Fulton County DA Fani Willis testifies before state senate committee — Full testimony

[0:00] Good morning, everyone. Welcome to today's meeting from the Senate Special Committee on Investigations. [0:09] Members of the committee, good to see everyone here today. [0:13] And I just want to point out, as a reminder for those of you on the committee, [0:20] Josh Belenfonte is seated to my right. He's the committee's counsel. [0:24] And before we do get started, I do want to make an announcement that, unfortunately, [0:27] Chairman Kausert is unable to be here this morning. [0:30] He had a medical procedure late last week, and doctors have restricted his activities and traveled during his recovery. [0:37] And he has requested that I chair this meeting as the vice chairman. [0:42] So with that, we do have some committee business to take care of before we get to our agenda for the day with Madam D.A. Fannie Willis. [1:05] And we do need to review the approval of minutes from our November 13th committee meeting. [1:11] I'll give the members a minute to review those minutes, and then we'll entertain a motion to approve the minutes. [1:22] We have a motion to approve by Senator Jackson, second by Senator Gooch. [1:29] All those approved, please signify by saying aye. [1:31] All those opposed, like sign. [1:34] And the minutes are approved. [1:35] All right, for those that are in attendance today, I just want to kind of go through a couple of guidelines on decorum. [1:44] I understand there's some, obviously, there's media in the room. [1:48] Press has lines. [1:49] I think you guys are all clear on where you're allowed to be in the committee room, where you're not allowed to be. [1:53] So thank you for working with our Senate press staff. [1:56] On that, if there are any available seats in the middle of your aisle, please, or in the middle of your row, please scoot over. [2:03] We do have overflow in room 125 here in the Capitol building for any of you that want to avail yourself of the overflow room as well. [2:11] This is a Senate committee hearing. [2:16] This is not a courtroom. [2:18] There is no judge in the room. [2:20] We will adjudicate the meeting today per the Senate rules and Mason's manual. [2:26] We have the Secretary of the Senate available to advise us if there's any considerations. [2:31] Governor Barnes, you are here as counsel for D.A. Willis. [2:34] Is that correct? [2:37] Sir, I mean, you can't decide privileges that are granted by all. [2:42] No, I didn't say anything about privilege. [2:43] I was just referencing that that's the capacity in which you're appearing today. [2:48] Oh, yes. [2:48] Yes. [2:49] And I just want to kind of maybe cast a net as for those of you that have not been here for any of our committee hearings. [2:56] This committee is charged with investigating and advising the General Assembly on any changes to Georgia state law [3:04] as the committee deems necessary as a result of our investigation into the criminal prosecution [3:12] as it relates to the election interference case of President Trump and the 18 others. [3:17] We've had a series of meetings and have been working with the District Attorney Willis to appear today. [3:25] We had a state law that passed, and it is my understanding you were appearing under the second subpoena that was issued, [3:31] and there is still a Supreme Court case relative to the 2024 subpoena and the General Assembly that issued that, [3:39] or the Senate that issued that at that time. [3:42] Great. [3:43] I referenced signs briefly. [3:45] It's minor saying that there's some people that have signs in the room. [3:47] You're obviously welcome to have those. [3:49] Please just don't hold those up as you will be blocking views from other members of the committee. [3:52] We do have a single-purpose agenda, and with that in mind, we will go ahead and swear in our witness today. [3:59] Madam D.A., please raise your right hand. [4:02] Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God? [4:06] I do. [4:07] Thank you. [4:07] Mr. Chairman, I have a statement I'd like to include in the record. [4:11] Sure. [4:11] If you want to pass that around to us, I'd be happy to make that as part of the record. [4:15] And I'm doing that because I was prohibited from giving a statement. [4:21] Yes. [4:21] So, again, this is going to be analogous. [4:23] I know it's been a while since you've been in the state senate. [4:26] You've had an illustrious career since then. [4:28] As you know, committee testimony is different than courtroom procedures, [4:32] and there's generally not opening statements in the senate committee testimony. [4:36] I've never known an investigative committee that did not allow opening statements. [4:41] We will proceed with the testimony. [4:43] And if either one of you and Madam D.A., is that the preferred title of how you'd like to refer to you? [4:50] Either district attorney Willis or Madam D.A. [4:52] Perfect. [4:52] We'll go with either one of those. [4:54] Thank you for being here today. [4:56] Please do pull that microphone closer or lean forward when you speak. [4:59] I'll try to get the volume adjusted so that everyone can hear it. [5:02] I doubt anyone will have trouble hearing me. [5:04] Fair enough. [5:06] Just love, if you could take a minute, walk us through your career history. [5:09] I know that you have a 30-year legal history. [5:12] If you could just tell the committee your path to becoming the district attorney in Fulton County. [5:16] Well, I went to the best university in the nation, Howard University, matriculated through there in three and a half years and graduated December of 92, although I walked in May of 1993. [5:29] I then came down to Georgia because I was admitted to one of the top 25 law schools in the country, Emory University School of Law. [5:37] While at Emory University School of Law, for the first time in Emory's history, I won the Frederick Douglass Moot Court Competition, which is a national competition put on by the Black Law Students Association. [5:48] Successfully matriculated through, took the Georgia bar because the Olympics was that year. [5:54] That was the last year that you could take the bar while still in law school. [5:57] So during my last semester of law school, I took the bar and passed on the first try. [6:03] Then became a lawyer. [6:04] I worked for a small law firm with Alvin Kendall. [6:09] Alvin Kendall has a great knack for picking talent because at that law firm at the time was myself and the former mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms. [6:18] who will be a great candidate for governor of this state and is now running for office. [6:23] Also, Teresa Mann, who is a judge in the city of Atlanta court and another lawyer by the name of Carl Touchstone. [6:30] We represented people in both criminal and civil cases. [6:33] I worked there for a small time. [6:35] I then left that law firm and opened up my own law practice where I practiced both juvenile law, criminal law, did some family stuff, young practitioner. [6:44] I did that out of Douglas County, Georgia. [6:46] But I represented people in the entire metro area during that time. [6:50] Got married, had two children, became a solicitor, needed a kind of a more calm life. [6:55] So I went to work for Raines Carter, who's been the longest standing solicitor, I think, in the country at this point. [7:01] Worked for him for some time. [7:03] Applied to become a district attorney. [7:06] Worked there approximately 16 years. [7:08] Tried every type of case you can imagine. [7:10] But I was really a murder prosecutor. [7:12] That's what I do best. [7:13] But also, at that time, tried the longest case in Georgia's history, which is the Atlanta Public Schools case, a RICO case. [7:20] That's how I became acquainted with John Floyd, because he taught me RICO inside and out. [7:26] And taught me how you can use that to bring criminals to justice, which I've done throughout my career successfully. [7:34] Worked there. [7:35] Then decided to leave to run for office. [7:37] I ran for judge, came up 49%, I believe, is the percentage of the vote that I won. [7:43] Actually went to a Republican strategist, he told me, because I went to a runoff. [7:48] Republicans will not vote for you. [7:49] And I said, why? [7:50] I've had a history of representing this state. [7:55] I've done so successfully. [7:57] I'm known as a prosecutor. [7:58] He said, you're black and female. [8:00] I said, I don't believe that to be true. [8:01] I don't think that's the state of the nation. [8:03] Who knew? [8:04] He was right and I was wrong. [8:05] I lost that election, but that was God's plan. [8:08] Because after that, I had the honor of representing the Judicial Qualifications Commission. [8:13] I'm one of the only black lawyers to ever be able to do that in the state of Georgia, where I prosecuted judges who had done something wrong. [8:20] And so that was a great honor of mine. [8:22] Richard Hyde was one of the people that helped me to get that position, because he had worked with me on Atlanta Public Schools. [8:27] I think that he's still doing that kind of work, and he's a very great investigator. [8:32] So I did that for a while. [8:34] I also got to represent a lot of fathers and mothers as they went through domestic things, did some criminal defense work. [8:40] And then people started coming to me, you need to run for district attorney. [8:44] Current district attorney has some problems. [8:46] You'd be outstanding at it. [8:48] And who knew? [8:48] I ran. [8:49] I won. [8:49] I'm the first woman to serve as district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia. [8:53] Best to ever do it. [8:54] I sit here with a 92% conviction rate. [8:58] That's my history. [9:00] Excellent. [9:00] Thank you so much. [9:01] For those of us on the committee, it would be helpful to kind of get a scope of what your office structure is like and kind of the makeup of your office. [9:07] So how many employees are within the Fulton County's DA's office? [9:11] A little over 300, approximately. [9:13] All numbers that I give today should be approximations. [9:16] You should not hold me to exacts. [9:18] Certainly will do so on these questions, for sure. [9:21] Of those employees, about how many of those are attorneys? [9:24] Half. [9:24] About 150 attorneys. [9:25] How many investigators? [9:27] 65. [9:28] Okay. [9:29] And how many paralegals? [9:31] I don't know. [9:32] About another 70 or so professionals. [9:35] Some of that is VWAPs. [9:36] Some of that is administrators. [9:37] Some of that is illegal assistants. [9:39] I'm not going to be able to guess at these numbers. [9:41] Sure. [9:42] The state pays the minimum salary for all district attorneys and assistant DAs. [9:45] Is that correct? [9:47] No. [9:48] No. [9:48] Okay. [9:48] Can you walk us through the pay structure? [9:50] The state pays for my office about 25 ADAs. [9:54] They're woefully underpaid. [9:57] The salary that the state paid is a joke right now. [9:59] If you want to look at some legislation, you should look at paying DAs across this country [10:02] more money because they do not make enough money. [10:05] And it is very hard for people to recruit DAs at the state pay. [10:10] So for those 20 or so, some lawyers that work at state pay, I do one of two things as incentives. [10:16] The first thing I do is the ones that work in-house, I give them supplements that the [10:20] county pays because the pay is so low and really just an embarrassment to think that [10:25] we pay public servants at that rate. [10:26] Another incentive I offer to some other very seasoned ADAs that are further along in their [10:31] career that are my state paid employees, I let them work 95% remotely, and all they [10:37] do is indict cases for my office. [10:41] The rest of the lawyers paid by the Fulton County District Attorney's Office are in fact [10:45] paid by the county. [10:46] But you should note here that I am a state employee. [10:49] I am not a county employee. [10:51] I represent the Atlanta Judicial Circuit. [10:53] The Fulton County DA is really slang. [10:56] Great. [10:57] So give me a range then of those ADAs, including the supplement. [11:01] What's the salary range of those ADAs? [11:03] Probably the lowest salary of any DA that works for me is 85, and the highest might be around [11:08] 200. [11:11] Again, don't hold me to exacts. [11:13] Sure. [11:14] Okay. [11:16] You were elected in 2020. [11:17] We talked about that. [11:18] You had a transition process in between the election and when you were sworn in. [11:22] Can you walk us through what that process looked like? [11:25] It was not a very good one. [11:26] Myself and the former District Attorney never had a conversation. [11:30] We still have never had a conversation. [11:32] But while I was still on my personal time, not yet being paid by the state of Georgia, [11:37] I interviewed every attorney and investigator of the office and some of the other staff because [11:45] I wanted to decide who I was going to keep and who I was not going to keep. [11:48] So I did that during that time period. [11:52] I also had some committee members where I got some advice on things that needed to be priorities [11:56] for the office as I took office. [11:58] So I got very esteemed members of the Fulton County and the greater community to kind of [12:06] advise me. [12:07] I believe in diversity, so it was a diverse group. [12:10] If you do studies on diversity, although some of you are against it, you will realize that [12:14] the companies that do the best employ diversity. [12:16] And so I employ diversity in that committee, and I've employed diversity in my staff because [12:21] I represent a diverse community. [12:23] Who was a part of that committee? [12:24] I don't remember all the names, and I'm not going to guess at it. [12:27] What names do you remember? [12:29] Oh, my goodness. [12:30] Lee Dupree's husband, William Dupree, was on that committee. [12:36] There was another anchor, and I'm embarrassed to say that was an African-American female. [12:42] I'm not sure. [12:43] I want to say Mayor Franklin may have been on the committee, but I can't remember exactly. [12:49] There were about 15 to 20 people. [12:52] That's been some time ago now. [12:54] The interviews that you referenced with the existing staff as you were kind of determining [12:57] whether they would stay, who participated in those interviews with you? [13:00] It would be different people each day. [13:02] Attorney Gabe Banks was one of the attorneys that did some of the interviews. [13:07] He wasn't able to do all, of course, because he had an active and thriving law practice [13:11] at the time. [13:12] Jeff DeSantis did some of the interviews with me. [13:18] Dacia Young did some of the interviews with me. [13:20] People would come in and out based on their schedules. [13:23] My deputy of operations now, Dexter Bond, did some of those interviews with me. [13:28] Mr. Nathan Wade had a thriving practice at the time as well. [13:31] He would come in and out and do some of the interviews. [13:33] I was at every interview, but other people could only commit so much of their time. [13:38] They each did as much as they could. [13:40] And that should not be the total list. [13:43] That's what I can recall quickly right offhand. [13:45] So don't take that as that was every person. [13:48] I may have missed somebody that assisted me in that. [13:49] But they'll have to blame it on my head, not my heart. [13:55] Okay. [13:59] Who was a part of the team that made the decisions on who you would keep and who you would go? [14:02] What was the consultation process after the interview? [14:05] And how many approximately, I can ask you this question a second time if you want to [14:10] answer the first one, but I'm trying to get to how many people did you retain from the [14:13] former DA's team and then how many people were brought in that were new? [14:16] I don't remember. [14:17] I might have fired 50 or 60 people, but I don't remember exactly. [14:20] Okay. [14:20] The AJC did an article on She Fired People, to which I told Fulton County I was going to [14:26] only bring the best and the brightest. [14:27] So I was always confused as to why that was a surprise. [14:31] Was there a lead on your transition team? [14:33] I was the lead. [14:34] I was the DA. [14:35] Okay. [14:36] Was there another person that you consulted with more than the others? [14:40] No. [14:41] I believe Mr. Wade said in her testimony that he was a part of over 90% of these meetings [14:46] or decisions. [14:46] Do you recall that being an approximate, accurate statement as to his involvement? [14:50] I can't speak to any other person's testimony, so I'm not going to ever comment on someone's [14:57] testimony. [14:58] If he testified to such, you're going to need to show it to me. [15:01] You'll have to forgive me. [15:01] I don't really trust you. [15:03] So I'll have to see that particular testimony. [15:05] Do you recall Mr. Wade being... [15:06] Wait just a minute. [15:07] She's got a right to finish her answer. [15:09] You don't have a right to cut her off. [15:10] That's incorrect, Governor. [15:12] Thank you. [15:12] No, sir. [15:12] It is not. [15:13] I'll be completing answers, though, sir. [15:15] Sure. [15:15] So we should get that straight from Mr. Wade. [15:16] Was Mr. Wade part of, would you say, more than half of the interviews that you conducted? [15:20] Yes. [15:21] Would you say it was more than 75% of the interviews that you conducted? [15:23] I'm not going to guess the numbers. [15:24] He was definitely more than half. [15:26] And what percentage of decisions, the same percentage of decisions that he was a part [15:30] of? [15:31] I ultimately made every decision. [15:33] I took wise counsel from a group of people. [15:36] So I took wise counsel from him. [15:39] I took wise counsel from Deputy Bond. [15:42] Ultimately, I made the decision on who stayed and who went. [15:46] Was Mr. Wade paid for this transition work? [15:48] None of them were paid. [15:49] It was all volunteer work. [15:52] It was wanting to make sure that the region was safe so people volunteered their time to [15:57] make sure that we had the best and the brightest representing Fulton County and that this community [16:01] stayed safe. [16:02] And every person who did it did it for free. [16:05] Thank you. [16:06] Part of one of the things you did when you came into office was you formed this new anti-corruption [16:10] unit. [16:10] Is that correct? [16:11] Absolutely. [16:12] Can you walk us through the decision process to stand that unit up? [16:16] If that replaced any other units and who was a part of that unit once it was stood up? [16:20] And I'm actually not sure we called it the anti-corruption unit when we first took over. [16:24] So when I became the district attorney, Paul Howard had 101 police brutality cases, many that went [16:33] back to years, maybe to 2009. [16:37] People in the community were very upset. [16:39] It was both unfair to the law enforcement officers and to the community that decisions were not [16:44] made. [16:44] And so I knew that one of the things that I was going to have to do was to make sure that [16:50] every case got looked at and was evaluated. [16:54] And so I was looking for attorneys to do that. [16:57] I'm not sure if that's what we called it at first because I ultimately, I think we called [17:01] it the civil rights unit. [17:02] In fact, when we first opened it, I think it was the civil rights unit. [17:06] At some point, I go to visit other huge district attorney's offices that have kind of the same [17:13] kind of struggles that I have as a major metro area. [17:17] I went to visit the Houston district attorney's office at that time. [17:21] And in that office, they had divided cases. [17:25] And I thought it was a brilliant way to do business. [17:27] And so I think that's the point that I then formed a civil rights unit, which would only [17:32] deal with police brutality and an anti-corruption unit. [17:35] So I think when we first started that it was called the civil rights unit. [17:40] Okay. [17:40] How many people were part of that unit once you got it fully operational? [17:42] Well, it depends. [17:44] You know, the county has, in my opinion, stolen people from me, so we can't do the job as [17:48] effectively as needs to be done. [17:51] I've had as many as it varies. [17:56] It has varied because we had an anti-corruption unit and a civil rights unit. [18:01] So it's varied. [18:04] Can you give us a range? [18:09] It really depends on who you're calling the anti-corruption unit. [18:12] I've probably not had more than two lawyers in that unit, maybe three at any given time. [18:18] An investigator or two and a legal assistant. [18:21] They may have been doing double duty somewhere else. [18:25] And you entered into a contract with Chris Campbell to do some taint work as a part of [18:29] that unit. [18:29] Is that correct? [18:31] That would be the civil rights unit. [18:34] It sounds like they were somewhat interchangeable from what you just said. [18:36] You said that it was called the civil rights unit when it started. [18:38] The civil rights unit may have encompassed everything at first, and then it ultimately [18:44] becomes police brutality cases. [18:47] And so what Mr. Campbell was, when the police take a statement, I know you're not an attorney, [18:53] but there's an issue called guarantee. [18:54] And what happens is government employees, mostly we're talking about law enforcement officers, [19:01] they will make a statement to the police, but that statement won't be Mirandized. [19:05] There's all kinds of legal rules around it. [19:07] I can't be privy to those statements. [19:09] I shouldn't have them. [19:10] Sometimes I think the police almost put them in there intentionally. [19:13] And so they'll be intertwined in statements and reports. [19:16] And so what he was hired to do is to redact. [19:21] So once that I got a file from the GBI when somebody had been shot by an officer, I never [19:27] read that. [19:27] That way we were never tainted. [19:29] That's why we used that word, by never seeing that. [19:32] And so, yes, he was hired. [19:35] He had been, I believe my recollection is he had been a former law enforcement officer, [19:40] and he was a lawyer. [19:41] I thought he was great for that work. [19:43] And Terrence Bradley was involved in that work as well, correct? [19:45] He had been a former probation officer and attorney. [19:49] That's one of the reasons that I thought that they would do outstanding at it, because [19:53] they had long histories in the law enforcement community and lawyers. [19:58] I have lawyers now currently doing that work. [20:02] Was Mr. Wade involved with the taint work? [20:04] No. [20:04] Mr. Wade, Bradley, and Campbell were law partners. [20:07] Is that correct at the time? [20:09] Loosely is what I understand. [20:10] I can't tell you about the design of, you'll have to, I can't tell you the design of his [20:14] firm. [20:15] I think more so what happened is they shared office space and cost or something, but I [20:19] don't know. [20:20] I shouldn't speak to that or speculate to it. [20:23] Did you place anyone in