcome of the 2026 midterm election and the 2028 presidential election. And there are plenty of reasons every American who believes in democracy and free and fair elections should be afraid.

To start, Wednesday’s raid was not an isolated incident but the latest in what has been a concerted effort to take over our elections and obstruct the will of the people.

In August, I was one of the county commissioners who defied a judge’s order and was threatened with jail time and a $10,0-per-day fine for the board for refusing to appoint two nominees to the Fulton County Elections Board: one who has direct ties to Cleta Mitchell’s so-called Election Integrity Network and who had refused to certify the results of a 2024 primary until a judge ruled she had to, and another who has challenged the voter registration of thousands of Georgia residents.

(Mitchell was an adviser to Trump in late 2020 and January 2021 as he tried to overturn the 2020 election and was on the Jan. 2, 2021, phone call when Trump pressured then-Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” enough votes to make him the winner. The Fulton County Board of Commissioners has appealed the judge’s ruling ordering us to seat those nominees.)

On Dec. 18, 2025, Georgia was one of the four states Trump’s DOJ sued for not turning over private voter data, such as Social Security numbers, home addresses, dates of birth and driver’s license numbers. A federal judge tossed out that lawsuit.

Let’s be crystal clear. They are just getting started.

In January, Trump mused that there “shouldn’t even be an election,” warned Republicans that he’d be impeached if they don’t maintain control of the House in November and told The New York Times he regrets that he didn’t have the National Guard seize voting machines in the swing states after the 2020 election. One of those swing states, of course, is Georgia.

Let’s be crystal clear. They are just getting started.

There’s no shortage of attacks that could come next, from purging state voter rolls to taking control of voting machines to enacting legislation that makes it harder for eligible voters to cast their ballot.

Trump wants to control the outcome of the 2026 and 2028 elections because he knows Republicans can’t win without it. Americans are fed up — fed up with the violence and killings in Minnesota, fed up with rising costs and a weakening economy, and fed up with a government that seems to have time to chase old ballots, but not to solve real problems.

That’s why Trump has been attacking your freedom to vote. That’s why he’s floating a ban on voting by mail, demanding that Republican legislatures redraw maps to protect their House majority, issuing unlawful executive orders and now sending federal agents after ballots and voter rolls.

Here’s my warning, and my ask, as a commissioner who watched FBI agents carry our votes out the door:

Do not discount the raid in Fulton County as just another distraction. This is about the future of our democracy; a future that depends on our ability to choose our leaders by casting our votes.

Stand with the election workers and local officials under attack, push back on the lies when you hear them and support the organizations defending voting rights and protesters.

And most importantly, get ready to vote in numbers so big in 2026 that no raid, no lawsuit and no desperate power grab can erase what the people decide.

Dana Barrett, elected in 2022, is the Fulton County Commissioner representing District 3

Related Posts