How a longtime Republican from Georgia turned one in every of Trump’s greatest critics

On January 2, 2021, four days before the deadly attack on the US Capitol, Georgia’s Foreign Secretary Brad Raffensperger received a desperate call from then President Donald Trump.

In the now infamous hour-long call recorded by Mr. Raffensperger, Mr. Trump not only threatened the officer, but also asked him to “find 11,780 votes” – enough to win the state in the 2020 presidential election, which has already been concluded.

His allegations of election fraud and election rigging sparked multimillion-dollar recounts in several states, including Georgia, and ultimately led to the Stop the Steal rally in Washington that immediately preceded the Capitol uprising.

I thought that … Secretary Raffensperger did a very good and respectful job of dealing with someone who was not on the level of reality

Gabriel Sterling

On the anniversary of the attack, The National met with Georgia State Department’s chief operating officer and chief financial officer Gabriel Sterling, a lifelong Republican and one of the former president’s loudest critics.

“At first I was really upset for not being part of that call,” said Mr Sterling.

From the rotunda of the Georgia state capital in Atlanta, Mr. Sterling said he changed his mind after hearing Mr. Raffensperger’s recording of the call.

“I thought that [state’s attorney] Ryan Germany and Foreign Minister Raffensperger did a very good and respectful job of dealing with someone who was not on the level of reality in the election, ”he said.

Donald Trump, then President, speaks during a rally protesting Joe Biden’s electoral college certification as President in Washington on January 6, 2021

Mr Sterling, recently asked by the House Special Committee to investigate the January 6th attack, said he did not think he could have kept a cool head on the call.

“I don’t know if I could have held back like that because I was still pretty angry about a lot of things I went through the previous month,” he said.

November 2020 after incumbent Republican Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler lost their elections to Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.

After Mr. Perdue and Ms. Loeffler demanded the secretary’s resignation and fueled Trump’s allegations of a stolen election, cars circled Mr. Raffensperger’s house, his son’s apartment was broken into and his wife received “sexual threats”.

Pictures of Mr. Sterling’s home were posted online along with his address and intimidating emails became commonplace.

“The secretary and I, we’re going to face ourselves out there somehow … we’re going to get threats like this. It’s not right, but not unexpected in the world we live in, ”he said.

But the turning point for Mr Sterling was a tweet addressed to an election worker.

“I saw the tweet that had the little swinging noose in it and said, ‘May God have mercy on your soul,’ and I named the young man,” said Mr Sterling. “They also tracked down his family members. I think at that point I said it was all going too far. And of course the worst result came on January 6th. “

In December 2020, Mr. Sterling, who voted for Mr. Trump in 2016, held a press conference in the Georgia capital, begging Mr. Trump to “just stop,” and condemning Republicans Perdue and Ms. Loeffler for their actions.

“Mr. President, you have not condemned these acts or this language,” said Mr. Sterling at the Georgia State Capitol.

“Senators, you have not condemned this language or these actions. That has to stop. We need you to rise. And if you want to take on a leadership position, show it. “

While pedaling his stolen election theories, Trump accused a Fulton County, Georgia election worker, Ruby Freeman, of throwing thousands of ballot papers, and even showed security footage of Ms. Freeman and others taken during the recount at rallies across the country worked.

“She was being terrorized … she had people coming to her house,” said Mr Sterling.

Trump supporter Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, even sent a publicist to Georgia to threaten Ms. Freeman and her daughter to admit they broke the law.

“Even if I say the words now, it just sounds so ridiculous that it has to be part of a bad movie plot … but her life and that of her daughter Shay were both heavily influenced.”

The threats of violence became so extreme that they both had to move several times, and one of the men arrested in the US Capitol on January 6 had Ms Freeman’s name on a “hit list” called by prosecutors.

Mr Sterling said that after the false allegations and the upheaval in their lives that have resulted from them, Ms. Freeman and her daughter seek some form of compensation.

“[Mr Trump] Many people around him told him none of this was true and he chose not to listen to them because it wasn’t what he wanted to hear; It’s not what leaders should be doing, ”said Mr. Sterling.

An explosion caused by police ammunition is seen while supporters of former President Donald Trump gather in front of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, the United States, on January 6, 2021. Reuters

“And he has, you know, for want of a better word, somehow screwed his own inheritance by doing what he ended up doing and then really harming my party by undermining it in future elections in this country. “

Spurred on by Mr Trump’s allegations of election fraud, Georgia state lawmakers passed law that puts new restrictions on voting, including the distribution of water or food to people waiting in long lines at polling stations.

Critics of the law say it disproportionately affects black and brown voters who traditionally vote Democrats.

The John Lewis Voting Rights Act, named after a late Georgia Congressman, is designed to strengthen the federal government’s ability to respond to electoral discrimination.

Mr Sterling has reservations about such laws, believing that it will create nationalized elections and remove voter identification laws that have benefited his state.

“John Lewis was a hero … an icon and a lion of his generation. This final bill, which bears his name, does things that I think will not build people’s confidence in elections in the long run because it can nationalize elections, “said Mr Sterling.

“If you start standardizing the rules across state borders and making them one size fits all, you’ll add costs and even make it harder for people to actually vote.”

According to the ruling of Mr Raffensperger, a person who has not voted in two parliamentary elections can be declared inactive and consequently purged.

In 2019, around 309,000 names – 4 percent of the state’s voters – were removed from Georgia’s electoral rolls. According to a report released by the ACLU of Georgia, 63 percent of those voters were mistakenly cleaned up.

Mr. Lewis served 17 terms as a congressman in the fifth district of Georgia, which includes the city of Atlanta and Fulton County, the largest in the state. He fought for the right to vote all his adult life, speaking at the 1963 Washington march.

Mr. Lewis died of cancer in July 2020.

Updated: January 10, 2022, 12:00 p.m.