charge of the anti-corruption unit, or did everyone that worked there report [20:27] directly to you? [20:28] I mean, ultimately, everyone reports directly to me. [20:30] But the anti-corruption unit, so when it was a civil rights unit, yes, it had a lawyer that [20:40] was over it. [20:41] His name is Brian Watkins. [20:42] He is a lawyer that's been practicing law longer than I. [20:47] And at first he had everything until we realized there was so much volume of work, because it [20:54] doesn't just do this kind of work. [20:55] It's not just police brutality now, right? [20:57] Now it's, you know, police lied or it's an elected official did something wrong. [21:05] It just became too much. [21:06] Once we stood up these units and my county understood we were doing these kind of things, [21:11] fortunately or unfortunately, the office started to get referrals. [21:15] And so it just grew. [21:18] How many cases has this unit brought to trial approximately? [21:20] Oh, I couldn't tell you over the years, but we brought some to trial, especially these [21:25] police brutality cases. [21:26] I couldn't tell you exactly, so I'm not going to speculate. [21:28] Okay. [21:29] It's not as many as, like, my major crimes unit. [21:31] But I can tell you that the anti-corruption and the civil rights unit, they cost me the [21:35] most money because of the experts that are needed when you are trying a police case. [21:39] How much money would you estimate that you spend a year on that unit? [21:42] I can't, and I'm not. [21:44] You can't, and you're not what? [21:45] I'm sorry? [21:45] I'm not going to speculate to it. [21:46] I can't estimate how much. [21:49] Okay. [21:49] Is that something you could provide for the committee? [21:51] I don't know that I can. [21:54] What happens is I have a professional services budget, and my top deputies of certain units, [22:01] so my ED over major crimes, if he needs an expert, he can hire one. [22:05] For instance, if you all want to look into legislation, look into properly funding your GBI. [22:09] The GBI does not have enough scientific experts. [22:12] This is not a criticism of the GBI. [22:14] The scientists that are there are excellent. [22:15] I want that to be noted that I said that. [22:17] The scientists that are there are excellent, but they do not have enough experts. [22:21] So in year one, when I become the DA, they tell me, and I have an email that proves it, [22:26] we don't have, we can't test all your ballistics evidence. [22:30] We don't have enough. [22:31] So I have to go into my budget, more than $100,000, I can tell you that. [22:35] I think it's been about that annually, and hire private scientists to do that ballistics work. [22:40] Now, I got the names of those scientists from the GBI, but also my deputy, Mr. Watkins, over civil rights, [22:48] if he needs an expert, he knows that he can get one. [22:51] If my ED over major crimes needs an expert, they can get one. [22:55] My domestic violence expert, if they need a domestic violence expert, they can get one. [22:59] And so it all comes out of this professional services budget that I both pay attorneys that come in and work as special prosecutors, [23:05] and that I pay professional witnesses that we have to hire to do our work. [23:11] So Mr. Watkins was in charge by title, or was it more so by function that he was in charge of the unit? [23:17] I don't understand your question. [23:19] Did he have a title of director of the anti-corruption unit, or was he just a person that everyone knew would make the calls within the unit? [23:25] He was the deputy of the civil rights unit. [23:28] He remains the deputy of the civil rights unit. [23:30] At some point, the civil rights unit became civil rights and anti-corruption. [23:36] Do you use those terms interchangeably now? [23:38] I do not use them interchangeably. [23:39] I have one deputy over anti-corruption and one deputy over civil rights. [23:44] Who's the current deputy over anti-corruption? [23:46] Tanya Boykin. [23:47] Who was the first one? [23:48] Sonia Allen. [23:49] She is now the district attorney of Cobb County. [23:52] She had a great DA from Fulton endorse her, and she won. [23:55] What was Mr. Wade's role in the anti-corruption unit? [23:58] He didn't have a role in the anti-corruption unit. [24:03] With the election interference case, what unit did it fall under? [24:06] I called it the election team. [24:08] Okay. [24:16] When Mr. Wade was hired, was he hired solely to focus on this election, to work on this election team, or did he do other work within your office? [24:22] I don't remember. [24:24] I think there were times where we might, I'd bring in some of my senior personnel and ask them, you know, what's your thought on this case or these facts? [24:33] I always involve wise counsel. [24:35] I'm sure he was in some of those meetings. [24:37] Would you classify Mr. Wade as senior personnel as being part of your team? [24:40] Would I classify him as senior? [24:43] So he was a special prosecutor. [24:44] He never worked for me as an employee. [24:47] What I would call him is a seasoned lawyer. [24:52] 25 years, first African-American lawyer to ever serve Cobb County as a municipal court judge. [24:58] What I would call him is a lawyer with a distinguished resume. [25:01] When did you begin to consider whether to bring charges in response to the 2020 presidential election in Georgia? [25:09] Don't answer that. [25:09] That's a deliberative privilege. [25:12] Don't answer that. [25:13] I instruct you not to answer. [25:16] Is it true that part of your transition team was involved in the process of interviewing people before you entered office to lead the investigation to the 2020 presidential election? [25:28] I'd like to answer that. [25:30] Go right ahead. [25:33] You only take my advice sometimes anyway. [25:36] Go ahead. [25:38] That's really an ignorant question. [25:42] And if you understand what the word ignorant means, it means the lack of knowledge. [25:46] If you recall the facts, I was already district attorney when this all came to light. [25:54] So it's factually impossible. [25:57] You were district attorney when what came to light? [25:58] When Raffensperger went on Good Morning America or whatever show he went on. [26:06] I was already district attorney. [26:07] So what you ask is a factual impossibility. [26:10] Now, I know they've gotten black folks confused and said I was running for office saying I was going to prosecute the president of the United States. [26:18] But that's what we call a lie. [26:20] Okay. [26:20] I would like to take a look at the screen for me, if you will. [26:36] Well, this is from Mr. Wade's deposition, two members of Jim Jordan's committee. [26:45] And he was asked for the search committee. [26:46] You said that began when D.A. [26:47] Willis took office on January 1, 2021. [26:49] Is that correct? [26:50] Yes. [26:51] And there was outreach to you to be part of the search committee prior to January 1, 2021. [26:56] January 1, 2021. [26:57] Absolutely. [26:58] When did that start? [26:59] Sometime after the election, but prior to her taking office. [27:03] Okay. [27:04] So between the election, you're referring to November 2020 election. [27:06] Is that correct? [27:07] Yes, ma'am. [27:08] And so when you had conversations with individuals, you said on multiple occasions, you said no, and you turned down the position, who were those conversations with? [27:18] They were with the district attorney. [27:20] So I think you're confusing facts. [27:22] We've already had a long conversation about I interviewed everybody at the D.A.'s office, and I interviewed other people to come and work at the district attorney's office. [27:31] And as I told you, I did that on my free time before I became D.A. [27:36] But I had no way of knowing that these criminals were going to commit a crime. [27:40] And that did not come to light until January of 2021 when I'm actually the D.A. [27:46] So it is a factual impossibility, like I already told you. [27:50] I think that that is misinterpreted. [27:52] He's absolutely correct. [27:54] We looked for talent for the district attorney's office before I became the D.A. [27:57] I didn't wait until the day I took office to look for talent that would represent my office. [28:02] But I was unable to look for talent for a case that didn't exist before I took office. [28:07] It's factually impossible. [28:09] I mean, it's common sense. [28:10] You don't need to be a lawyer. [28:11] I'm going to read you some additional testimony. [28:19] I'll try to put it on the screen. [28:20] You can read me as much as you want. [28:22] And I will. [28:23] Thank you, Madam D.A. [28:24] I apologize. [28:31] I did not intend to have to get into this here. [28:43] What was the – when Mr. Wade says that there was an interview on line 13, as you'll see here, this is prior to you entering office, what were you interviewing him for? [28:52] I didn't interview him prior to him entering office. [28:56] He had a thriving law practice. [28:57] Because even when he ends up being offered the position, he doesn't want it. [29:03] Okay. [29:03] Now, so it's your testimony today that you and Mr. Wade did not have any conversations prior to you taking office relative to an investigation into the 2020 election. [29:20] Don't answer that. [29:22] That is a deliberative privilege of what goes on in a district attorney's mind and the process that goes – [29:28] She wasn't district attorney. [29:30] She was. [29:31] Prior to being sworn in, she was district attorney? [29:33] No, she was not. [29:35] But you – you asked – [29:36] I'll return to my question. [29:38] Prior to you being sworn in as district attorney, is it your testimony today that you did not have any conversation with Mr. Wade about investigating the 2020 election? [29:53] It's a dumb-ass question. [29:55] I know it is. [29:56] But go ahead and tell him because it occurred after she took office. [30:01] But go ahead. [30:02] I didn't know that he was going to commit a crime prior to me taking office. [30:05] Like, factually, it's impossible. [30:07] Okay. [30:08] Thank you. [30:08] Would you agree with the statement – actually, I'll skip that question. [30:19] When did you decide to hire outside of your office a special assistant district attorney for this election case? [30:26] Oh, Lord. [30:29] So when I became the district attorney of Fulton County, the office was in absolute chaos. [30:38] I have to take you back. [30:39] Can you hear me? [30:40] It's a little – I was going to try to turn you up if you don't mind leaning forward. [30:43] When I became the district attorney of Fulton County, the office was in absolute chaos. [30:51] And I mean every level of chaos. [30:53] On the ground, the carpet was molded and there were holes in it and it was disgusting, a disgusting environment. [31:00] There were boxes in offices, some to where you couldn't open the door. [31:06] I remember walking through the office before. [31:09] I told you I'd fired 50 or 60. [31:11] I don't know exactly how many employees that I felt were unqualified to do this work. [31:16] That doesn't mean they were bad people, but they were unqualified for the positions that they held. [31:20] There were 18,000 – write that down – 18,000 unindicted cases that went back six or seven years that I was looking at, not to mention another, you know, 10,000 indicted cases in the system. [31:40] Now, some that the judges had – he hit on judicial hold, but they were still there. [31:44] So the office was in absolute chaos. [31:49] And then I'm in office – in the office on – I came in that Saturday, so that would have been day one. [31:56] That was the day that I walked through the office. [31:59] And I'm literally in the office that Monday or Tuesday. [32:02] I can't recall now what day it is. [32:04] And there's this phone call and the secretary of state saying, oh, the proper venue to investigate this might be Fulton County. [32:13] And so my priority became – and this is important, too – there were 200-and-something murders that had been sitting for years, families that had been waiting for justice for years. [32:25] And so when I come to be the district attorney, my first responsibility is just getting the office properly set up. [32:33] In fact, one of the most important roles I held up that I tried to find was the head of the civil rights lawyer. [32:39] So when Brian Watkins walked into my office and actually interviewed to come there, because he was not with the old administration, that was like a gift from God, [32:47] that I had a lawyer that had enough experience and would be talented enough and ethical enough and have the integrity to do this work. [32:54] But my primary job was getting the entire office set up. [32:59] So I immediately do things like set up a murder backlog project. [33:03] And I put Mike Carlson and Michael Sprinkle in charge of that. [33:07] We're going to get all – every family is going to get an answer. [33:10] They may not like the answer. [33:11] The answer may be we can't prosecute this. [33:13] But we're not going to sit with cases. [33:14] You know, we've got to make decisions on these cases. [33:16] And it took us years to get through that. [33:18] But we did. [33:19] And I'm happy to sit here and announce to you every one of those 18,000 cases a decision got made on to include those 101 police cases I talked about, [33:27] as well as the 46,136 cases that came in January 1st, 2021, until December 31st of 2024. [33:38] So while people tell these lies about the DA ain't been working, I want you to find a DA working as hard as me. [33:44] My question was, when did you decide to hire outside counsel, a special assistant district attorney, for the election interference case? [33:54] When it became obvious that this case would take so much investigation to learn the truth and that I would need people that could focus on that. [34:05] And although I had talent in the office that was being developed, each and every member of my staff had a priority. [34:12] See, this is the most important case to you. [34:14] Let me tell you what the most important case was to me. [34:16] When I walked in the office, there had been two black children that had been killed, Sequoia Turner and Kennedy Maxwell. [34:23] Those were the two most important cases to me as the DA. [34:26] And I needed to make sure that those families got justice, but the cases didn't come with a bow on them. [34:31] In fact, one of the cases was particularly not done properly. [34:36] And so my priority became making sure I had the talent to make sure we got all of those cases done. [34:43] And if you're wondering, both those men are doing life right now for taking those children from us. [34:47] Certainly aware of the case in the autonomous zone and everything that happened back in that tragic time frame. [34:53] So definitely appreciate those murderers being behind bars. [34:59] So you didn't really give me a date range, but we'll just move on here. [35:03] But you did consider Governor Barnes for this role. [35:05] He's testified to that previously. [35:07] And let me tell you what Governor Barnes told me. [35:09] Governor Barnes told me when he was the governor, he changed the state flag from the Confederate flag. [35:15] And that as a result of him changing the Confederate flag to, changing the flag to make it more inclusive to all Georgians, [35:23] that the Ku Klux Klan sat outside his house and that he lived under threat during that time period. [35:30] He told me that him and his beautiful wife had survived that, but that he was an older gentleman now. [35:35] I'm going to say that nicely. [35:36] He was an older gentleman. [35:38] And due to the nuts that would come out of the woodwork if I was doing this type of work, [35:44] that he was not at a juncture in his life where he could take those kind of security risks. [35:48] He also refused to work for $250 an hour. [35:57] We've got some question in here, Governor, on your rates. [36:01] And we'll get to that in a little bit. [36:04] You did, Madam DA, you considered several attorneys for this case in addition to Mr. Barnes? [36:08] I did. [36:08] And ultimately, you selected Mr. Wade to oversee the anti-corruption union. [36:12] Is that correct? [36:13] He never oversaw the anti-corruption union. [36:15] My apologies. [36:16] To oversee the elections interference case? [36:18] To manage, yes. [36:20] How would you delineate manage versus my choice of oversee? [36:24] They're the same. [36:24] Okay. [36:30] What happened between January 2021? [36:32] I believe that's when the phone call was that you referenced in November 2021, [36:36] which was the time that Mr. Wade signed his first contract. [36:39] What type of work happened within any area of your office in terms of gathering evidence [36:45] or considering whether or not to bring these charges? [36:48] I don't think it's any other business. [36:58] If you're getting into why a grand jury returns a bill of indictment, [37:03] that is a deliberative process wrapped in the discretion of the district attorney. [37:10] We're not going to get – I'm going to instruct her and not to answer. [37:13] You can – if you see fit, you can seek to enforce that question, [37:24] at which time she would be entitled to a jury trial in Fulton County, [37:29] and I would be able to cross-examine you with each one of you with a real judge, [37:34] really, on a real law. [37:36] But until that happens, I'm going to instruct her and not to answer. [37:38] So in your advice of counsel, you're asserting privilege? [37:42] I'm telling her not to answer. [37:45] I'm clarifying with the witness. [37:47] You don't have to answer that. [37:48] I'm not a potted plant. [37:49] I can answer. [37:51] You can advise – you can absolutely advise your client, Governor Barnes. [37:54] I'm asking your client – [37:55] I suggest you move on. [37:56] I'm asking your client if you are asserting privilege on the answer to the question. [38:00] I've made the objection of the record and told you even what you can do to enforce it. [38:07] What was the total cost of the election interference case? [38:10] I don't recall, but if we want to talk about cost, [38:16] I'd love to talk about how last year long the AG paid one lawyer $8 million. [38:21] You don't know what the cost of the – you don't know the cost of the election interference case? [38:25] I don't know the exact cost. [38:27] What's the range? [38:30] I don't want to speculate to numbers. [38:36] Whatever it cost, they tried to steal the rights of thousands of Georgians. [38:42] It couldn't have been enough. [38:43] What was the rough total operating budget of your office last year? [38:47] I don't know that. [38:47] It's probably around $40 million. [38:50] That's a speculation and a guess. [38:52] That includes state money, grant money, and that's not an exact number. [38:55] I don't do the budget. [38:58] I have very high-level conversations about that. [39:01] Okay. [39:01] Can you give us a rough breakdown of that – the county budget and the state budget? [39:05] I cannot, and I'm not going to guess for you. [39:07] Does the federal government give you any money? [39:08] I do have some grants, yes. [39:10] The only source of federal money you get is from grants? [39:12] To my knowledge, I don't. [39:15] There may be something else. [39:16] We may have some federal seizure money. [39:22] If we do, it's not much. [39:25] So I don't know. [39:26] I don't want to speculate. [39:28] If I say, oh, they gave me grant money and this federal seizure money, [39:33] and you find some line item someplace that I don't know, [39:36] you'll swear I was trying to lie to you when the truth is I don't know the correct answer. [39:40] I'm just trying to get to – I know you run a tight ship over there. [39:43] You're proud of your work. [39:44] I would assume that you would have – [39:47] The best DA in the southeast, why wouldn't I be proud of my work? [39:49] What's your annual budget? [39:51] I told you it's around $40 million, but I do not know an exact number. [39:54] And what's the approximate source of funds that you receive from the state versus the county? [40:00] Me, like every other district attorney in the state, do not receive enough funds. [40:04] I told you that you all pay 20 to 25 ADAs. [40:10] I don't know the exact number. [40:11] I don't have it in front of me. [40:12] You pay one – no, no, two legal assistants and one investigator. [40:17] Now, Fulton County is a million two people. [40:20] It's the place that when people come to Georgia, they're coming is to Atlanta. [40:24] On a daily basis, we have five million people, and we are very improperly funded. [40:31] If this committee wants to do some real work, it will get serious about crime fighting among this state. [40:38] From every rural community to every – [40:41] I'm answering my question. [40:43] That's not the answer to the question. [40:44] Okay. [40:44] If this committee wants to get serious about legislation to make the communities in the state of Georgia safer, [40:54] they will invest more money in every district attorney's office across this state. [41:00] That's the rural DAs need more, the middle size, the residentials, and the big cities like Atlanta. [41:07] All of us need more resources to be able to do our job appropriately, [41:11] and it is a joke the way that these people are funded, [41:14] that are dedicating their lives to public service. [41:18] Also, I want to go back to – because this is extremely important, and you have the power to do it – [41:22] the Georgia Bureau of Investigations cannot taste rape kids. [41:26] I did not ask her for advice on what the legislature can do. [41:29] That's exactly what the rent said, to take advice on legislation. [41:34] And we will get to that time. [41:36] Well, she has – you answer the question, she has a right to fully answer. [41:40] And if she would answer the question, Governor, I would not be saying it. [41:44] She's pontificating on everything from rape kits, which was what she was about to get into. [41:49] The question was the amount of money that came from state funds and county funds. [41:55] And if she doesn't know the answer to that question, the answer is I don't know. [41:58] The question isn't let me talk – the answer isn't let me talk about rape kits. [42:00] So I'll get back to the line of question. [42:03] I'm going to give you – I'm going to give you latitude here, Madam D.A., but same way in a courtroom, there are guardrails as to what we need to stay in and within. [42:13] Indeed, Governor. [42:14] And this is not a courtroom. [42:16] I have to make evidentiary rulings, and you don't have the power. [42:20] I have plenary power, Governor, to conduct the meeting. [42:23] No, sir, you do not have plenary. [42:25] I know you think you do and that you're above the law, but you are not. [42:30] If you want to cite her for contempt – [42:33] Governor. [42:34] She is entitled to a jury trial, and I can examine you on your actions, and I can examine you on your motives, [42:42] then I will be glad to take that as plenies make my day. [42:47] Well, we know the motives. [42:48] He's on the ballot. [42:49] Governor, this is a hearing of the Senate Special Committee on