The special jury investigating whether former President Donald Trump or his allies broke the law in their efforts to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results has heard testimony from at least four witnesses regarding Giuliani’s activities. Three of those witnesses were Georgia Democratic lawmakers who testified this week and were at the state Capitol when Giuliani and other Trump attorneys shared conspiracy-laden allegations of voter fraud in December 2020.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who is leading the investigation, has been seeking evidence of possible crimes, including incitement to voter fraud, misrepresentation to state and local government agencies, and conspiracy.
Bob Costello, an attorney for Giuliani, said the only request he received from Fulton County was from someone, perhaps a detective, inquiring if he would accept service on something on Giuliani’s behalf. Costello said he doesn’t know if there was an attempt to serve a subpoena because he refused to accept service.
As for Giuliani’s election-related activities in the state being a potential legal headache, Costello said, “It’s hard to worry if you don’t know about it.”
On December 3, 2020, state senators Jen Jordan and Elena Parent — both of whom confirmed to CNN that they testified before the grand jury — were on the Georgia Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Election Integrity, in which Giuliani, then a Trump Attorney, listened, spread conspiracy theories about what he described as widespread irregularities and fraud in the state.
“The focus obviously seemed to be on that Senate subcommittee meeting where Giuliani was in attendance and effectively doing his dog and pony show without anyone hitting back,” Jordan, a Democrat, told CNN in an interview about her testimony before the Grand Jury.
Jordan, who is also a lawyer and running for attorney general, told CNN she was interrogated for nearly two hours. Portions of her grand jury testimony focused on Giuliani’s unusual appearance at the hearing, where he played heavily edited videos of Fulton County poll workers and urged lawmakers to ignore the statewide results and appoint a slate of pro-Trump voters.
While video of Giuliani’s appearances before lawmakers was released at the time, investigators were interested in the unusual manner in which the hearings had come together, lawmakers’ impressions of the information exchanged, and the suggestion that lawmakers might consider an alternative List of voters should track .
Jordan said it seemed clear to her that Trump’s legal team and Republican lawmakers were conspiring “to present a false narrative that goes beyond trying to sway public opinion.”
“It was intended to confer legitimacy or provide a basis for legislative action, to basically cast aside the list of voters,” Jordan added.
Numerous state and federal officials have debunked Giuliani’s cheating allegations in a state Joe Biden won by nearly 12,000 votes. Byung “Bjay” Pak, the former chief federal attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, was among those who testified before the US House of Representatives special committee investigating the January 6, 2021 riot that Giuliani’s allegations of voter fraud in Fulton County were investigated by federal authorities and found wrong.
On December 30, 2020, Giuliani and other Trump associates returned to the Georgia Capitol and for the second time falsely told state lawmakers that there had been widespread election irregularities.
“There are 10 ways to demonstrate that this election was stolen, that the votes were fake, that there were a lot of them, dead people, criminals, fake ballots,” Giuliani said at the time.
“It’s very surreal to go back and piece together all these moving pieces that led to the attempt to overturn the results of the election and that led to the January 6 fallout,” said Georgia State Assemblyman Bee Nguyen, who also Testified before the grand jury, CNN said as she exited the Atlanta courthouse. “It is very surreal that the Georgian legislature was involved and that these hearings were taking place in our legislature.” Democrat Nguyen will challenge Georgia’s Foreign Minister Brad Raffensperger in the race for the state’s top election in November Labor. She said she testified for about two hours Thursday, and the questions centered on what she saw in the Georgia Legislature room on Dec. 30, 2020.
While Giuliani’s testimony seemed absurd at the time, Jordan said she now believes they narrowly avoided a constitutional crisis.
“I kind of thought, this can’t be serious because everything they say is so ridiculous,” Jordan said. “Well, in hindsight, we really dodged a bullet in terms of democracy because those people didn’t play.”
CNN’s Pamela Brown, Chris Youd, and Katelyn Polantz contributed to this report.