Investigations. [42:58] You're not worried about those that you convicted illegally and locked up. [43:02] Why is it that you run ads – [43:04] We're going to go on to our next question. [43:06] How are the funds – you say that we give you the money, and I know that's a loose term. [43:11] And that flows into the Fulton County coffers, so to speak, and when you remit payment, [43:19] you do that through the Fulton County accounting system. [43:21] Is that correct? [43:22] Your question was compound. [43:23] I didn't understand that. [43:24] Sure. [43:24] I'll try to break that down. [43:27] When checks are written as a result of a check request made by your office, [43:32] those checks are paid by Fulton County. [43:34] Is that correct? [43:39] I don't know how every check is written and if that's going to be 100% accurate, [43:45] so I'm going to refrain from asking that question. [43:47] What I can tell you is that – and probably happens in every other circuit – [43:53] the district attorney has control over their budget and they don't have to go to the county. [43:57] But I understood I was a woman DA coming into the office. [43:59] I also understood that I was African American. [44:02] And so, therefore, there would always be a target on my back. [44:05] And so I did two things financially. [44:07] One is I've never – so people can stop requesting – had a credit card associated with that office. [44:12] Never. [44:13] So I've never had a credit card. [44:14] Will never have a credit card. [44:16] The other thing I did is that there is a CFO of Fulton County, a white female. [44:20] Her name is Sharon Whitmore. [44:22] I believe you've heard from her. [44:23] And so I made it so that the procedures of my office, although I did not have to do it, [44:27] that it has to go through her for clearance. [44:29] That way nobody would say the district attorney stole any money. [44:32] Okay, that gets to the core of my question. [44:33] So when you're paying vendors, when you're paying contractors, that's going through – [44:38] I think you said her name was Ms. Whitmore, and she did testify before the committee. [44:41] What I'm getting to and I'm trying to figure out is whether when the state funds come in, [44:47] the federal funds come in, the county funds come in, are those paid for out of separate accounts? [44:51] Are those funds kind of commingled into a general budget, if you will, and that gets allocated? [44:57] I really couldn't answer the question. [44:58] There's many, many different pots of money from the county. [45:03] The state directly pays those state employees. [45:07] Then they get another check from the county, the ones that don't make enough from the state. [45:11] I really can't fully answer your question of all the ways. [45:15] I have a team that I call my – I have a deputy of operations and a team that does that kind of stuff. [45:20] But there's some money from the county. [45:22] There's some money from the state. [45:24] The grant money I know goes through the state. [45:26] The truth is I don't have any grants. [45:28] Fulton County has grants. [45:29] But those grants do benefit my office. [45:32] My Saki unit is renowned. [45:35] I'm ending the year with a 100 percent conviction rate on Special Victim Division. [45:39] Saki is a sexual assault kit initiative. [45:42] Georgia, like many states, failed victims, mainly victims of color. [45:46] And so rape kits for years, going back to the 80s, were not tested. [45:51] So we have a grant with the federal government that – and I'm talking about thousands of rape kits – [45:58] where they go and they test those rape kits. [46:00] What we have found is if they would have done those jobs and believed those victims, [46:04] that many of those rape kits go back to serial rapists. [46:08] They also go back to people that have committed other crimes. [46:11] I have excellent attorneys that are in that unit, some that I pay out of my – the grant, [46:16] some that I add with my general fund. [46:18] And as I said, not just my Saki unit, but my Crimes Against Children unit, my Saki unit, [46:23] my sexual assault unit, my human trafficking unit, we're ending the year with 100 percent. [46:29] So just yes or no on these, we can move quickly on to the next topic. [46:32] You said you do not have a county credit card or a DA credit card. [46:35] Absolutely not. [46:36] So y'all can say I stole some money. [46:38] Is there any sort of DA checking account that's separate that you use to pay your vendors or anything like that, [46:43] or is it all to go through the county? [46:47] I really can't answer that, and so I'm not going to speculate. [46:49] Okay. [46:50] You mentioned forfeiture funds before. [46:53] Do you have a ballpark of how much you've received? [46:54] I think you said it was a small number of state forfeiture funds. [46:57] No, I said federal. [46:58] Okay. [46:58] I don't think there's much in the federal forfeiture account. [47:01] Do you receive state forfeiture funds? [47:04] I do. [47:05] Approximately how much a year is that in an average year? [47:08] I don't know the number to that. [47:10] I can tell you I have sitting in a bank, so I just did a huge forfeiture, [47:13] but it's not money we can touch yet, and it's a couple million dollars. [47:16] Okay. [47:17] What's your understanding of the allowed uses of state forfeiture funds? [47:22] Oh, if I don't know the use of a forfeiture money, I talk to lawyers in the office. [47:28] I'll go to PAC. [47:29] I don't touch forfeiture money unless I get some approval. [47:33] Do you know of any delineation between the allowance of uses between state forfeiture funds and federal? [47:38] Yeah, there's definitely rules. [47:39] There's definitely rules. [47:41] I was asking about the difference between federal and state, if there's any rules there. [47:43] There are rules to both, and I can't tell you the rules for each. [47:48] Anytime we were going to make an expenditure, we would look at it, I'm sure. [47:51] Do you know if those funds are commingled at all within your system? [47:54] I don't know, but I would have believed not. [47:57] Okay. [47:58] Who is it? [47:58] You mentioned that you've got people. [48:00] Who is it that oversees the use of forfeiture funds in the office? [48:02] It's going to be the county. [48:03] Stuff is going to go back to the county. [48:07] And do you know whether or not any forfeiture funds were used to pay Mr. Wade? [48:11] I'm not aware of that. [48:12] We would have submitted the invoices to the county. [48:14] The county would have used one of those mini-line items. [48:17] They would have paid them. [48:21] Can you think of a reason why forfeiture funds would be used to pay Mr. Wade? [48:26] I guess he's... [48:26] No, man, she just told you that she doesn't know, so... [48:30] Yeah, you were asking me to speculate. [48:32] You do not know whether Mr. Wade was paid with state forfeiture funds or not? [48:36] You're asking me to speculate. [48:38] No, I'm asking if you know whether or not state forfeiture, any forfeiture funds were used. [48:41] I'm unaware of that. [48:44] Okay. [48:44] I'm unaware if the answer is yes. [48:46] I'm unaware if the answer is no. [48:48] What I'm aware of is the process was turning a bill, and they would do it. [48:53] You and Jim Jordan working together? [48:54] I've never talked to Mr. Jordan. [48:59] I don't know about that. [49:00] Anybody who doesn't report people that get raped in college, I'm going to have to disagree with you there, Governor. [49:04] I just want to point this out here. [49:05] This is... [49:06] Do you recognize the bottom form here, Fulton County court payment voucher? [49:13] I don't. [49:14] You've never seen any document in this format before? [49:17] Never. [49:17] Okay. [49:19] Well, this shows a number of things here. [49:21] It shows what fund it was paid from here, which is 440, which is the forfeiture fund account. [49:28] You can see at the top the unit name, confiscated funds for this invoice. [49:33] And then here you can see that this was a payment made. [49:35] And I apologize. [49:36] You can't see my mouse. [49:37] On the left side there, right in the middle, you can see that this was a payment made to the law office of Nathan Wade. [49:46] In reviewing for your testimony today, we just did review the bills and look through different sources of funds that were used to pay Mr. Wade. [49:54] I know you weren't, your testimonies, you were not aware that forfeiture funds were used. [49:59] We saw Mr. Wade was paid from forfeiture funds and from the county general fund, which is Fund 100. [50:06] And that's why I was getting to the uses of forfeiture funds to pay independent contractors. [50:12] Do you have any knowledge of any restrictions that may be around the concept of using forfeiture funds to pay independent contractors? [50:22] I do not. [50:23] It was my understanding that Mr. Wade was paid out of my professional services budget. [50:29] Okay. [50:32] What's the accounting process? [50:34] That's kind of what I was getting to earlier. [50:35] If it was your understanding he was paid out of the professional services budget, that would intimate that there's some sort of accounting procedure within either your office or the county office where there are separate fund allocations. [50:49] And I asked you if your funds were co-mingled and everything was paid out of the same or if there were dedicated accounts. [50:55] So you were, A, unaware that Mr. Wade was paid out of the forfeiture funds. [51:00] You believe he was paid out of the professional services funds. [51:02] What would be the process, as you understand, in your office to determine what fund an invoice is paid from? [51:11] You're in the weeds and I don't know the answer. [51:13] Okay. [51:13] We've already talked about the selection of the special SADA, special assistant district attorneys. [51:20] I may use those interchangeably. [51:22] The process of interviewing Governor Barnes, among some other folks, ultimately settling on Mr. Wade. [51:27] I don't want you to act like he was, you know. [51:30] Well, after talking to two or three people, I think, to be fair, I'm not saying he's the bottom. [51:35] This is in law 25 years. [51:36] Sure. [51:39] What was the reason that you chose to use, and I think if you could just unpack this for us a little bit more, [51:43] that you chose to use a special assistant DA at the rate of $250 an hour versus using the attorneys that were already in your office [51:53] or hiring additional attorneys at a rate that you referenced earlier is between, I think you said, between $85,000 and $200,000 a year. [52:01] Because we were drowning, and each of my – so most of the lawyers I had in the office wouldn't be qualified to do that work, most of them. [52:15] I had some that were qualified to do that work, but each of them had a major project. [52:22] Let me use those two cases that mattered most to me, Kennedy Maxey and Sequoia Turner. [52:27] I was determined we were going to win those cases. [52:30] So on day one, those cases got handed to Ms. Dacia Young. [52:35] In addition to handing her that because nobody has one job, I handed her the special victims division, at which time had like eight units. [52:43] So she's doing both these two big cases, and she's over the entire special victims division. [52:49] Same thing with Mr. Carlson, very qualified lawyer, but I handed him six units, and I also told him, [52:56] you're going to get rid of these 250 or so murders that we have. [53:01] We're going to do a project. [53:02] We're going to set it up. [53:03] We're going to go one by one. [53:04] So every lawyer I had with that level of experience had a huge project. [53:10] I assigned a lawyer to deal with the $18,000 backlog. [53:13] I don't want to be sitting here and, you know, it took us, I think, three years to get through those as well as keep up with the 46,000 cases [53:21] that end up coming in in my first term. [53:23] So everyone had some. [53:25] So it became obvious to me that I needed a lawyer that could manage this team while I did the rest of the work of the people. [53:34] And there was nobody else either internal or that you could have hired at a lower rate that could, as you just described. [53:39] A lower rate than 250? [53:40] It's an insult to take 250 for a lawyer that's been practicing law that long. [53:44] I thought you told me earlier that your range of people that work for you are between $85,000 a year and $200,000 a year. [53:53] Yeah, but $85,000 is like one domestic violence grant. [53:57] I usually only hire someone with three years of experience. [53:59] I make an exception with that because that's, you know, an offensive salary, although I can tell you I think the state is paying lawyers $64,000. [54:06] I mean, it's just ridiculous. [54:09] I know a little girl who just graduated Georgetown Law, and she's making $283,000, $300,000 a year. [54:15] We do not take public service seriously, and we need to because my lawyers do greater work than most of these lawyers in this civil firm. [54:23] In gross amounts, that doesn't include the perks, the health insurance and all that stuff. [54:32] Which weight does that have? [54:33] Sure. [54:36] Describe for me the experience level of your top paid or somebody that would fall within the category of the top paid assistant district attorney that works for you at the $200,000 a year, and to Governor Barnes' point, plus benefits. [54:49] Let's just say that that's $250,000. [54:51] And if I take that divided by 2,000 hours, that's about $125 an hour. [54:56] I don't understand the question. [54:57] My question is, what is the experience level of the assistant district attorney in your office? [55:04] Are you trying to intimate that you're going to tell me who to hire and how to do my job? [55:07] No, ma'am. [55:07] I'm asking you, the people, the wonderful people that you have hired, they're the top of your pay scale at $200,000 a year. [55:14] What is their experience level? [55:17] Because you, I'll let you answer that, and I'll ask my next question. [55:20] 20 years practicing or more. [55:22] And it's your testimony that somebody with 20 years practicing or more would not be able to manage the election interference case? [55:31] You didn't, you are really not listening. [55:34] I said that I had people at that pay rate, and each of them was assigned a major task within my office. [55:43] And no, I did not have anyone that was not assigned with a major task that I trusted to manage this case. [55:51] And so I made a decision. [55:53] The people of Fulton County elected me to make that decision, and I did. [55:58] Is there a reason why you decided to go the special assistant district attorney route via independent contractor as opposed to a new full-time hire? [56:08] I think it's asked and answered, sir. [56:11] Okay. [56:12] Because it was cheap. [56:16] You don't have to pay the perks. [56:18] Governor, I'm happy for you to provide counsel to your client. [56:23] But in terms of testimony, that's what the district attorney is here for today. [56:26] Can you describe? [56:28] To give you fair notice, I'm not going to allow her to ask repetitive, answer repetitive questions that have been answered time and time again. [56:37] Were there any internal policies that you had that kind of drew a line between when you would use your internal staff versus hiring a special assistant district attorney, [56:45] or was it more so based on workload like you described? [56:48] It was based on my decisions. [56:51] Okay. [56:51] At its peak, how many total attorneys were working on the election interference case? [57:03] Maybe nine, approximately. [57:08] You referenced a Mr. Cross before. [57:10] I believe that's a... [57:10] Who? [57:11] I believe you referenced a Mr. Cross before. [57:14] I don't know a Mr. Cross. [57:15] A couple minutes ago. [57:16] Ms. Cross, I apologize. [57:20] What about him? [57:21] Her. [57:22] Who are you talking about? [57:23] Ms. Anna Cross. [57:24] I never referenced Ms. Anna Cross. [57:27] I believe you referenced Ms. Cross when we were going through... [57:30] I didn't. [57:30] Read back the testimony. [57:34] Can you give me the breakdown of the total attorneys that were on the case? [57:37] How many of those were full-time within your office, and how many of those were independent contractors? [57:43] I believe I had three independent contractors. [57:46] One of those being Mr. Wade. [57:50] Who were the other two? [57:53] John Floyd and Anna Cross. [57:55] Diversity. [57:56] White male, white female, black male. [57:58] Diversity is intentional. [57:59] What kind of experience do you look for in those special assistant district attorneys? [58:05] They're all amazing lawyers. [58:11] John Floyd is the RICO expert. [58:13] He wrote the book literally. [58:14] He taught me RICO. [58:17] So that was his experience. [58:19] He's not necessarily going to be the trial prosecutor, but he certainly is great to help you put together an indictment, [58:30] and he is certainly capable of questioning a witness, but that was not his forte. [58:35] Ms. Cross is a brilliant mind. [58:39] She writes beautifully. [58:40] And so, and is very well-versed in the law. [58:44] I had worked for a prosecutor in the past, so I looked for smart people with integrity that could do the work. [58:52] And I got three lawyers, each the guy put in different skin that could do the work. [58:59] Thank you for giving us Ms. Cross's background, the rest of those as well. [59:08] Has Mr. Wade ever prosecuted a RICO case prior to the election interference case? [59:14] Mr. Wade has, certainly was served as a prosecutor before this. [59:19] He also has worked as a criminal defense attorney, and I don't know, I believe he has defended RICO cases. [59:26] But as far as you know, he had not prosecuted. [59:30] I didn't need him for that. [59:31] That's why I get to make this election and not you. [59:34] Has he ever prosecuted any felonies? [59:36] I know you've referenced him prosecuting cases. [59:38] It's my understanding that this was the first felony case that he was on the prosecutor's side for. [59:42] Is that accurate? [59:43] I'm not sure if that's accurate. [59:44] I know he did some, I believe he did some work for the attorney general, although the attorney general never tries as many cases as my office. [59:56] But different people are needed for different things. [1:00:00] And the people of Fulton County elected me to make those decisions. [1:00:04] And I know y'all want to come in and be daddy and create QAnon committees that will judge prosecutors and have these committees. [1:00:10] But unfortunately for you, I won this vote by 68% this time, 87% in the Democratic, 68% in the general, 72% last time. [1:00:21] So the people of Fulton County have selected me to make these choices, and I make them. [1:00:25] And my city and county are safer because I make them. [1:00:32] In your prior testimony with Ms. Ashley Merchant, there was conversation around what she referred to as block billing. [1:00:42] How would you describe block billing? [1:00:44] Oh, let's talk about Ms. Merchant. [1:00:46] Let's just talk about block billing, please. [1:00:48] We're not. [1:00:49] You've opened it now. [1:00:50] I've opened the question to block billing. [1:00:52] You're not saying it as an issue. [1:00:58] Well, then let's just. [1:00:59] So I'd like to talk about what this committee did the last time we were here, and for the press, I will have 50 copies of this so each person can get a copy. [1:01:08] You all, the last time y'all had a committee meeting, you all purported this lie that I had the honor of meeting Vice President Kamala Harris. [1:01:19] The question was block billing. [1:01:20] I'm going to answer this question right now. [1:01:22] And when you stated that, you stated that it was me and it was Mayor Dickens, and then you put this exhibit up for the entire world to see. [1:01:31] How disingenuous, how lacking of integrity for Ms. Merchant as an attorney to put it up and for Cowsert, who I noticed is cowardly, not here, to have it here. [1:01:41] This clearly says, I'm at a Black History Month project. [1:01:45] Almost every important black elected official across the country was invited to it. [1:01:50] I'm on the lawn with a cocktail. [1:01:52] And yet, y'all, tell the world, I was sitting down with the vice president having a meeting. [1:01:57] It was a damn lie. [1:01:59] And this is the evidence of it. [1:02:00] And y'all had the audacity to put it up on a screen as if you were showing something other than the DA was having a cocktail on the lawn. [1:02:07] I have never even had the honor of meeting Vice President Kamala Harris. [1:02:12] Never. [1:02:13] How would you define block billing? [1:02:16] Like somebody who didn't know what the hell they were talking about? [1:02:21] I'm going to refer you to the screen. [1:02:25] I don't review those documents, so you're asking me to look at documents that I haven't for the first time. [1:02:30] What I can tell you is that I only allowed Mr. Wade to bill 160 hours a week. [1:02:35] And then Mr. Wade would be the first one in the office making sure that my staff arrived. [1:02:40] He corrected their behavior. [1:02:41] They thought that 830 meant 830. [1:02:44] He taught them that 830 means 745. [1:02:46] He got there before them. [1:02:47] He left after him. [1:02:49] He taught them how to do this case. [1:02:52] And he was a leader to that team and a public servant. [1:02:55] And for that, him, like me, has been threatened thousands of times. [1:03:00] You want something to investigate as a legislature? [1:03:02] Investigate how many times they've called me the N-word. [1:03:05] Why don't you investigate that? [1:03:06] Why don't you investigate them writing on my house? [1:03:08] Why don't you investigate the fact that my house has been swatted if you want something to do with your time that makes sense? [1:03:14] And you can use all this in your campaign ad. [1:03:17] You attacked Fonnie Willis. [1:03:19] What have you done, sir? [1:03:20] Nothing. [1:03:21] So I'm going to refer you to the screen. [1:03:23] I know you said you don't approve. [1:03:24] I don't look at this. [1:03:25] I've never seen it. [1:03:26] So I can't talk to you about documents I don't approve and don't review. [1:03:30] Can't talk to you about it. [1:03:31] Who does approve the documents in your office when invoices come in? [1:03:34] I thought we've been through this. [1:03:37] I don't believe you said who reviews the invoices and approves the invoices in your office. [1:03:40] First of all, I have no firsthand knowledge of it. [1:03:44] You have no firsthand knowledge of it? [1:03:45] You want me to testify about something I don't have any firsthand knowledge of? [1:03:47] I'm asking you. [1:03:48] Are you asking me to speculate? [1:03:49] Because I've clearly told you I don't have any firsthand knowledge of it, and I'm not going to speculate. [1:03:53] The question is, when an invoice comes into your office from a special assistant district attorney, [1:04:01] what is the review process for that invoice before it's paid? [1:04:04] She's answered. [1:04:05] She said she has a deputy of operations, and he reviews or she reviews, and then it goes through the county. [1:04:13] So it's a repetitive question. [1:04:15] What's the name of the deputy of operations? [1:04:17] The question has been asked and answered, and I believe it goes straight to the county, so I'm not sure. [1:04:23] Dexter Bond. [1:04:24] Do you know who ATG may be, initials, within your office? [1:04:29] I don't. [1:04:30] I would assume it's accurate to say that's probably not Dexter Bond. [1:04:34] I don't. [1:04:35] It may be somebody at the county. [1:04:39] What we're looking at here are two bills that were paid by and approved by your department. [1:04:44] The one on the left is from the cross firm, which I refer to Anna Cross that we referenced earlier. [1:04:49] The one on the right is invoice number 11 from Nathan Wade. [1:04:54] And the first thing that... [1:04:55] Let me tell you why this is such a damn joke. [1:04:56] The first thing that jumps out to me as a non-lawyer but as someone who has paid lawyer bills before, [1:05:03] and I believe this gets to the question which was around block billing, and here's my question for you, Madam DA. [1:05:11] Are there rules in your contracts or otherwise when you hire independent contractors that gets to the billing methodology for your attorneys? [1:05:20] In other words, are they allowed to always bill to the even hour, or is there a professional expectation that they would bill to the 10th or quarter hour? [1:05:29] Let me tell you something. [1:05:29] I had three attorneys working with me that had integrity for you to insinuate that a judge that sat for 10 years [1:05:36] and was the head of the magistrate court judges, that they did something illegal. [1:05:41] They were underpaid. [1:05:42] I have here documents where in one annual year, because I want you to remember his bills were over the course of three years. [1:05:48] In one annual year made $8 million, made $5 million, and I'm going to make sure that the press has that so that when you're asking me about this great service to the state of Georgia, [1:06:00] that it is understood that these are more than reasonable, but actually bargain basement amounts. [1:06:07] Ms. Cross would insist that I wrote government rate in her contract, because she didn't want anyone to get confused that she would actually work for this rate, [1:06:14] but for the fact that it was service to her community. [1:06:18] So I don't know what we're talking about here, but to insinuate these three lawyers that have great integrity, have served this community well, did something unethical, [1:06:28] I don't know why we're having this conversation. [1:06:30] I'm trying to. [1:06:30] I don't know anything about the pot, whatever you're talking about. [1:06:33] The state of Georgia allocates funding to your office. [1:06:38] They hire those 25 lawyers, yes. [1:06:41] And we are trying to, the question in here is relative to the approval process of invoices that are paid by your office. [1:06:51] You have testified that that is done by Dexter Bond, that you're unaware of who this ATG is that signed off on this. [1:06:58] So we'll move on to the, to this further line of questioning here. [1:07:04] You know, old men have to go to the bathroom about every hour. [1:07:07] Governor, would you like a five-minute recess? [1:07:09] We'll take a five-minute recess. [1:18:24] What I meant to speak is $160 a month. [1:18:26] Also, I have referred several times to the rates of the AG. [1:18:31] I would like you to know that in 2020, the Attorney General of this state paid $52,000 in attorney's fees. [1:18:41] I've done initials, $52 million in attorney's fees with the top recipient in that year, initials AF. [1:18:48] I've taken off their name at $3,593,000. [1:19:08] That was for 2020. [1:19:09] In 2021, again, in excess of $52 million, with the top one in that year being AD as the initials, $2,673,000. [1:19:19] I should note the great Josh Belafonte was one of the recipients that year, and he made $1.3 million in 2021. [1:19:27] In 2022, the AG's office spit on special prosecutors $55 million. [1:19:34] DS being the top recipient for that year, $2 million, $200,000. [1:19:40] Josh Belafonte made $911,000. [1:19:43] In 2023, the AG's office spit on $65 million, with the top recipient making $5 million, initials MR, and I'm going to finish. [1:19:55] In 2020, the top was MR, and they made $4.6 million, and then let's not leave off 2020. [1:20:04] All right, we're going to move on to the next question here. [1:20:06] And it is relevant, since you're questioning the rate of special prosecutors. [1:20:35] That's for the press. [1:20:38] All right, I want to refer your attention to the screen. [1:20:51] Madam D, have you seen this letter before? [1:20:53] It's got my signature on it. [1:20:55] Do you have seen this letter before? [1:20:57] Yes, that's how it got signed. [1:21:00] You sent this letter on December 17, 2021, requesting access to documents from the January 6th Committee, Chairman Mr. Representative Thompson. [1:21:09] Is that correct? [1:21:09] I did. [1:21:11] Okay. [1:21:12] Did you or anyone in your office receive help in your investigation from the January 6th Commission? [1:21:16] You mean by help? [1:21:22] Did they send you documents? [1:21:25] Well, they're public documents. [1:21:27] Did they send you any documents that were not public? [1:21:29] That were not public at the time? [1:21:32] None that I can recall. [1:21:34] None that I can recall. [1:21:35] In the letter you offered to meet them in person, did they take you up on the offer to meet in person? [1:21:41] I've never met Thompson. [1:21:44] Have you ever met anyone that was doing work with the January 6th Commission? [1:21:48] Not to my knowledge. [1:21:49] I may have met them and not known they were doing that work. [1:21:52] Mr. Wade traveled to D.C. with members of your staff, is that correct? [1:21:56] That is correct. [1:21:58] And Mr. Wade, billed for conference calls for the January 6th Committee, is that correct? [1:22:02] I haven't looked at the bills. [1:22:04] What difference does that mean? [1:22:10] On the left side of the screen here, and I apologize, the camera's in your way, there's a screen over here. [1:22:14] You'll have to remember the criminals that I indicted, they had committed crimes all over the country. [1:22:18] And so, as a result, as a prosecutor, if you know that a criminal has done crimes in this state and other states, it would almost not be due diligence to try to get information from them. [1:22:30] Here goes some more legislation you can take up. [1:22:32] There is a process called TUI with the federal government where state prosecutors try to get information from federal prosecutors. [1:22:39] They are not very helpful. [1:22:41] On this bill, on the left-hand side, the first red highlight. [1:22:47] I haven't seen the bill, so you remember? [1:22:49] That's why I'm showing it to you, Madam DA. [1:22:51] It says, team meeting, conference with January 6th, research legal issues to prep, and it ends with V. [1:22:57] He testified, and the testimonies on the right side of the screen, that that meant interview. [1:23:02] And then the second one is travel out of state, interview and research, which was from April 27th until April 29th. [1:23:09] Are you aware of a trip that Mr. Wade took out of state that your office paid for in April of 2022? [1:23:15] Yes. [1:23:16] What was the purpose of the trip? [1:23:18] I don't recall. [1:23:20] Okay. [1:23:22] I'm sure to get information on some of the criminals I ended up indicting. [1:23:24] This slide here shows essentially a reimbursement request on the right-hand side for Mr. Wade at the Hyatt Place Hotel. [1:23:34] And on the left-hand side, this is an invoice for the Hyatt Place Hotel during the time period I referenced earlier for Mr. Michael Hill. [1:23:42] Do you know who Michael Hill is? [1:23:43] He was an assistant chief when he left my office. [1:23:46] He's an investigator, though, a sworn law enforcement officer. [1:23:50] And he was on your staff during April of 2022? [1:23:53] You said when he left your office. [1:23:54] When did he leave the office? [1:23:55] I don't remember. [1:23:55] But yes. [1:23:58] Yes to the first question. [1:23:59] He was on my staff at that time. [1:24:01] I don't remember to the second question of when did he leave. [1:24:05] Not long ago, he got a higher title at another office. [1:24:11] Do you know who else from your office attended this trip? [1:24:14] I can't recall. [1:24:15] You can refresh my recollection if you like. [1:24:19] This is an invoice for the same hotel and the same dates from Mr. Francis. [1:24:24] I assume it's Mr. Wakeford. [1:24:25] That's the one that worked in your staff? [1:24:27] An amazing attorney. [1:24:28] What was his role? [1:24:29] He's an attorney. [1:24:30] What work did he do within your department, your team? [1:24:34] He does all types of work, but he is what I would consider to be an appellate lawyer. [1:24:39] Did he do work on the elections interference case? [1:24:41] Absolutely. [1:24:44] What work did he do on the election interference case? [1:24:46] He did a lot of excellent writing. [1:24:54] This slide here is for Mr. John Wooten. [1:24:56] Same hotel, same dates, same trip to D.C. [1:24:59] Do you know John Wooten? [1:25:02] He works for me. [1:25:03] Currently? [1:25:04] Yes. [1:25:04] What was his role in April of 2022? [1:25:08] A lawyer. [1:25:09] Works for my office. [1:25:10] Does a lot of white-collar crime for me. [1:25:12] Did he work on the election interference case? [1:25:14] Yep. [1:25:16] Okay. [1:25:17] So is it safe to assume from both the testimony I had on the screen, your letter, and Mr. [1:25:23] Wade's invoices that referenced January 6th, is it safe to assume that Mr. Wade and other [1:25:28] members of your staff went to D.C. in furtherance of your investigation of the 2022 election? [1:25:34] Sorry, 2020 election. [1:25:37] I'm not going to make assumptions under oath. [1:25:44] You are unaware of whether or not members of your staff, four of them that we have here [1:25:48] so far, are three in one independent contractor. [1:25:51] You are unaware as to whether or not the purpose of their D.C. trip was to meet with the January [1:25:55] 6th committee or members of the January 6th committee or lawyers working for the J6 committee. [1:25:59] I know that they went to D.C., and I know it was in reference to this investigation. [1:26:06] I do not recall who they spoke with, but you all have tried to make this some nefarious [1:26:13] thing that lawyers would try to investigate and find out information about people who came [1:26:20] to Georgia and committed crimes. [1:26:23] And instead of being honorable and trying to defend those people that you've taken oath [1:26:29] to serve, we're here with this foolishness. [1:26:32] Do you know how many trips Mr. Wade took to D.C.? [1:26:36] In his life? [1:26:37] As it relates to the J6 committee or the 2020 elections interference case. [1:26:42] I believe one, but I don't know. [1:26:43] It's speculation. [1:26:46] It wouldn't be speculation if he had told you about it. [1:26:48] Did he tell you about any other trips that he took? [1:26:49] But what you have to remember is it is whatever day it is in December of 2025, and I'm an office [1:26:55] that prosecutes 64,000 people. [1:26:57] And I know you are somewhat offended that I had the audacity to prosecute, you know, these folks [1:27:04] that came into my county and committed crimes. [1:27:07] But this wasn't special to me. [1:27:09] This was another day of business. [1:27:23] On the screen is another invoice from Mr. Wade. [1:27:25] The highlighted section, and I'll just read it out loud, says January 6th meeting at ATTY [1:27:30] COMPF, and that's from November 16th of 2022. [1:27:35] And then there is a second entry immediately below that, interview with D.C. slash White [1:27:41] House, November 18, 2022. [1:27:44] Have you seen this bill? [1:27:46] No. [1:27:46] Are you aware of phone calls or conferences that Mr. Wade either attended or was a part [1:27:52] in that relates to the J-6 committee or the election interference case working with the [1:27:57] J-6 committee that is separate from the April trip that we just discussed? [1:28:00] We didn't do much work with a J-6 committee. [1:28:03] So I've never seen this bill before. [1:28:08] And I believe the only thing that we called the White House about was did we have to go [1:28:13] through the detourine process with that White House like we have to do with the Department [1:28:20] of Justice. [1:28:21] That's my recollection. [1:28:22] That could be right or wrong. [1:28:24] But we were trying to speak to people in the Trump administration, the first one. [1:28:31] So I don't believe we had a lot of contact with the White House. [1:28:35] So I'm not aware. [1:28:37] You said you were trying to speak with people that were part of the first Trump administration [1:28:39] in these travels to D.C. [1:28:40] Or are you saying that more generally? [1:28:42] More generally. [1:28:43] Okay. [1:28:43] And just to clarify, I want to make sure that I have the record correct here. [1:28:49] You're unaware of who Mr. Wade and the others met with. [1:28:51] I can't recall those levels of details. [1:28:53] I know you want to take me back to 1948 where an African-American prosecutor can only prosecute [1:28:58] certain types of people. [1:28:59] But I prosecute and stand up for all victims that come into my circuit. [1:29:05] When was the special purpose grand jury impaneled? [1:29:09] I don't remember the date. [1:29:10] But that's an interesting point. [1:29:12] Two grand juries said these people did these crimes. [1:29:14] The date that I have is... [1:29:15] The grand jury was made up of independents, Democrats, Republicans, two... [1:29:22] The date that I have is January 24th of 2022. [1:29:26] Does that seem like it's within the range of being the correct date? [1:29:29] So I already stated I don't trust you. [1:29:30] I understand you're trying to run for lieutenant governor right now. [1:29:33] Anything you want me to testify to, I'm going to need to see. [1:29:36] Okay. [1:29:38] Were you aware that in between the time of the special grand jury being sworn in and receiving [1:29:41] evidence, Mr. Wade traveled to Athens, Georgia, to meet with officials from the White House [1:29:45] Counsel's Office? [1:29:46] I got a call. [1:29:48] On the right-hand side here is the meeting that I reference. [1:29:57] The highlighted section reads, travel to Athens, conf with White House Counsel. [1:30:00] How does this assist you in developing laws for Georgia? [1:30:04] Because I believe the purpose that I'm here for is because you all need assistance in doing [1:30:09] your job. [1:30:10] And you want assistance with rules and regulations around how people should be a prosecutor. [1:30:16] And it made sense to me that you'd come to the best prosecutor in the state to ask for [1:30:20] some advice. [1:30:21] But I'm confused as to how this assists you and what the purpose of me being here is. [1:30:26] The committee has a broad purpose. [1:30:28] I'd be happy to refer to counsel as to the overall purpose of the committee. [1:30:31] But my question for you is, as it relates to this trial, I don't think it's relevant, [1:30:34] so I'm objecting on relevance. [1:30:36] She's asked and answered. [1:30:38] She's told you that the Tui process goes through the White House Counsel's Office. [1:30:43] She's asked and answered. [1:30:47] And it's your testimony today that the Travel to Athens Conference with the White House [1:30:52] Counsel, as far as you are aware, was due to a part of this Tui process that the governor [1:30:57] is referencing. [1:30:58] I've testified. [1:30:59] I don't recall anything about this. [1:31:00] Okay. [1:31:02] And I don't see how it's relevant to what your alleged purpose is. [1:31:07] Now, your real purpose is to try to get elected, which I would say, Georgia, please, let's [1:31:12] elect any lieutenant governor, but this one. [1:31:14] We'll get to your work trying to elect a lieutenant governor in a second, Madam DA. [1:31:22] But for now, we're talking about the travel to D.C. [1:31:25] I've done no work with an elected governor, but if I will do some work with this. [1:31:29] I see that Counselor left you alone today. [1:31:32] I'm not going to. [1:31:32] And he is running to be Attorney General of this state. [1:31:36] Madam DA, we're going to answer the question. [1:31:36] And he was not qualified to be such. [1:31:39] By record, by this document where he put up a false document trying to prove that I met with [1:31:46] the vice president, that shows you he does not have ethics. [1:31:49] But there is somebody running for Attorney General that has been a state prosecutor, a [1:31:53] federal prosecutor, a civil rights attorney, and a state's legislature. [1:31:57] So if people want to vote for people that are ethical and actually have the experience [1:32:01] to do the job, I'd say donate now to Tanya Miller. [1:32:04] Madam DA, I've asked you about Mr. Wade. [1:32:30] Did you speak with anyone that had worked with the January 6th committee or was a lawyer [1:32:35] for the J6 committee? [1:32:36] Ask an answer. [1:32:38] She said she'd never done it herself. [1:32:42] That's what she testified. [1:32:43] Did you communicate with members of the J6 committee through any intermediaries that [1:32:46] relayed messages back and forth on your behalf? [1:32:49] I don't recall ever speaking to anyone of the January 6th committee. [1:32:53] What you ask me, though, is have I ever met someone? [1:32:56] I am a public official. [1:32:57] I meet people all over this country all the time, shake hands, take pictures, kiss babies, [1:33:02] all the things elected officials do. [1:33:04] So I have no idea if I've ever met someone that may have been part of the January 6th committee. [1:33:11] As J6, is that where they stormed the Capitol? [1:33:16] And killed a police officer? [1:33:18] Is that the same committee we're talking about? [1:33:22] So it's clear on the record? [1:33:24] The ones that have been exonerated, we say that we stand with law enforcement but don't [1:33:27] care when police officers get killed. [1:33:30] We're going to continue on to the next question. [1:33:32] Governor, you are here to advise your council. [1:33:34] You're not here to pontificate. [1:33:35] Absolutely. [1:33:41] How does this help you belong? [1:33:43] Yes, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Governor. [1:33:46] There must have been a conspiracy here when they went up and looked into the folks that [1:33:56] broke into the Capitol in shamu suits or whatever that was and put the Vice President of the [1:34:04] United States out saying, hang Mike Pence, and that they were prosecuted and then pardoned [1:34:11] by President Trump. [1:34:13] And you're trying to say and infer that it was illegal, immoral to investigate that, that [1:34:20] it was part of a pending case. [1:34:22] We're asking questions relative to the investigation, Governor. [1:34:25] We're going to move on to the next question. [1:34:26] You're trying to infer some wrongdoing where none exists. [1:34:31] Ask the question, let's move on. [1:34:33] Thank you for- [1:34:33] Also to divide this country, and it should be noted that there were many great, honorable [1:34:38] Republicans that brought this case to me because they knew what happened was wrong. [1:34:43] One of them is Duncan, who's now running for governor. [1:34:47] So you have your endorsement? [1:34:51] I didn't endorse it. [1:34:52] Wait, wait, just a minute. [1:34:53] Don't answer that question. [1:34:55] So I- [1:34:56] But I do think it should be noted that although you are trying to divide this country, that [1:35:02] this country is not divided. [1:35:04] Most people in this country are trying to do the right thing every day as they get up for [1:35:09] work. [1:35:09] Most people know when someone is murdered and victimized, you don't act as a depraved human [1:35:14] being and tease them and their family in their greatest time of loss. [1:35:19] Most people. [1:35:19] So I want to talk about a little bit of a timeline as it relates to D.C. and just lay [1:35:27] out a fact pattern here, and I'll ask you a couple questions. [1:35:30] On November 9th, then-President Biden stated and was asked about President Trump returning [1:35:36] to office, and he stated that we just have to demonstrate that he will not take power [1:35:41] if he does run, making sure he, under legitimate efforts of our Constitution, does not become [1:35:48] the next president again. [1:35:49] Are you familiar with that quotation from the president? [1:35:52] It has nothing to do with this inquiry. [1:35:55] If you want to subpoena President Biden, subpoena him down here. [1:35:59] I'll come. [1:36:00] I might even represent him. [1:36:01] I hope he's got a fee. [1:36:02] I hope he's got something left. [1:36:04] We're getting minded things. [1:36:13] So, a couple of days after this, President Trump did indeed announce that he was running [1:36:20] for president. [1:36:21] You can see on the date there, November 15th, 2022. [1:36:26] And then the very next day, and we've referenced this a second ago, but we're going to go back [1:36:35] to it. [1:36:41] This helps you develop legislation how? [1:36:43] The very next day, there was a conversation between Mr. Wade. [1:36:48] I'm sorry, there was an eight-hour. [1:36:52] It was described here as an interview with D.C. and the White House. [1:36:55] Interview with who? [1:36:56] It reads, interview D.C. slash White House. [1:37:00] It's on the screen. [1:37:02] And I'm getting to, I'm laying a foundation here, Governor. [1:37:08] On November 18th, the very same day as this eight-hour phone call with the White House, [1:37:17] U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith. [1:37:23] And around that same period of time, some news reports say the same day, but we know within [1:37:26] two weeks of that time, Matthew Colangelo, who was the former third-highest-ranking official [1:37:32] at DOJ, tendered his resignation to take a position in the Manhattan prosecutor's office, [1:37:38] which would go on to also indict President Trump. [1:37:42] Committed crimes a lot of places. [1:37:43] And you know, you all want to, no, no, this is very important. [1:37:54] On November 18th. [1:37:55] You all want to intimidate people from doing the right thing. [1:37:58] And you think that you're going to intimidate me. [1:38:01] You all have been trying to intimidate me for five years, which is why I have not been able [1:38:05] to live in my house for five years, because the N-word has been written on my house. [1:38:10] Thousands of threats have come to my office. [1:38:12] And instead of doing some legislation, when someone, no, no, no, when someone says something [1:38:17] inflammatory that you know is going to cause them to be the victims of crime, you ought [1:38:22] to do something about it. [1:38:23] But you see, I'm not Marjorie Taylor Greene. [1:38:25] I ain't going to quit in a month because somebody threatens me. [1:38:28] I took an oath to do the right thing. [1:38:30] People came into my community and committed a crime, and I indicted them. [1:38:34] And rest assured, if someone else comes in my community and commits a crime, I will [1:38:38] indict them again. [1:38:40] The special purpose grand jury released its report just under a month after this timeframe [1:38:46] on December 15th of 2022. [1:38:47] And said 39 people should be indicted, but in my discretion and looking at the evidence [1:38:52] that was the most damning, I chose to only present an indictment to the grand jury of 19. [1:39:01] And who knew? [1:39:02] The citizens of Fulton County, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, non-politicals all said [1:39:08] these 19 people deserve to be indicted, and they were. [1:39:11] The question was the special purchase grand jury, purpose grand jury, released its report [1:39:17] just under a month after this phone call between Mr. Wade and the White House, just a month [1:39:22] after on the very same day Jack Smith was appointed by Merrick Garland, and just a month after [1:39:27] the third ranking member of the Department of Justice left the Department of Justice to [1:39:30] go work for Alvin Bragg, that date being December 15th, 2022. [1:39:34] Is that the date that the special purpose grand jury released its report? [1:39:38] I don't recall. [1:39:39] Let me tell you. [1:39:42] You don't recall. [1:39:43] Does that? [1:39:44] She said she did. [1:39:47] And to try to. [1:39:48] Everybody's a crook in your mind. [1:39:51] Jack Smith. [1:39:52] Well, there were some crooks. [1:39:53] Well, I know. [1:39:54] They were on the indictment. [1:39:55] So you referenced your prosecutorial discretion and bringing these charges. [1:40:03] I believe you said 50. [1:40:04] You were talking kind of fast there. [1:40:05] Was it 50 that you said? [1:40:06] I said that the grand jury recommended that 19 people be indicted. [1:40:10] It's there. [1:40:11] It's part of public record. [1:40:12] What I did was look at all of the evidence against each of those persons, and I chose to only [1:40:19] put forth an indictment that talked about the 19 most culpable. [1:40:25] Those 19 were presented to a grand jury. [1:40:29] I just want to clarify. [1:40:30] You said 19 twice. [1:40:31] I just want to clarify your testimony. [1:40:32] Nineteen people were indicted. [1:40:33] Originally, how many were recommended? [1:40:35] You said 19 for both of those. [1:40:36] Thirty-nine were recommended. [1:40:38] Nineteen were presented. [1:40:41] How many of the electors, there were 16 electors here in the Capitol that cast votes for President [1:40:48] Trump. [1:40:49] Is that correct? [1:40:53] You talking about the fake electors that y'all sat in a hearing and listened to? [1:40:56] Many of y'all? [1:40:57] In this same room? [1:40:58] I was not in the room, but I'm referencing. [1:41:00] There were 16 electors who took part in that meeting. [1:41:02] Is that your understanding? [1:41:03] Why are you not offended that people came before you and lied? [1:41:06] Were there 16 electors? [1:41:10] I don't remember. [1:41:11] I don't remember. [1:41:12] Okay. [1:41:13] How many did you indict? [1:41:14] What does this have to do with you developing legislation? [1:41:15] Because this is not relevant, so I'm going to object relevance. [1:41:18] Where are we going? [1:41:21] I thought this was supposed to be... [1:41:23] I thought y'all needed some help. [1:41:24] It was supposed to be about rules of conduct. [1:41:28] And so now you're getting into where the electors met here and they weren't really electors. [1:41:34] And how many of them got indicted and why did you do that? [1:41:37] We're here for far more. [1:41:39] Wait just a minute. [1:41:40] We're here for far more than rules of conduct. [1:41:42] ...on why she chose to do so. [1:41:46] It was presented to two grand juries. [1:41:48] They returned an indictment on one because an investigative grand jury cannot indict. [1:41:54] It can only investigate. [1:41:56] And so how's this to do with the conduct and legislation? [1:42:02] I'm amazed that everybody's fixated that the election was fixed five years ago. [1:42:11] We'll come back to this one for a second. [1:42:16] We'll move on for a good bit. [1:42:19] Maybe a half hour. [1:42:20] Well, we'll see what you think of this next slide question, Governor. [1:42:23] In January of 2021, you referenced his name earlier, but you hired Jeff DeSantis to be [1:42:28] the deputy district attorney overseeing the media relations unit of the district attorney's office. [1:42:33] Is that correct? [1:42:34] And strategy. [1:42:35] Media relations and strategy. [1:42:38] What's the, what's the, can you describe the difference between those two separate roles [1:42:41] or you're just saying that's the title? [1:42:42] That's the title. [1:42:44] It's the title. [1:42:45] Okay. [1:42:46] Was he serving in your office in April of 2021? [1:42:48] Yes. [1:42:50] Okay. [1:42:51] He's classified, though, as an ADA for personnel purposes. [1:42:54] He is a lawyer. [1:42:55] He went to Emory Law School. [1:42:56] He was there two years ahead of me and graduated. [1:42:59] He's my elder. [1:43:00] You're referencing media relations. [1:43:09] How would you describe the overall role of media relations? [1:43:12] This has relations in any of these resolutions. [1:43:19] It's beyond the scope. [1:43:21] This is within the scope of the state's funding to that department. [1:43:24] Not a question about who's the director of media relations. [1:43:27] I didn't ask who, I'm asking what the role of media relations is. [1:43:30] Neither is that. [1:43:31] Don't answer. [1:43:32] I instruct you not to answer. [1:43:34] Completely irrelevant. [1:43:35] Your objection is relevance. [1:43:37] No. [1:43:39] My objection is the reason she hired and the reason that she has, hires and fires employees [1:43:47] and the reason that she undertakes to run her office is a matter of employees, which [1:43:53] is executive and is privileged and is a deliberative process. [1:43:57] So you are asserting that the role of a, of a media relations director is privileged. [1:44:02] You want clarity on that counselor? [1:44:09] So you're instructing the witness. [1:44:10] I'm going to, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm not arguing with you. [1:44:14] I'm just trying to understand what the objection is. [1:44:17] Where's the corporate board? [1:44:18] Here's the corporate board. [1:44:20] It would help if you, governor respectfully would help if the objections could be limited [1:44:24] to like five to 10 seconds. [1:44:26] I mean, I don't need a speaking objection. [1:44:28] I, I, I, I talk slow. [1:44:31] I'll, I'll give you 30 seconds, but it's counted by words, governor. [1:44:35] I'm a country lawyer and it's real hard for me to get things done. [1:44:40] It is beyond the scope of the resolution, number one. [1:44:44] Okay. [1:44:45] All right. [1:44:46] Can we, can we break and address that? [1:44:48] I'm going to state my objection. [1:44:49] I mean, I'm not here. [1:44:50] That's fine. [1:44:51] We'll do it all together. [1:44:52] I'm not here. [1:44:53] I'm just trying to understand. [1:44:54] I'm, I'm not trying to debate, governor. [1:44:55] I think he's just looking for clarity on your objection, governor. [1:44:59] Well, beyond the scope. [1:45:00] Okay. [1:45:01] All right. [1:45:02] On the beyond the scope. [1:45:03] I'm sorry. [1:45:04] Oh, I can do that. [1:45:05] I guess. [1:45:06] Is that me? [1:45:08] It's, it's on. [1:45:09] Oh, it's on. [1:45:11] Okay. [1:45:12] Can you hear him? [1:45:13] I'm no, I'm not going to convince you, but I just want to give you the chance. [1:45:14] I certainly know I'm not going to convince you, madam. [1:45:15] Whereas, uh, this is lines 26 to 30 of Senate resolution five, whereas many have concluded [1:45:32] that the conduct of district attorney Willis has brought her and her office into disrepute. [1:45:36] My office has brought myself into respect. [1:45:39] I'm sorry. [1:45:40] Wait. [1:45:41] I'm sorry. [1:45:42] And so that. [1:45:43] I'm not, I'm not done. [1:45:44] Okay. [1:45:45] Go ahead. [1:45:46] Undermine public confidence in the fair and partial. [1:45:48] The public voted me again by 68% respect. [1:45:52] Yes. [1:45:54] Madam D. I don't think that it's, well, you, you, you continued. [1:45:58] I mean, I've got my second fundraiser email from you while we're sitting here. [1:46:01] Did you donate? [1:46:02] Partial. [1:46:03] I did early on when you ran against Paul Howard and you know that. [1:46:06] Um, you've selected the best DA in the country. [1:46:09] I'm just here as a lawyer, ma'am. [1:46:14] Fair and impartial disinterested administration of justice by prosecutors across our state [1:46:19] and cast significant doubt as to the purpose and validity of the charges of her office has [1:46:24] brought in regard to the 2020 presidential election. [1:46:26] Further. [1:46:27] When you get to the language, the actionable language under powers and duties of the committee. [1:46:35] The committee is hereby reauthorized to undertake legislative investigation into the issues [1:46:41] mentioned above or related thereto. [1:46:43] So I would submit it's broad. [1:46:44] I presume that doesn't change your position, but I just. [1:46:47] Okay. [1:46:48] Uh, you say that it is irrelevant is, is. [1:46:51] You mentioned at the start of this that you were going to be able to object to privilege. [1:46:56] Is it, is it your position that relevance is a privilege that you're asserting? [1:47:00] More than just privilege. [1:47:01] It is also, it is also that it's beyond the scope of what you've read me there is just [1:47:07] confirmed that it's beyond the scope. [1:47:09] Or related thereto when it speaks to. [1:47:12] Or related thereto refers to the 2020 election. [1:47:16] Correct. [1:47:17] And, and both you and Madam DA have said that her decision to bring the case and how it [1:47:22] was brought and who was brought against. [1:47:24] Correct. [1:47:25] The exact things the court of appeals talked about those initial pretrial decisions. [1:47:29] Correct. [1:47:31] Caused people to question and the fairness and of justice. [1:47:36] And so if that is what the courts have said, not me, I'm not here to say one way or [1:47:43] the other. [1:47:44] But if that's what the courts have said, and that is in the language of the Senate resolution, [1:47:48] your, your position is that it is limited to what? [1:47:52] It, it certainly does not encompass who the, who the press secretary is. [1:47:57] Okay. [1:47:58] But the question that was on the, on the floor was what is the role of a media relations person? [1:48:04] What his role would be? [1:48:05] How has that got anything to do? [1:48:06] I think the question was, and if you need, we're going to heat, I'm sure it could be asked [1:48:12] this way is what is the role of the person? [1:48:14] And, and, and, and so to that question, which does not include any individual. [1:48:19] But what is the role of the office? [1:48:21] The objection is scope and privilege or scope and relevance? [1:48:25] Correct. [1:48:26] Okay. [1:48:27] And, and, and also. [1:48:30] And since you mentioned fundraising, I'd like to make sure that this is part of the record. [1:48:33] Cows are believing he's going to go after Fonnie Willis and asking to donate at the last period. [1:48:38] I also have 50 of these for the press because this is about folks sitting here trying to get elected. [1:48:43] Do we have anything else? [1:48:47] We do have a lot more, Governor. [1:48:49] We'll, we'll take a lunch break just so you all are aware if you want to make arrangements at 1230. [1:48:53] I'd like to go straight through. [1:48:55] We'll take a lunch break at 1230. [1:49:01] Madam DA, relative to your full-time employed staff such as Mr. DeSantis, what rules, if any, [1:49:07] exist relative to other work that they can do, either contract work or employment work, outside of your office? [1:49:19] It's an investigator and they're working a job, off duty job, extra job as most police officers do. [1:49:27] The chief of investigations has to sign off on approving them for that work site as well as the district attorney. [1:49:34] So that is to the law enforcement that report to me because, you know, I basically, I have a police department there [1:49:41] and so they have to get it signed off on that it's appropriate work. [1:49:45] I don't like my investigators working at nightclubs, but they can certainly work at a store. [1:49:49] They like to work at State Farm Arena and things of that nature. [1:49:53] If it's a professional that's not an investigator and not a lawyer, they're pretty much able to do whatever. [1:50:01] Of course, they can't do it on my hours, but they can work whatever. [1:50:05] And if it's a lawyer, prosecutors are not able to practice law doing that. [1:50:11] You know, they were selling pies at Christmas, I probably don't care. [1:50:15] Somewhere in between practicing law and selling pies, are there any restrictions besides that? [1:50:23] None that come to mind. [1:50:24] Okay. Are you aware of an entity called Critical Mention? [1:50:31] I am. I'm aware that you are using it. [1:50:36] What can you tell me about Critical Mention? [1:50:38] Critical Mention kind of tells you when your office or an issue that concerns your community comes into the new space. [1:50:50] It has been used as a device by my office to find witnesses. [1:50:56] It's been used as a device to determine if there's a pressing issue among my constituents that they are concerned about. [1:51:03] But it is basically an outlet that lets you know what's going on in your community. [1:51:08] It's helped us find witness victims and, like I said, been used for security. [1:51:12] Help me understand how it helps you find victims or find out what's happening in the community. [1:51:20] What's the... [1:51:21] You'll be surprised because people will complain about some issue. [1:51:23] You won't know anything about it. [1:51:25] Somebody got robbed. [1:51:26] It brings cases to your attention. [1:51:28] Because, you know, I'm not a small prosecutor's office. [1:51:32] I'm a huge prosecutor's office and so it brings things to your attention. [1:51:35] I can't give you more than that. [1:51:37] Are you aware of any other uses that your office uses Critical Mention for? [1:51:43] I don't know all the uses. [1:51:45] I gave you some. [1:51:46] Okay. [1:51:47] You sent a letter to Governor Kemp, Secretary of State Raffensperger, and Attorney General Carr. [1:51:58] I believe it was essentially a records retention notice in early 2021. [1:52:04] Is that correct? [1:52:05] That is correct. [1:52:06] Okay. [1:52:10] I didn't want anyone destroying evidence. [1:52:13] Not that they would do so intentionally, but I didn't want them to do it unintentionally. [1:52:16] So, on the screen is a report from Critical Mention that we referenced earlier. [1:52:21] Actually, this report was in an email from Mr. DeSantis to you and someone who worked for [1:52:27] you at the time. [1:52:28] And this came the week after the time that the letter was sent. [1:52:35] The letter I just referenced to the Governor, the AG, and the Secretary. [1:52:40] Mr. DeSantis' email states that the NLS graph is attached to this PDF. [1:52:47] The previous one I sent was for, quote, Fulton County District Attorney. [1:52:51] This one is for, quote, Fonnie Willis. [1:52:54] We're getting more coverage via your name than by title. [1:52:58] This graph has the coverage value for the last week at over $150 million. [1:53:03] That's obviously high, but even adjusting downward, it's still a huge number. [1:53:09] And then what's highlighted in red here is part of the Critical Mention report that mentions mentions, [1:53:14] which I'm going to just assume how often the search, which I think that he said this one is for your first and last name, [1:53:20] what the audience was, which was approximately 6.3 million people, and then publicity value, [1:53:26] which I think is what Mr. DeSantis is referencing when he references coverage value, at $150 million. [1:53:35] Do you recall seeing this report? [1:53:37] I don't. [1:53:38] Do you recall Critical Mention being used at all within your office to track the value of media as it related to the coverage of the election interference case? [1:53:50] She already told you she didn't. [1:53:52] She told me she doesn't recognize this chart. [1:53:54] I'm asking generally if she, this report, I'm asking if you've seen any report. [1:53:58] I don't know that I've seen any report, but I have definitely say, I've definitely heard Mr. DeSantis say, you know, [1:54:05] that these numbers are always inflated. [1:54:07] It's, so yes, I've heard of it before, but you're asking me about a particular report. [1:54:13] Have you seen this page from a PowerPoint document before? [1:54:19] I've, I've seen it. [1:54:20] I don't recall it. [1:54:21] Okay. [1:54:23] This was also sent by Mr. DeSantis to your email, and here this captures a broader range of time. [1:54:30] The first one I believe is for just a couple of weeks. [1:54:33] This captures essentially the first 11 months of 2021, at which point in time those audience impressions [1:54:39] and grown from the previous number of 6 million, if I recall correctly. [1:54:43] The publicity value on the last one that we looked at was 150 million. [1:54:46] This one is $637 million. [1:54:51] Do you recall seeing any other report that was tracking the publicity value of your name, your work, or your prosecutions? [1:55:01] I can never recall seeing a report. [1:55:03] It does not mean I have not seen one. [1:55:05] I do not recall seeing a report. [1:55:07] But so that we're clear, I've heard Mr. DeSantis mention things that are along what you're talking about. [1:55:13] This is an email from Mr. DeSantis dated around the same time frame as the first report, February 17th. [1:55:23] And he's referencing now just the first search that he did, which was for Fulton County District Attorney. [1:55:28] He, he lays out that that name received $67 million, which he already said was more than your name. [1:55:34] And he concludes his email by stating that even half of that value would be staggering. [1:55:40] Right. [1:55:41] He doesn't believe the numbers. [1:55:42] He thinks they're inflated. [1:55:43] And that's kind of what I reference him talking that he doesn't believe the numbers. [1:55:46] But he does believe that the value, whatever value, what value means that we would all need to interpret there. [1:55:52] But that even at half of the value, he believes that that would be staggering. [1:55:55] You're asking me to speak on. [1:55:58] No, I'm just stating what, what, what I'm reading in the context here. [1:56:01] How does this help? [1:56:02] Well, now I'm going to ask you as a public prosecutor, why would media coverage in the earned media value either for your title or your name be relevant to your job as a prosecutor? [1:56:15] You have to ask somebody else because I don't know the answer to what someone else is thinking. [1:56:20] I do know that it has been very important to me and it continues to be very important to me that we are very transparent with our public about what we're doing and that the media, when they're doing their job, it is important that they tell the public what the work is that we're doing and that they tell them what the services are that we provide them and that we are always here for them. [1:56:44] So that is an important value. [1:56:46] The first time I don't want my constituency to see me, and this is something I say all the time, first time they get to know the Fulton County District Attorney shouldn't be when I'm locking up their nephew. [1:56:55] That's not when it should happen. [1:56:57] The first time they should see us is when we are out in the community doing service projects, whether that is I am in the schools. [1:57:04] I am the only district attorney in the country that all year long I am in the schools with our children making sure that we see them in the classrooms and not the courtroom. [1:57:13] So that is me touching my students and their parents. [1:57:16] The first time they see me is when I'm giving away book bags. [1:57:19] The first time they see me is when we're doing Christmas drives or Thanksgiving drives. [1:57:23] The first time they see us is so that they know that they are coming to an office that is a judgment-free zone. [1:57:28] And I think it's why, and I have this for the media too, I have a 92% conviction rate this year. [1:57:34] I tried more cases than any prosecutor in the state. [1:57:37] That's the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District. [1:57:39] That's the AG's office. [1:57:41] My office is doing this work. [1:57:43] We are keeping the community safe because I know y'all don't believe me. [1:57:46] I brought a report here from the Atlanta Police Foundation talking about how crime is down in our community. [1:57:54] And it's not the district attorney's office alone. [1:57:57] It is the district attorney's office combined with the law enforcement in this community. [1:58:01] See, I care about the police. [1:58:03] So I don't excuse that an officer got killed on January the 6th. [1:58:06] To me, it's a problem. [1:58:09] The question was, as a public prosecutor, why would media coverage be relevant to your role? [1:58:13] I answered it. [1:58:14] I don't know that you did and I want to clarify because I think what you answered was why public relations are important to your role [1:58:21] and people seeing you before they get locked up and all that stuff you referenced, which I think is valid. [1:58:26] My question is, there are multiple emails that are tracking in concurrency with your work in the election interference case. [1:58:35] With my concurrency in work, period. [1:58:37] That's the work that you think is important. [1:58:40] I've answered the question. [1:58:41] It's asked and answered. [1:58:42] We should move on. [1:58:44] The question that I'm asking you is not why are you doing public relations? [1:58:50] I'm asking you why are you tracking the dollar value of your name and your title? [1:58:56] She has told you she does not know the report. [1:59:00] She has told you that she has heard it discussed but she does not know the details. [1:59:06] She has told you that it's important to get a message out. [1:59:10] And if that's not been asked and answered, I don't know what it is. [1:59:13] Governor, I certainly understand. [1:59:16] I'm not asking about the outbound messaging. [1:59:18] I'm asking about the inbound tracking of the dollar value. [1:59:20] If you believe that we've covered that, we'll move on. [1:59:22] This is the first payment for critical mention. [1:59:25] That's a yearly subscription of $10,000. [1:59:29] You told me earlier you've never seen a payment voucher form from Fulton County. [1:59:32] So I would assume you've never seen what's on the bottom right. [1:59:34] Is that correct? [1:59:35] I don't think we should assume, but you'd actually be correct. [1:59:38] Okay. [1:59:39] I'm assuming that your testimony was correct earlier and I'm tying it together to right now. [1:59:44] The second time that critical mention was used, we talked earlier about funds and accounts. [1:59:52] This check was used to pay critical mention for their 2022 contract. [1:59:57] Have you seen this check before? [1:59:58] Have I seen the check? [2:00:00] Yes, ma'am. [2:00:01] No. [2:00:02] Okay. [2:00:03] What account is this from? [2:00:04] It was a Fulton County account. [2:00:07] One of the accounts Paul left, so I can't answer you what account it's from. [2:00:12] Whatever bank that's from, that's the account it's from. [2:00:14] Just to clarify, you're saying Paul, you were referencing former District Attorney Howard? [2:00:19] Yes, and that was absolutely correct. [2:00:21] Former District Attorney, I believe it's from one of those accounts. [2:00:26] But that's actually speculation too, but I assume that's what it's from. [2:00:30] Do you know how your name got on an account that was formerly used by District Attorney Howard? [2:00:35] Absolutely. [2:00:36] At the beginning of my tenure, I had to go and switch names from that DA to this DA. [2:00:42] And part of that changing of names was changing this bank account? [2:00:48] Correct. [2:00:49] Okay. [2:00:50] What is the source of funds for this bank account? [2:00:53] I know when we talked earlier, you referenced essentially you get everything over the county. [2:00:57] You don't have your own debt credit card. [2:00:59] You don't have your own accounts. [2:01:01] I want to clarify what this account is. [2:01:03] It was accounts that Paul left. [2:01:04] There were a couple of them. [2:01:06] At the beginning of my term, we went, we put our name on those accounts. [2:01:10] Me and District Attorney Howard did not have a conversation. [2:01:15] He went to the bank, then I went to the bank, and we used it for things for the office. [2:01:19] We've been audited 50 million times, so it's in some audit. [2:01:23] There's no DA that's been audited as much as me. [2:01:25] Do you know how much money was in that account? [2:01:28] I can't recall any of those facts. [2:01:30] Do you know if you've allocated any additional funds in the time that you've been DA into this account? [2:01:35] I do not believe so. [2:01:39] Brings me to an interesting point. [2:01:41] We did not want to take in money, and I also wanted to have an office that was transparent. [2:01:47] And so in my first four years, the only way that a District Attorney would take in money would be from open records. [2:01:54] Well, I had this great idea as the new DA. [2:01:57] I wanted the records of Fulton County DA's office to be equally accessible to the indigent and the rich. [2:02:03] Many people abused that, and so I had to change it in term two. [2:02:08] I mention this because I didn't take any money during the first time for open records, [2:02:14] and so there's no other reason that a DA would take money in that I can think of. [2:02:19] If there is one, I'll have to be educated on it. [2:02:21] As it relates to this, well, let me ask this question. [2:02:26] You referenced there was two or three other accounts? [2:02:29] There was a couple of accounts. [2:02:30] We've been auditing all of them. [2:02:31] I passed all my audits. [2:02:33] You know, once y'all started attacking me, they audited me every other week. [2:02:36] There is no DA. [2:02:37] I just passed a DOJ audit. [2:02:41] Do you recognize the signature on this check? [2:02:43] It looks like DB, Dexter Bond. [2:02:45] Dexter Bond, just for clarity, is your? [2:02:47] Deputy of operations. [2:02:48] Deputy of operations. [2:02:49] That's why he would see these kind of things, and I would not. [2:02:50] Do you know what the allowed or the restrictions around the allowed uses of this account, of [2:02:56] which use? [2:02:57] All money that we have has to be used for the betterment of my office. [2:03:01] And the only source of funds that you're aware of in this account, it was money that [2:03:04] was in the account when you signed it over from former district attorney? [2:03:09] That is correct. [2:03:10] Okay. [2:03:11] Are you aware of anything else that has been paid for out of this? [2:03:14] No. [2:03:16] Make sure you understand me clearly so I don't think. [2:03:19] I'm sure other things have been paid for out of this. [2:03:22] Your question was, am I aware of other things that have been paid for? [2:03:26] I can't recall that from 2021 or 22 or any other year. [2:03:29] What's the reason that this account will be used versus the voucher system with the county [2:03:34] that I've had up on the screen a couple of times so far this morning? [2:03:37] That would make us, I go to them if this is what I need done for the office. [2:03:41] I don't make selections on what account is used. [2:03:45] I don't even know what all those accounts are. [2:03:47] I can't tell you that this account is the account that you can buy books out of. [2:03:51] This is the account that you can do this out of. [2:03:54] But I know they have those kind of delineations with the county. [2:03:58] But I don't get that you're in the weeds. [2:04:00] And it's your understanding that this account would have been something you referenced in audit. [2:04:05] The state senate has never done an audit. [2:04:07] I've been audited a million. [2:04:08] The county has audited me. [2:04:09] The federal government. [2:04:10] I have been audited and audited and audited. [2:04:13] And is it you understand that this account would have been captured in an audit? [2:04:16] Absolutely. [2:04:17] Okay. [2:04:25] I was asking you earlier about essentially what I'm just going to colloquially refer to as side work [2:04:29] that is done by full-time staff within your office. [2:04:33] And I believe that you told me essentially you're not micromanaging. [2:04:37] There's no prohibition on side work. [2:04:39] Is that correct? [2:04:40] Well, I told you specifically with my investigators, there is an absolute process. [2:04:44] They cannot work as investigators or police officers because that is what they are. [2:04:49] I think some people don't understand that in a district attorney's office, [2:04:52] the investigators are sworn law enforcement officers with very great careers. [2:04:57] It's something that a lot of them come to do after they've been policed for many years. [2:05:00] And we do have a sign-off process because I don't want my investigators to work at nightclubs. [2:05:06] I know they pay a lot per hour, but I would prefer them not to do that kind of work. [2:05:10] Although I do allow them to do extra jobs. [2:05:13] Most recently as it relates to the, I will call it the larger story of the case recently, [2:05:18] that was a ruling relative to an appearance of impropriety on this case. [2:05:22] What are you talking about? [2:05:24] I'm talking about the appearance of impropriety that resulted in your disqualification from the case. [2:05:28] Prior to that, your office was investigating the now Lieutenant Governor, [2:05:33] all Lieutenant Governor, was not Lieutenant Governor at the time Burt Jones. Is that correct? [2:05:36] I don't understand the question. [2:05:41] Has your office ever conducted an investigation into then Senator or Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones [2:05:46] as it relates to the election? [2:05:47] How does that help you with legislation? [2:05:49] Yes. [2:05:51] Don't answer it as part of the deliberative process of returning in and not investigating returning in the thing. [2:06:01] Is it not a matter of public record, Governor? [2:06:03] Then why are you asking? [2:06:06] I'm laying a foundation as you would call it. [2:06:10] Skip along to the question. [2:06:13] We're getting there. [2:06:14] You're objecting to the, it's deliberative as to whether or not Lieutenant Governor Jones is part of an investigation. [2:06:21] It is deliberative because we know he was part of an investigation and he was indicted by two, [2:06:28] or recommended by one and by a second one, but the reason he was indicted. [2:06:33] I'm not asking for the reason he was indicted. [2:06:35] So I believe that we can, we can agree on the grounds that, that Lieutenant. [2:06:39] What's the question? [2:06:40] The question is, uh, the, the degree to which Madam DA was aware that Jeff DeSantis, while he was serving in the office, [2:06:52] was the registered agent for a business named Charlie Bailey for Georgia. [2:06:57] Okay. [2:07:02] What's your question? [2:07:03] My question is, are you aware that while he was employed by your office, Mr. DeSantis was serving as a registered agent [2:07:08] and secretary of an entity called Charlie Bailey for Georgia? [2:07:12] I don't think I knew that until now, but Charlie Bailey, who's now head of the Democratic Party, [2:07:22] I consider a great personal friend. [2:07:24] I heard that he was maybe in the Capitol today. [2:07:28] I haven't had the opportunity to meet him yet. [2:07:31] Former assistant. [2:07:32] Excuse me. [2:07:37] Are you aware of any work that Mr. DeSantis did on Mr. Bailey's campaign? [2:07:43] Nope. [2:07:44] When he ran for Lieutenant Governor or for, I believe this was for, uh, Attorney General? [2:07:49] I'm not aware. [2:07:50] Would, are you aware of general campaign work that Mr. DeSantis is involved in? [2:07:54] I don't know. [2:07:56] Am I aware that he's ever been involved in campaigns? [2:07:59] While he's been working for your office, I'll clarify that. [2:08:01] Um, I, no, I'm not sure that I do know that he's working for campaigns while employed for the office, [2:08:08] but I certainly know that in a prior life that he did work on campaigns. [2:08:14] He's like, you know, as we get older, we tell war stories. [2:08:17] So what was the date on that? [2:08:21] Well, it varies, Governor. [2:08:24] It was... [2:08:25] It says 2-1-2018, which would have been long before I was there, [2:08:29] but then it says last annual registration year, 2022. [2:08:32] So I'm not sure at what point Mr. DeSantis did this. [2:08:36] I'm not sure it tells what it purports to tell, but it's on the screen. [2:08:42] Well, this is the secretary as well as what I was asking about, [2:08:46] which is the role of an officer. [2:08:47] Uh, the officer information is noted there at the bottom. [2:08:50] Um, did you say you were a supporter of Mr. Bailey when you ran for Attorney General? [2:08:58] I said that Mr. Bailey was a friend. [2:09:00] I think that was a cute little question you asked. [2:09:02] But what I said was that he was a good friend. [2:09:04] He used to be an assistant district attorney that reported to me when he was a younger lawyer. [2:09:09] I was his supervisor. [2:09:10] Um, if you know Attorney Bailey, he's a white male, probably around 40 years old now. [2:09:17] And I just adore him and his family. [2:09:20] So you did not...you don't recall if you supported him for Attorney General? [2:09:23] I would support Mr. Bailey in anything he does. [2:09:25] He has great integrity. [2:09:27] Anything he wants to do, I'm here to support him. [2:09:29] So you did support him when he ran for Attorney General? [2:09:32] I... [2:09:33] I did. [2:09:34] She did. [2:09:35] I'm trying to get to the core of the question here. [2:09:36] Yeah. [2:09:37] And... [2:09:40] Professor Gayton, ma'am. [2:09:43] Professor... [2:09:44] Beyond the scope... [2:09:46] We know that Mr. Bailey was...there was a founding...finding of conflict in this case, [2:09:51] specifically relative to Mr. Bailey. [2:09:53] I'm sure that part of that may have been to the campaign contributions that were made [2:09:58] on behalf of the DA to Mr. Bailey, which is now on the screen. [2:10:02] There was a fundraiser, I believe, that was the acute conflict that the judge recognized. [2:10:07] And so that's what we're getting into. [2:10:09] This is...this is directly applicable to this case. [2:10:13] I don't find it relevant. [2:10:16] But he's a friend and I gave him some money when he was running. [2:10:20] And I'm asking people to give Tonya Miller for Georgia some money so we can get a good Attorney General in here, [2:10:30] not a corrupt one that puts false things on screens. [2:10:35] So Mr. Jones was a candidate for Lieutenant Governor, is that correct? [2:10:41] It should be noted at the time of that ruling, which I still find to be ridiculous, [2:10:45] Mr. Bailey was not running against Mr. Jones. [2:10:47] He was running against Kwanzaa, and I can't remember his name, who was a Democratic race. [2:10:53] But the ruling was found. [2:10:55] I take exception with many of that judge's actions. [2:10:58] But, you know, I'll leave that for another day. [2:11:01] At the time of the fundraiser that you did, it was in a primary, and you knew that whoever... [2:11:08] That's a great point. [2:11:10] It was a primary. [2:11:11] It was not a general. [2:11:12] He was not running against Byrd Jones. [2:11:14] That was a fabrication of facts. [2:11:16] He was running against Kwanzaa Hall. [2:11:18] His name just came to me. [2:11:19] You get older and you forget things. [2:11:21] But he was running against Kwanzaa Hall, and I did a fundraiser for him. [2:11:25] That is absolutely correct. [2:11:26] And he need to give me some money back, $2,500. [2:11:29] I need a contribution. [2:11:32] Mr. Jones moved to have you disqualified from the investigation based on your fundraiser. [2:11:36] Is that correct? [2:11:37] Yes, and that's something else that I'd like you all to take up as a legislative body. [2:11:40] I think that when judges rule on things that are directly in the favor of legislatures, [2:11:46] we should have a bar of when they can be appointed to the next bench. [2:11:50] Because I'm watching a lot of judges in my career do things in an effort to kind of say, [2:11:55] pick me, pick me, get promoted. [2:11:57] And I think that it would be some good legislation of this body and of the legislature to say [2:12:03] that if a judge directly rules on something in the favor of any legislature, [2:12:08] it should bar them from being promoted. [2:12:10] That'd be some legislation since y'all want some help with legislation. [2:12:14] And Judge McBurney granted the motion to Mr. Jones to have you disqualified. [2:12:20] Is that correct? [2:12:21] Correct. [2:12:22] And then surprise, surprise, Scandalakis dismissed the case. [2:12:25] We're going to get to Scandalakis in just a second. [2:12:27] But Judge McBurney said that it was, quote, [2:12:29] a plain and actual and untenable conflict. [2:12:32] Is that correct? [2:12:33] He did. [2:12:34] He described it. [2:12:37] I believe in oral commentary and said that he regarded the optics were horrific, [2:12:45] described it as a what were you thinking mode. [2:12:47] The left researcher described McBurney as unethical. [2:12:49] We're going to talk about, you know, people pontificating. [2:12:52] Is that what we're doing here? [2:12:53] I'm just, I'm just laying, we're going through the fact pattern of this case. [2:12:57] I'm just telling you some history. [2:12:58] And then as you referenced, Mr. Peter Scandalakis, [2:13:01] as head of PAC, continued the investigation after you were disqualified. [2:13:04] He concluded the investigation did not further warrant further action [2:13:08] after interviewing Mr. Jones four times and reading your entire file, [2:13:12] among other things. [2:13:13] Did you give your entire file? [2:13:14] Mr. Scandalakis has never read our entire file. [2:13:16] When he just dismissed his case, there is no way that he read the entire file. [2:13:19] There's no way that he reviewed all the evidence. [2:13:22] It's no way that he interviewed witnesses. [2:13:24] But as Calcers set up shitting and grinning in front of the media saying, [2:13:28] oh, we know this case is going to be dismissed. [2:13:30] I bet you do. [2:13:31] Are you familiar with a company called Canal Media Partners? [2:13:37] That's my fundraiser. [2:13:38] I think that's the name of my fundraiser? [2:13:40] No. [2:13:43] No, no, no, no, no, no, no. [2:13:44] Canal Media Partners is who I pay to do filming or something. [2:13:49] It's somebody I pay. [2:13:51] On the screen we've got your 2024 summary from the State Ethics Commission page [2:13:58] and Canal Media Partners is listed as the second highest paid expenditure [2:14:02] of your successful DA campaign. [2:14:05] They do great commercials. [2:14:06] Use them. [2:14:07] To the tune of $527,000. [2:14:09] It's my understanding from looking at their website that they do media buying, [2:14:14] among other things. [2:14:16] That's why I won by 87%. [2:14:18] And there's a gentleman by the name of Mr. Chris Huttman who does work for you. [2:14:26] Is brilliant. [2:14:27] So you're familiar with Mr. Huttman? [2:14:28] He is brilliant. [2:14:29] What does Mr. Huttman do? [2:14:30] He buys media space. [2:14:33] And if you're an elected official listening, you might want to hire him [2:14:36] because he is able to go and find you the best rates so that you can get the best media, [2:14:41] so really the best bang for their buck. [2:14:43] Don't mean this to be a commercial, but, I mean, I did win by 87%. [2:14:47] You might want to work with him. [2:14:49] His LinkedIn shows present work with or employment ad. [2:14:53] It doesn't clarify either, but it shows that he's been at Canal, [2:14:56] which we've talked about for the last 13 years, [2:14:59] and in a company called 2020 Insight LLC for the last 15 years. [2:15:03] Are you familiar with a company called 2020 Insight? [2:15:05] It sounds familiar, but no. [2:15:07] I might have paid him. [2:15:11] I just don't remember. [2:15:12] According to 2020 Insight's current website, [2:15:21] it is a partnership between, well, they don't say partnership here, [2:15:26] but this states under their who are we, it lists Mr. Jeff DeSantis [2:15:30] and Chris Huttman, Mr. DeSantis being the same one that serves in your office, [2:15:33] and Mr. Huttman being the gentleman that we just talked about that you referenced. [2:15:38] I don't know that he currently still works with him, [2:15:40] but we could have got to that question three questions ago. [2:15:42] I know at one point they worked with each other. [2:15:45] The website for saying that Mr. DeSantis is there is current, [2:15:51] but it's your testimony today that you don't know whether he does work with 2020 Insight before. [2:15:55] I don't know that he actually continues to work with them, [2:15:58] but I certainly know that in the past that he worked with them. [2:16:01] Is it your understanding that Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Huttman were business partners? [2:16:05] I really don't know what their professional relationship was, [2:16:08] so I don't want to speculate. [2:16:10] I will tell you this, the governor talked about old men having to go to the bathroom, [2:16:14] 54-year-old women do as well, so we don't have to get me to a bathroom break. [2:16:18] We'll take five. [2:16:19] Thank you. [2:16:20] We're going to reconvene. [2:58:13] Thank you all for your time this morning. [2:58:18] For those of you at home wondering why I've been the only one answering questions, [2:58:21] the committee policy for the duration of this committee under the leadership of Chairman Kausert [2:58:25] has been that questions would come through the chair of the committee, [2:58:28] and so that's what I've been doing so far this morning. [2:58:32] And then in conjunction with that, many questions from the minority party [2:58:36] would go through the minority leader or an individual designated by the minority leader, [2:58:41] and Leader Jones is here. [2:58:43] You've indicated you will be asking those questions on behalf of the minority party, [2:58:49] and with that, I'm going to turn it over to Leader Jones. [2:58:53] And it has to be pretty brief. [2:58:55] Hopefully, we're near the end here. [2:58:57] Madam DA, nice to see you. [2:58:59] Good afternoon. [2:59:00] Good afternoon to you too. [2:59:01] I do have one quick disagreement point with you. [2:59:05] As a fellow person from the MEAC, we all know the South Carolina State University is actually the university. [2:59:11] There always has to be a number two. [2:59:14] And they won the championship. [2:59:16] They did win the championship. [2:59:18] Absolutely. [2:59:19] I did have a question for you because I was wondering if I had the numbers correct. [2:59:23] Did you say $80 million was spent by the AG's office in one period of year? [2:59:27] In one year, yes, sir. [2:59:29] This exhibit, you are welcome to it. [2:59:32] It runs, and it's $80 million just for the special prosecutors. [2:59:37] In 2025, it was $75,744,000 in 2025 to date. [2:59:44] So the year is not over. [2:59:46] They have spent $80,056,000. [2:59:48] What we did was collect the 13 top people that received money, MR, [2:59:53] because we didn't think it was necessary for people to know who they were. [2:59:56] But you can get this off the MAID $8,181,000. [3:00:00] The 13th person on the list, so everybody else is in between, MAID $1,050,000. [3:00:05] This is in one annual year. [3:00:08] Thank you. [3:00:09] Thanks for clearing that up. [3:00:12] I did have a question also about the block billing, and I know that you didn't really look at the bills. [3:00:16] But just kind of asking from a standpoint of just, I guess, experience. [3:00:20] It could also be just as reasonable that whoever was actually looking at the bills could say, [3:00:25] look, I don't need every phone call. [3:00:28] I don't need every witness name that you talk to. [3:00:32] Just give it to me in one kind of block, and we do it that way. [3:00:35] And by the same token, someone else could say, no, I want every single thing. [3:00:39] And you just have a difference about how the person can input it into their particular system. [3:00:43] Is that accurate? [3:00:45] Ms. Whitmore, who is the CFO for the county, is a stickler. [3:00:48] If she paid a bill, it was done to whatever the county rules are. [3:00:52] But again, you're asking me to speculate? [3:00:54] Yeah. [3:00:55] I never saw the bills. [3:00:56] I don't see the invoices. [3:00:58] And that's a good point of clarification. [3:01:00] Several documents have been put up this morning. [3:01:02] I can't attest to the accuracy of any of them. [3:01:04] In fact, it is clear that some of them have been augmented, and they're not authenticated documents. [3:01:11] So no document that's been shown here today has been authenticated, and it's clear that some of them have been altered. [3:01:17] But whether they've been altered or haven't been altered, it was my first time seeing them. [3:01:21] In any event, however a person wants to get the billing or not, would you think that this is actually a good way for us to come up with a recommendation on how local DAs or solicitors should actually try to do their billing for outside counsel? [3:01:38] That the Georgia General Assembly should decide this is how we should do our billing process? [3:01:42] What I think is that the voters should elect ethical district attorneys, and that those district attorneys should do the things that are needed to make their communities safer. [3:01:56] And that I always like the idea for me. [3:02:01] I don't think it's necessary for every DA, but I liked that the county looked at our documents. [3:02:05] I didn't have to do that. [3:02:06] But I knew I was a black DA. [3:02:09] I knew I was the first woman DA. [3:02:11] And so I took extra precautions because I understand what that means. [3:02:15] Absolutely. [3:02:16] And you also want, I think, kind of clarify on this White House trip where you're saying you were actually on the lawn. [3:02:20] I didn't know if you wanted to- [3:02:21] I was not at the White House. [3:02:22] Right. [3:02:23] And so that has been a lie that has been purported by members of this committee. [3:02:26] But what happened is, I know we don't like to talk about black history, right? [3:02:30] We want to get rid of black history, men's dams. [3:02:32] We want to get rid of, and I want to say this, we want to get rid of free admissions to parks on June 10th and on Martin Luther King's birthday. [3:02:38] But I'll let you know something. [3:02:39] I appreciate our president because he made free admissions to parks on my birthday. [3:02:43] So I do appreciate that. [3:02:45] Hopefully King Petty don't get rid of that day. [3:02:47] But right now you can get into a federal park on my birthday for free. [3:02:50] Now, with that being said, that was a party celebrating Black History Month. [3:02:56] And I was so excited to get the invitation. [3:02:58] And leaders from all across the country literally came to not the White House, because I never went to the White House on that trip. [3:03:06] And I think I was there like 24 hours. [3:03:08] It was at the vice president's house, but not actually at our house. [3:03:12] It was in a tent on the lawn. [3:03:14] Quite frankly, while we were there, I never got a chance even to meet the vice president, which was disappointing. [3:03:21] I thought, you know, you have all these people from all over the country there. [3:03:24] You would like kind of do an assembly line and sign and, you know, everybody take a picture. [3:03:29] But that did not even occur. [3:03:31] She did come on the stage at one point with her secret service all around her. [3:03:35] I don't know what was going on, but secret service was all around her. [3:03:38] But it was still a very valuable trip because I got to meet leaders from all over the country that were trying to service their communities. [3:03:45] And so I was honored that I was thought to be a leader worthy of having an invitation to that event. [3:03:52] Thank you. [3:03:53] And there was also a question about whether, you know, Judge Wade had met with somebody from a January 6th committee and things of that nature. [3:03:59] But let me ask you this, whether that took place or not, and there's a question about that. [3:04:04] But whether that took place or not, would that have any relevance to the co-conspirators in this case who are going around from state to different states, [3:04:11] making stuff about the 2020 election and actually trying to do the things that they were trying to do in this case? [3:04:17] We based our case on what we investigated. [3:04:22] And as someone from the South and as a black woman, I've taken a lot of offense to this because there's been this indication that I'm not smart enough or people from the South aren't smart enough to be able to do this type of complex investigation. [3:04:34] We did it. [3:04:35] It was my team who did it. [3:04:37] We did it all. [3:04:38] And Dollazoff, I hope that I pronounced your name right because I want to Senator Dollazoff, asked about ethics. [3:04:45] I think he should know if we want a full picture of ethics, that Judge McBurney who he just mentioned, one of the fake electors threw him a fundraiser. [3:04:52] So while we're having facts, I want to make sure we get all the facts out here. [3:04:55] And when we were talking about also with, you know, Judge Wade and Billing and things of that nature, did that cause at all, [3:05:04] I think the record will show that the vice president's personal attorney, based on what these conspirators actually were doing, actually called a former federal judge and said, [3:05:13] you need to send out a tweet to say that Vice President Pence must actually certify this election because he was so concerned that there might be denied a certification coming January 6th. [3:05:24] Anything about this billing have any impact on any of that kind of thing taking place at all? [3:05:30] Nothing about this billing can bring back the five lives that were lost on January 6th. [3:05:34] To include, I understand that four were people that were in the mob, but they didn't deserve to lose their lives. [3:05:39] One is very personal to me because it was a police officer just trying to serve. [3:05:44] And here goes another example of a good American, and this is not about parties as you all have tried to make it. [3:05:50] They tried to kill our vice president, Pence. [3:05:53] Now, I probably have never agreed politically with anything Pence said. [3:05:56] But what I do know is he has a right to do his job and to be free from harm. [3:06:02] And we're trying to, you know, we say we're not for violent crime, but we sure like violent criminals if it's helping our cause. [3:06:09] And we also talked about, what is it called, critical measures? [3:06:12] Mentions. [3:06:13] Mentions. [3:06:14] Mentions. [3:06:15] Critical mentions. [3:06:16] So even discussing that, what critical mentions actually have anything to do with the fact that just yesterday as a matter of fact, [3:06:23] two former co-conspirators, this case has been dismissed, I think Mr. Roman and Mr. Cheeseborough, [3:06:28] just yesterday in Wisconsin was held to answer charges, four felony charges, for actually creating a fact or lack of program [3:06:37] that was similar to what was prosecuted right here in Georgia. [3:06:40] That they're going to have felony charges facing those. [3:06:44] And there were two conspirators in this particular case that had the same kind of scheme. [3:06:49] Anything about his billing or anything about critical mentions have anything to do with the fact that two persons that were indicted in your case. [3:06:56] Right now, just yesterday, a judge in Wisconsin said, you're going to face charges, 11 charges, based on similar scheme that took place in Georgia. [3:07:05] No. [3:07:06] And it should be noted that Roman was indicted in three separate states and that many of the co-defendants were indicted in separate states [3:07:14] because, you know, and let's be clear so the record is clear, in my indictment in Arizona, they indicted John Eastman, [3:07:22] Gina Ellis, Wilbur Giuliani, Mark Meadows, and Mike Roman. [3:07:26] Mike Roman was represented by Merchant who came here and testified. [3:07:30] In Wisconsin, they also indicted Cheeseborough and Roman. [3:07:35] And so, you know, we could go on and on about in the federal case had only one defendant, Donald Trump, but he was also indicted in my case. [3:07:46] So these defendants committed crimes in our state and other states. [3:07:51] You know, and there's all this talk about political enemies. [3:07:54] Not one of these defendants do I consider to be my political enemy. [3:07:58] I'm sorry that they think of me as an enemy. [3:08:01] I guess they don't know that their job is to serve me, to work for me, to make life better for me and my family. [3:08:08] But they are not my political enemy. [3:08:10] And I actually pray for them because I see issues. [3:08:13] And also within Wisconsin, the quote-unquote fake electors there actually got sued. [3:08:19] And the discovery in that case was over 577 pages. [3:08:23] Now, you didn't get to the discovery process in your particular case. [3:08:26] But I'm just curious because we were talking about Mr. Scandalakis and how deep he had gotten to your case. [3:08:32] How voluminous was your case at the time it stopped? [3:08:35] Huge. [3:08:36] You know, much of this room it could fill up, if not all of this room. [3:08:43] It was huge. [3:08:44] It was lots of witnesses that had to do. [3:08:47] A lot of work was put into this. [3:08:49] Because I always want to make sure that I am a fair DA. [3:08:53] And that's why you see a grand jury recommending 39 people based on their conduct being indicted. [3:08:59] And me cutting it down to 19. [3:09:01] Because I'm only going to put forth those with the worst evidence who did the worst things. [3:09:05] But I'm also a fighter for victims. [3:09:07] And I was fighting for the victims in this case. [3:09:10] And the fact that, you know, to some prosecutors, Ruby Freeman and her daughter have no value. [3:09:16] She has value to me and she should have value to other Americans. [3:09:19] Because what happened to her is horrible. [3:09:21] And for someone to say they couldn't prosecute a defendant who came in a room and lied for the grand jury. [3:09:26] I mean, a baby prosecutor could have prosecuted it. [3:09:28] But, you know, that's neither here nor there. [3:09:30] And lastly, where we were talking about billing being correct or things of that nature or critical mentions. [3:09:39] Does any of that change the impact, I think, what these co-conspirators were doing based on the indictment that the goal was, the ultimate goal was to overthrow the 2020 election? [3:09:51] That was the ultimate goal. [3:09:52] That was the ultimate goal. [3:09:53] And we've had people that are supposed to be leaders that instead of being leaders are just cowering down. [3:10:00] This country needs leaders, not cowards. [3:10:02] I don't have anything else, Madam Chair. [3:10:04] Thank you, Leader Jones. [3:10:07] I've got a few more questions here. [3:10:09] Some of this, Madam DA, will be a little bit more, I guess, philosophical manner. [3:10:15] I want to get your take on some of the testimony that we've had prior to your arrival around some of the state laws. [3:10:20] You've shared some of your thoughts already on some of those things. [3:10:23] But one thing that we've talked a lot about in the committee is the use of special purpose grand juries. [3:10:29] Can you, for the benefit of those watching, outline the difference between a grand jury and a special purpose grand jury? [3:10:38] A special purpose grand jury is for the purpose of investigating. [3:10:41] They are not legally allowed to put forth an indictment. [3:10:45] And so that is what a special purpose grand jury is for. [3:10:50] So, and you referenced this earlier, the process of going to two grand juries. [3:10:53] In your case, with the use of the special purpose grand jury, you went from that special purpose, which was used for investigatory means that you mentioned, [3:11:01] and then ended up ultimately with a grand jury. [3:11:03] Is that correct? [3:11:04] That is correct. [3:11:05] Okay. [3:11:08] It's been described to me that a grand jury exists to essentially put a check on prosecutorial power to require the prosecutor to have to prove some element of grounds to bring indictment. [3:11:20] Would you agree with that statement? [3:11:22] That's one way to phrase it. [3:11:25] How would you phrase it? [3:11:26] That a grand jury is made up of citizens. [3:11:31] That the citizens are brought there. [3:11:33] I'm the only DA in the state. [3:11:35] I do grand jury four days a week. [3:11:36] So I have an A grand jury. [3:11:38] It runs on Monday and Tuesday. [3:11:40] And I have a B grand jury. [3:11:41] It runs on Thursday and Friday. [3:11:43] And we bring forth cases to the grand jury where usually law enforcement, but sometimes lay witnesses testify. [3:11:51] If the grand jury finds that there is adequate evidence, they will put forth an indictment. [3:11:58] It should be known by the general public that not all felonies require an indictment. [3:12:03] Some of your lower level felonies you can do by accusation, just like you could do a misdemeanor. [3:12:08] But for any serious felony, you need to go to the grand jury. [3:12:14] You may have touched on this, and I'm just going to ask you to, in the context of this conversation, outline it again if you don't mind. [3:12:21] What was the reason for the use of a special purpose grand jury in this election case? [3:12:26] To investigate, to make sure I took this matter very seriously. [3:12:31] I was not just going to charge people with a crime before I found evidence. [3:12:35] And sadly, a lot of people in government, the governor and other officials, refused to testify unless they had a subpoena. [3:12:45] Well, I can't get a subpoena unless I have a special purpose grand jury. [3:12:49] And so we served them with subpoenas, and they honored their subpoenas, and they came forward. [3:12:55] So with the grand jury for out-of-state witnesses, there's no way to get, for a regular grand jury, to get a subpoena? [3:13:01] For a regular grand jury, but by the time you're before a regular grand jury, you're indicting. [3:13:06] And I didn't go into this case knowing that there would even be an indictment brought forth. [3:13:11] Tell me about a material witness warrant and what the process is to get one and when one would be used. [3:13:16] When someone won't cooperate, you have to go get one. [3:13:18] Do you have to get one for all out-of-state witnesses unless you're using a grand jury? [3:13:22] I'm sorry, a special purpose grand jury? [3:13:24] You can get a material witness warrant for a witness in a trial. [3:13:29] We have had to get material witness warrants for someone in a trial. [3:13:32] So I don't know that I understand your question. [3:13:34] But basically, when someone will not cooperate, it requires you to go get a warrant. [3:13:39] Typically, you have to send someone to that state. [3:13:42] They have to testify as to why this person is material. [3:13:45] Then the judge there makes a determination, yes, they are material. [3:13:49] They sign the warrant. [3:13:50] They come down. [3:13:51] That's very brief, but that gives you kind of the gist of what a material witness warrant has been used. [3:13:56] I've used them many times in my career. [3:13:58] My understanding is essentially you need two judges. [3:14:00] What sounds like one is the out-of-state judge, one would be a Georgia judge to compel that testimony. [3:14:04] Is that accurate? [3:14:05] Because they have to make a determination that it's actually material. [3:14:08] And with a special purpose grand jury, you have the ability to send essentially a letter and a warrant to whoever you wish [3:14:14] and compel them to testify without the process of going through the material witness warrant. [3:14:18] Is that accurate? [3:14:19] Yeah. [3:14:21] Again, we're getting into the weeds. [3:14:23] We needed a special purpose grand jury because I need to be able to issue subpoenas. [3:14:27] So you can issue subpoenas from the grand jury to bring the people there to testify. [3:14:32] And so if you're asking that we do that process, you know, we fought in every court in this land. [3:14:37] Lindsey Graham took us all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States, who unanimously, I believe. [3:14:42] Yeah, I think it was unanimously voted that he would have to come in to appear. [3:14:45] We are getting in the weeds and just indulge us because we do need to, the law needs to be specific. [3:14:49] And I'm not sure if you watched the testimony. [3:14:53] We had a couple of DAs that testified, one of whom, and I apologize. [3:14:58] I don't recall the gentleman's name. [3:14:59] He essentially, I'm going to paraphrase here, said that he believed that, or I think he stated that it would be fine with him if we struck the entire code section as it related to special purpose grand juries. [3:15:10] Because in his opinion, that kind of blurred the line between investigator and prosecutor and puts you in the position of kind of being the investigator and the trier of fact. [3:15:19] And I'm not, I don't know if you've heard about this testimony or not. [3:15:23] I haven't heard this testimony, but what I do know is Coca-Cola and the girl that sells lemonade, they both sell liquids, but it ain't the same work. [3:15:30] And so you brought people from jurisdictions that do not do the complexity of cases that I do. [3:15:37] Now, all work is honorable work, so hear that. [3:15:41] And prosecutors everywhere are trying their best to uphold the law. [3:15:45] But to get somebody from a jurisdiction where they got 15 lawyers and, you know, they've been a grand jury once every six months and to ask them to discuss my work where I'm running grand jury four times a year and 12,000 new felony cases. [3:16:00] I'm sorry, four times a week and, you know, 12,000 felonies a year and the most complex cases, you know, that this state sees. [3:16:09] I don't think you were talking to people that you should have been. [3:16:12] So I disagree with him and I don't even think he has the ability to comment on the work of the Fulton County DA. [3:16:20] And I noticed that you didn't bring any diversity here when you brought witnesses. [3:16:24] You brought all Republican, Caucasian people to come and to tell you about my work. [3:16:29] I don't need Daddy to tell me how to do my work. [3:16:31] I know how to do my work. [3:16:33] Yeah, I don't recall any of the DAs that came commenting on your case at all or your work at all. [3:16:38] It was more so trying to get a broad swath of the state somewhere from... [3:16:40] But it would be like me telling you how to run a DA's office in a rural community. [3:16:44] I don't know. [3:16:45] Well, the challenge for us, Madam DA, is we have to write laws that do give respect and deference to the reality that there are larger jurisdictions like yours [3:16:53] and there are smaller ones and there are a lot of DA's around the state that have to follow the same law. [3:16:56] Well, that brings us to another law. [3:16:58] When you all are trying to decide the salaries of district attorneys, you surely should not compare those two that have my volume of work to those that have smaller jurisdictions of work. [3:17:07] Now, I know it brings ire to some that is the Democratic DA's that keep most of this state safe. [3:17:13] But the reality is they run the largest jurisdictions. [3:17:16] They happen to, in most cases, be minority and they deserve to make more money. [3:17:20] Mr. Chairman, may I, since I was here when we did an investigative group, could I explain the difference? [3:17:31] Governor, I think we'll defer to you not because you were a governor but because you started your illustrious career in the Georgia State Senate. [3:17:37] Well, I started as an assistant. [3:17:39] Well, your first elected role was in this chamber. [3:17:44] When a grand jury, and there are lawyers everywhere that do not understand this. [3:17:50] When a grand jury, you present a bill of indictment or special presentment, you can do it either way, to a grand jury, [3:17:58] then there has to be laid before the grand jury a specific bill of indictment alleging facts, circumstances, and the defendants. [3:18:08] And you just can't use a regular grand jury to say, well, we need to investigate this. [3:18:16] The law goes back to the common law. [3:18:19] It has to be an indictment, perfect in form, laid before the grand jury, charging a specific person with a specific crime. [3:18:28] So there is no way for a regular grand jury to investigate, unless they are given some civil investigation powers, for example, the jail, things like that. [3:18:43] But in a criminal case, the case has to be made on that bill of indictment. [3:18:48] So an investigative grand jury, and they're rarely used, but investigative grand jury says something went wrong here. [3:18:59] And I don't know exactly who should be indicted, and I don't know exactly what they should be indicted for, but it deserves investigation. [3:19:09] And where a grand jury may be drawn and is set in statute, an investigative grand jury requires the additional step, so that it won't be misused, that the additional step, that in fact, it must be approved by not only the district attorney, but the chief judge. [3:19:36] Not that I'm trying to obstruct you on the law, but... [3:19:41] Remind me, Madam DA, how many times in your career as a DA of Fulton County have you employed a special purpose grand jury? [3:19:51] Once. [3:19:57] Chairman Cousert, who obviously I've said before can't be here today, he has contemplated this concept of a statewide grand jury. [3:20:05] And one of the things that he and I talked about was just getting your thoughts on whether it's appropriate for the Fulton County DA and Fulton County grand jurors to have sole authority and responsibility, [3:20:15] essentially for prosecuting all state level officials, simply because the capital is here in Atlanta, or what your thoughts might be on what that resting with the attorney general and a local municipality in this case, that would be, or a local jurisdiction, which would be your office. [3:20:29] And that's the real issue. [3:20:30] And I know that it bothers you all that the district attorney in Fulton County is me. [3:20:35] But I think you absolutely need, when laws are broken in someone's jurisdiction, they should have the ability to prosecute them. [3:20:45] There is no need to do that in that way. [3:20:48] And the reality is I prosecute more cases than the attorney general. [3:20:53] We are equipped to do it. [3:20:54] We are doing it. [3:20:55] I think that what has happened is the complexion of the DAs have changed. [3:21:01] And so now there's all this concern. [3:21:03] Now we need a QAnon committee, the oversight committee y'all have come up with. [3:21:07] Now we need a statewide grand jury and we need to take rights away. [3:21:11] No, it's just fine how it's always been. [3:21:13] I think what he's contemplating, at least as he kind of jotted some thoughts out to me, would be concurrent jurisdiction where you would still have autonomy, but the attorney general would also have the ability to prosecute cases. [3:21:23] You would be opposed to that. [3:21:26] They already have that ability. [3:21:27] Okay. [3:21:28] They have that ability. [3:21:29] So then he, they have the ability. [3:21:33] That may be the distinction that he was getting to. [3:21:35] I just want to get on the record because he couldn't be here today. [3:21:37] And that is something that he asked about. [3:21:39] We heard from, and I'm just going to summarize this because I know we are getting short on time. [3:21:47] I do want to talk about federal grants because it was discussed in this committee. [3:21:50] Did you hear me say I just passed another audit? [3:21:52] I did hear you say that, I believe. [3:21:54] Ask and answer, I believe, as y'all would say. [3:21:57] I don't think you gave us this number, but what's a ballpark number of federal grants in an average year of what y'all receive? [3:22:07] Is it hundreds of thousands? [3:22:09] Is it a couple million dollars? [3:22:10] Is it? [3:22:11] I don't know an exact answer. [3:22:13] I can tell you we do excellent work with our grants. [3:22:15] And because of the current administration, not just in my office, but all over the country, people are losing valuable grant money to do the work of the people. [3:22:24] And that is going to require some work of the legislature because the state's going to have to kick in more. [3:22:28] This year alone, I lost 14 employees as of September 30th because not as many grants are being given. [3:22:35] Grant work that just does excellent things for community. [3:22:40] And the grant, so that we're clear, they're actually not the Fulton County District Attorney's grants. [3:22:46] They're not the Atlanta Judicial Circuits grants. [3:22:48] They are the grants of the county. [3:22:50] So they are not my grants. [3:22:52] So that's a misnomer, slang. [3:22:55] What do they do? [3:23:09] A combination of everything. [3:23:11] Some lawyers, some investigators, some staff. [3:23:15] Okay. [3:23:17] And those weren't all federal grants. [3:23:19] I want to move quickly through, and I don't want to belabor this, but there was a letter that I want to ask you about that came from Senator Grassley relative to grants. [3:23:28] And then we heard testimony from someone who I believe used to work in your office is no longer employed named Amanda Timpson. [3:23:35] Yeah, all of her, five of her cases have been dismissed now. [3:23:38] So I think that you should know that on summary judgment because she gave this committee information that was incorrect and her cases have been dismissed. [3:23:46] You're not soothsayers. [3:23:48] You wouldn't know that as you went into the future, but facts were provided to you that were inaccurate, not true, and those cases were dismissed. [3:23:55] And it's about five cases. [3:23:57] Some dismissed by her counsel. [3:23:59] One was just dismissed on summary judgment. [3:24:01] I have not misused grants funds. [3:24:03] You were given false information. [3:24:05] That's not the only witness that gave you false information, but that one certainly did. [3:24:09] Okay. [3:24:11] And I'm going to kind of cross-reference a couple things that was the testimony from Ms. Timpson, and I also referenced a couple things in the letter. [3:24:19] The letter specifically notes that your office received $500,000 in 2020 to open a youth empowerment and gang prevention center. [3:24:28] You know I wasn't the DA in 2020. [3:24:30] Correct. [3:24:31] I'm just going to ask you if the money for the grant has been used for that purpose to your knowledge. [3:24:34] I wasn't the DA in 2020. [3:24:36] I can't speculate. [3:24:37] After receiving Mr. Grassley's letter, did you have the opportunity to look into the use of that $500,000? [3:24:42] I don't believe I did. [3:24:43] I don't think I responded to Mr. Grassley. [3:24:45] Okay. [3:24:46] The letter highlights a report that roughly $89,000 of those funds have been diverted to what is known as the Offender Alumni Association. [3:24:54] Is that report accurate to your knowledge? [3:24:56] I don't have any knowledge, and I'm not going to speculate. [3:24:58] Okay. [3:24:59] When Ms. Timpson was here, she previously testified that she discovered the office was using these grants and expenses that were not eligible for the grant. [3:25:11] Specifically, she mentioned swag, computers, and travel. [3:25:14] And didn't know what she was talking about, which is why our cases were dismissed. [3:25:17] So is it your testimony that the funds were not used for swag, travel, or computers? [3:25:23] Let me speak specifically to the one that I know about. [3:25:25] Okay. [3:25:26] I bought a computer for a grant employee. [3:25:28] I did not use grant funds to buy it. [3:25:32] I can, which I do with all my grants. [3:25:34] It's never enough. [3:25:35] So you always do things to support the people working on the grants. [3:25:40] But what I can tell you is her cases were dismissed because they had no merit. [3:25:44] One was just dismissed on summary judgment. [3:25:48] She testified that she had brought this to your attention in late 2021. [3:25:51] Do you recall that conversation? [3:25:53] I do not recall it. [3:25:55] What I recall is Ms. Timpson being a troubled employee that did not do well at the office, that I moved her. [3:26:01] I remember she was one of those people I interviewed. [3:26:04] I remember feeling terribly sorry for her because she's got a tragic story. [3:26:08] So I was proud of that she had kind of lift herself up by her bootstraps. [3:26:12] But she ended up being an employee that was a holdover employee and not very good at her job. [3:26:19] We tried and tried to work with her. [3:26:21] Ultimately, she put some of my employees in fear and she was let go. [3:26:26] And that's what I recall. [3:26:27] And she was let go in January 2022. [3:26:29] I don't remember. [3:26:30] You know, I've had up to 400 employees before the ARPA money was employed. [3:26:35] Like, I literally have no idea. [3:26:37] She obviously was not a lawyer or an investigator. [3:26:39] And that is the tears of my office, a lower level employee. [3:26:42] I don't remember. [3:26:43] Okay. [3:26:44] Going back to Grassley's letter. [3:26:46] I told you I didn't respond to Grassley's letter. [3:26:49] I don't remember it. [3:26:50] It doesn't stand out to me. [3:26:51] It wasn't important to me. [3:26:52] I'll just highlight for you one thing he said. [3:26:54] Just allow you to clarify if it's accurate or not. [3:26:57] He cites a report in the letter that says that in 2023, 98% of these federal grant funds were spent on travel and conferences. [3:27:04] I don't know if that's true or not. [3:27:06] I doubt it's true. [3:27:07] But if it was spent on travel and conferences, it would have been allowances of the grant. [3:27:11] But that sounds inaccurate to me. [3:27:13] But again, we're speculating. [3:27:14] Okay. [3:27:16] Chairman Grassley asked you for a series of documents. [3:27:19] And based on what you just said, I think I know the answer to this question. [3:27:21] But I just want to clarify. [3:27:22] He asked for a list of all federal grants received by the office since 2019. [3:27:26] Complete accounting of all expenditures of grant funds, reports related to planned expenditures of those funds. [3:27:31] Have you complied with Mr. Grassley's request? [3:27:36] I believe Mr. Grassley was ignored. [3:27:38] Okay. [3:27:39] Would you be willing to provide those documents to this committee? [3:27:41] I think you've been provided documents. [3:27:43] What did happen was I provided documents to Jim Jordan. [3:27:46] Do you know if federal grant uses and sources and details that was requested by Mr. Grassley [3:27:54] would have been captured in what you provided to Mr. Jordan? [3:27:57] I have no idea. [3:27:58] This is a large office. [3:27:59] This is not a rural office. [3:28:00] I have a grant team. [3:28:02] So if we request these documents, you'd be willing to provide them to the committee? [3:28:05] Whatever has been provided is what I was willing to provide. [3:28:08] Yeah. [3:28:09] Okay. [3:28:10] We'll consider. [3:28:12] But I think it included because I'm Washington with Jim Jordan. [3:28:16] Can you say that one more time? [3:28:19] I went to Washington on the Jim Jordan meeting. [3:28:22] Twice. [3:28:23] And they had, they, not only did they have all the documents, they sent another team of [3:28:29] auditors down and they said everything was spent. [3:28:32] Correct. [3:28:33] I just passed a federal DOJ audit this week. [3:28:36] The Fulton County ethics code was amended in April of 24 to clarify that it includes elected officials. [3:28:47] Is that your understanding? [3:28:50] I have no idea what Fulton County did. [3:28:52] That wouldn't apply to her. [3:28:55] Yeah. [3:28:56] I'm not a county elected official. [3:28:57] I'm a state. [3:28:58] She's a state elected. [3:28:59] Right. [3:29:00] Okay. [3:29:01] So you, your position would be that the county ethics code, anti nepotism code that they, [3:29:05] that they updated to include elected officials when they expanded that scope that that would [3:29:08] not include you. [3:29:09] That would be your position. [3:29:10] There's county electeds and there's a state elected. [3:29:11] I am a state elected. [3:29:12] Okay. [3:29:13] I represent the Atlanta judicial circuit. [3:29:16] Does PAC have any sort of model language around either internal ethics codes for your office [3:29:22] to use or any sort of anti nepotism? [3:29:24] You have to ask PAC. [3:29:25] Are you, are you aware of anything that PAC has provided? [3:29:29] I'm not. [3:29:31] Can you provide the committee with any sort of internal ethics guidelines that you have as [3:29:35] well as any sort of anti nepotism policy that your office has in writing? [3:29:38] I subpoena them. [3:29:39] We'll consider and decide whether it's relevant to the quarry or whether it's privileged or whether [3:29:45] you've already received it. [3:29:46] Okay. [3:29:54] Does an internal ethics policy exist in writing? [3:29:59] You know, you mentioned companies and you know, it's interesting because I also saw where [3:30:03] you posted where it's always Fulton County. [3:30:06] But the truth is you have a company that you've listed on your, your disclosures for finances [3:30:12] and that company stole millions of dollars from Fulton. [3:30:15] If you want to look at ethics, you might want to look at that. [3:30:20] Does your, does the, your office have any sort of internal ethics? [3:30:23] The company's name is Teletrax in case anyone thinks I'm making this up. [3:30:27] And people died because that company did not provide the services that they purported to provide. [3:30:32] Does your office have an internal ethics policy that's in writing? [3:30:38] Not that I can recall. [3:30:40] Okay. [3:30:41] I want to lastly just ask a couple of questions about the open records act. [3:30:47] Let me tell you something. [3:30:50] I have a 92% conviction rate and a 92% clearance weight with open records from January of 24 to November 30th of 2025. [3:31:01] I've gotten over 1600 open records requests. [3:31:06] This ain't a rural town. [3:31:08] Say that number again. [3:31:09] I'm sorry. [3:31:10] 1,600 and we have cleared 92%. [3:31:13] Now it should be noted that in 24 people were abusing the open records thing. [3:31:19] Ms. Merchant, as you mentioned, over 30 requests for open records. [3:31:23] Lots of people were abusing it. [3:31:25] And it troubles me that in 25 I have to now start charging people for open records because I realize people will abuse it. [3:31:32] But 92% of the open records requested we have cleared. [3:31:37] Can you define cleared? [3:31:40] What do you mean when you say cleared? [3:31:41] They've asked for documents and we've given them to them. [3:31:43] Okay. [3:31:44] And you mentioned you're now having to charge an hourly rate. [3:31:47] You were not, there were no hourly rates. [3:31:48] Not from January 1st of 2021. [3:31:50] That was a novel idea. [3:31:51] A young, naive, new district attorney did. [3:31:55] I thought that I could provide documents or I wanted to have transparency. [3:32:00] I wanted to be able to communicate with the public and I wanted indigent people as well as rich people to be able if they had something to give it to them. [3:32:07] What I didn't know is that there were a lot of evil people that would abuse that to make up lies. [3:32:15] Can you clarify for me? [3:32:16] You said you started charging just earlier this year? [3:32:18] January of 2025. [3:32:19] Okay. [3:32:20] But I don't take in those funds. [3:32:21] I had Ms. Whitmore do that. [3:32:23] Prior to your getting sworn in, did your office charge for open records? [3:32:28] I believe the prior DA did charge for open records. [3:32:30] But you know when you become the new DA you have new ideas. [3:32:33] One of my new ideas was I wanted to offer this level of transparency to my constituents. [3:32:38] It was abused by people all over the country. [3:32:40] You referenced certain individuals abusing the process. [3:32:44] Absolutely. [3:32:45] When you said 30, just to take the example of Ms. Merchant just since she has been before the committee. [3:32:49] You said she filed 30 open records requests? [3:32:51] More than 30. [3:32:52] More than 30. [3:32:53] It was a little bit in excess of 30. [3:32:56] Yes. [3:32:58] I did say that. [3:32:59] Over what period of time? [3:33:00] I don't remember. [3:33:01] I don't remember. [3:33:04] Generally speaking in kind of the scope of the case of the election. [3:33:07] I don't remember so I'm not going to speculate. [3:33:09] Okay. [3:33:10] What, in your opinion, what should... [3:33:16] I know she also came in here and testified that I diverted money from my homicide backlog. [3:33:21] I cleared my homicide backlog, all of it. [3:33:23] Didn't divert any money. [3:33:24] People came in here and lied to you. [3:33:26] You should be upset about that. [3:33:28] In the... [3:33:29] In the... [3:33:31] As you think through the law, the open records law currently is unlimited, right? [3:33:34] Somebody can... [3:33:35] I think if you want a new open records law you should make the legislature have to answer open records. [3:33:39] That would be my recommendation for a new law. [3:33:42] I would vote for that as well. [3:33:43] But let me just get your... [3:33:44] I just want to get your opinion on the scope and how you would limit that. [3:33:49] How you determine abuse versus non-abuse. [3:33:52] How I would limit open records? [3:33:56] Sure. [3:33:58] Is that what you're asking me? [3:33:59] If you were to take an extreme case, right? [3:34:01] You say 30, I think... [3:34:02] I don't think that district attorneys should actually be subject to the open records. [3:34:05] But if they are subject to the open records, obviously attorney work product should not be subject to it. [3:34:12] Only cases that are, you know, completely closed, and I mean closed past the habeas, you should have to give. [3:34:23] Help me understand why you don't think you should be subject to open records. [3:34:25] I would agree with you that the General Assembly should be. [3:34:28] Judges are not subject to open records. [3:34:29] Do you think they should be? [3:34:30] Do I think judges should be subject to it? [3:34:34] Not their work product, because judges also have work product. [3:34:37] But I think they should be akin to DAs. [3:34:41] And do you think DAs should be akin to the legislature? [3:34:44] Or do you think that the legislature should be akin to a county commissioner? [3:34:47] I don't know that I understand your question, but I think that you should be subject to open records. [3:34:52] I think that you're making laws that are supposed to be in the benefit of the community. [3:34:56] As opposed to this day where we're wasting a lot of time, where me and my staff could be keeping the community safe. [3:35:02] But I'm here to do this song and dance with you. [3:35:04] The reality is I brought forth an indictment because people came in my county. [3:35:09] They committed a crime and they got charged. [3:35:11] They didn't get charged because of their race. [3:35:13] They didn't get charged because of their political party. [3:35:15] They got charged because they came in my community and committed a crime. [3:35:19] And two grand juries passed forth an indictment. [3:35:22] And this is what you should know. [3:35:24] I don't care how many times they threatened me. [3:35:26] I don't care that they've threatened my family. [3:35:28] Actually, yesterday, just yesterday, I went home. [3:35:33] And the Department of Justice sent me a letter about another person that they are prosecuting and that I can come in January because this person swatted my home as well as the home of other public officials. [3:35:46] This has to stop. [3:35:48] What you all need to do is to pass laws to allow people to do their jobs, to do them safely. [3:35:54] What happened to Marjorie Taylor Greene? [3:35:56] It's horrible. [3:35:57] That she had to quit her job because they were bomb threats to her house and threatening her children. [3:36:02] But she didn't care when it was me. [3:36:04] She didn't care when my children were threatened. [3:36:06] She didn't care that I haven't had the ability to live in my house. [3:36:09] But I'm a better human being than that. [3:36:11] I don't want any of your lives threatened. [3:36:13] I may not care for you personally. [3:36:15] I may not believe in your politics. [3:36:17] I may think that today is nothing more than evil and you trying to get yourself elected. [3:36:22] All of that being said, I don't think anyone should threaten you and your family. [3:36:26] And I think if you're here to protect, you ought to establish laws that if someone uses hate speech and that creates an environment where people like myself are threatened doing their job, we ought to do something about it in Georgia. [3:36:39] Just a couple of quick questions on the open records law and your thoughts on it. [3:36:45] And I think it is a challenge to get to this concept of what is abuse and what is not abuse. [3:36:51] As it relates to Ms. Merchant though, the court seemed to indicate that she was... [3:36:56] The court indicated that a CFO would not be in the weeds as I was not. [3:37:00] And we gave Ms. Merchant many, many documents and she abused it. [3:37:04] So if you look at what they said, the court said that the CFO, which is what I am of the district attorney's office, I wouldn't be involved in the weeds. [3:37:11] What I know is that when you have 1,600 people requesting, requesting, requesting, requesting, we do the very best we can. [3:37:17] What's a shame is because we had people abusive, I now have three attorneys working on open records, two master level peoples and employees. [3:37:24] None of those people are doing the work that I care about. [3:37:28] What I care about is getting gangsters off my street. [3:37:31] What I care about is getting people that sexually assault children. [3:37:35] I don't hang out with human traffickers or the victims. [3:37:37] I care about representing people that are trafficked. [3:37:41] Like we've got problems here in Georgia. [3:37:43] They're real problems. [3:37:44] This is a major metropolitan city and I'm standing on the line here trying to keep people safe. [3:37:51] And y'all had me in here with this foolishness. [3:37:53] I indicted them. [3:37:54] I'm going to indict them again. [3:37:55] If they committed a crime in my jurisdiction, I don't care if you like it. [3:37:58] It's not 1948. [3:37:59] No, let me get to this. [3:38:00] It's not 1948. [3:38:01] I know that you're offended. [3:38:02] I didn't. [3:38:03] So here's the question. [3:38:06] What I was asking was, and I think I didn't get there. [3:38:18] The court essentially found that Ms. Merchant was treated differently than other people making open records requests. [3:38:26] You're correct. [3:38:27] It did find that you were not in the weeds on dealing with that. [3:38:29] What I'm curious about in response to the court case, have there been any internal changes with how you handled? [3:38:35] I now have three lawyers on open records, two master level people and an assistant. [3:38:40] That was the change. [3:38:42] Okay. [3:38:43] I had to waste more resources to not do the main thing. [3:38:46] So you want something else? [3:38:47] Give the district attorney in Fulton County more lawyers so that she can do our job because what happens in Fulton is going to impact the entire community. [3:38:55] Gang bangers don't stay just in Fulton. [3:38:57] They go to the cab. [3:38:58] They go to Tawita. [3:38:59] They go to Douglas. [3:39:00] And I'm here on the front line, keeping people safe. [3:39:02] And you talk about critical. [3:39:03] It wasn't just about this case. [3:39:05] I prosecute a lot of high profile cases. [3:39:08] Walk me through the change real quick. [3:39:09] What did you have before in terms of staff? [3:39:11] And what do you have? [3:39:12] When I started, I had one. [3:39:13] When I say before, let me say, let's call it 2024 versus 2025. [3:39:17] I've increased staff. [3:39:19] I now have two special assistant attorney generals that work on it. [3:39:23] I have two, excuse me, special assistant prosecutors that work part time on it. [3:39:28] I have right now two lawyers that work on it full time. [3:39:32] I'm bringing a third one in. [3:39:34] I have two master level people that work on it. [3:39:37] When I first got there, there was one lady with a master's degree. [3:39:40] We've had to expand and expand and expand for this foolishness. [3:39:43] And what I'm supposed to be doing and what I'm, my main emphasis, what I focus my day-to-day [3:39:50] on is making sure I lock up murderers, making sure I lock up sexual offenders, making sure [3:39:56] I lock folks up that are dangerous. [3:39:59] And I also spend my time on making sure we have programs for people so we can turn their [3:40:03] lives around, which is why I got a 92% conviction rate. [3:40:10] I must be doing something right. [3:40:12] Leader Jones, I've asked a couple of questions since you've had the opportunity to ask. [3:40:15] I want to defer to see if you had any questions you'd like to ask before we, before we wrap [3:40:19] up here. [3:40:22] Let me turn your mic on. [3:40:23] One final one. [3:40:24] You kind of touched on it. [3:40:25] And that was at the end of the day, this case here, this conspiracy case that took place. [3:40:30] Why did you bring this case? [3:40:33] Because folks came in my jurisdiction and broke the law. [3:40:35] And as elected officials, there are things that are precious and that are our responsibility. [3:40:41] One in a free society is keeping people safe, right? [3:40:44] And I stand on the line keeping people safe every single day. [3:40:48] I have dedicated my entire career to making sure that people are safe and that they feel [3:40:54] valued, children feel valued, no matter who you are. [3:40:57] See, I'm not like these people. [3:40:58] I believe in diversity. [3:40:59] I've sat on my floor and cried with little white children, black children, Spanish children. [3:41:04] And I fight with my last breath to keep those people safe. [3:41:07] But I have also prosecuted black people, white people, Asian people. [3:41:11] It doesn't matter to me. [3:41:13] It seems to matter to some. [3:41:16] So I brought this case because they came in this jurisdiction and broke the law. [3:41:19] And they didn't only break the law here. [3:41:21] They broke it other places. [3:41:22] Because the other thing that we have to do as a free society is we have to protect elections. [3:41:27] It is important. [3:41:28] If the people of this jurisdiction, the 19th, voted Senator Blake Tillery to be that senator, [3:41:34] then I have to work to make sure that he is instilled into office. [3:41:38] If someone does something, goes into a voting booth like they did in Coffey County, they do that. [3:41:43] If they threaten workers, these little old people that work the polls, how dare somebody threaten them? [3:41:48] And how dare you all not take that to be important? [3:41:50] Is it not important because it was an older black female? [3:41:53] It ought to be important to everybody. [3:41:54] That's who you all are here to protect, those that cannot protect themselves. [3:41:58] And I'm willing to stand on the line so y'all can keep threatening me, keep bringing me to the committees, [3:42:03] keep auditing me, and I'm going to keep doing my job with excellence. [3:42:06] All right. [3:42:07] No other further. [3:42:19] No other questions. [3:42:20] Madam DA, we'd like to thank you for appearing today before the committee. [3:42:25] Governor Barnes, we'd like to do the same. [3:42:29] This meeting is- [3:42:30] Happy Holidays.