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| Photo Credit: AP. |
Wandrea “Shaye” Moss who testified on Tuesday gave a hallowing account of her trauma when Mr Trump and his allies falsely accused her and her mother of pulling fraudulent ballots from a suitcase in Georgia, The Associated Press reports.
The former
Georgia elections worker recounted her ordeal as she testified before the panel
saying, Mr Trump latched onto surveillance footage from November 2020 to accuse
her and her mother, Ruby Freeman of committing voter fraud, according to The
Associated Press. Although she quickly debunked the allegation, it spread like wild
fire largely among conservative media.
The African
American woman said she received messages “wishing death upon me. Telling me
that I’ll be in jail with my mother. And saying things like, ‘Be glad it’s 2020
and not 1920,’” according to The Associated Press.
“A lot of
them were racist,” Moss said. “A lot of them were just hateful.”
Her mother,
Freeman also testified before the panel giving an account of the family’s
ordeal at the time.
“There is
nowhere I feel safe. Nowhere,” Freeman told the committee in the prerecorded
video, according to The Associated Press. “Do you know how it feels to have the
president of the United States target you? The president of the United States
is supposed to represent every American, not to target one.”
“But he targeted me,” she added.
The panel in
the testimony sought to show how Mr Trump’s lies about widespread voter fraud
translated into real time violence and intimidation against election officials.
Several of the
people who believed the lies by the former President visited the home of Moss’
grandmother to make a citizen’s arrest.
“I’ve never
ever heard her or see her cry, ever in my life,” Moss testified, according to The
Associated Press. “She called me screaming at the top of her lungs ... saying
people are at her home.”
“I just felt
so helpless,” she added.
According to
The Associated threats against the two county workers escalated after Trump
lawyer Rudy Giuliani played surveillance footage of them counting ballots in a
Georgia Senate committee hearing on December 10, 2021. Giuliani claimed the
footage showed the women “surreptitiously passing around USB ports as if they
are vials of heroin or cocaine.” What they were actually passing, Moss told the
committee, was a ginger mint.
Despite
rebuttals, Giuliani and Trump allies continually peddled the false election
fraud narrative that Moss and Freeman along with other election workers in key
battleground states packed ballots into suitcases but was dismissed by several
Georgia election officials who found the footage showed regular ballot
containers used in Fulton County.
Conservative
networks like One America News Network seized on the false claim to spread the false
narrative along with Mr Trump.
Mr Trump
mentioned Freeman’s name 18 times in a call with Georgia Secretary of State
Brad Raffensperger, said Rep[. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) during Thursday’s
hearing.
At one point
Trump called Freeman a “professional vote scammer and hustler,” according to The
Associated Press.
“This has
affected my life in a major way. In every way. All because of lies. All for me
doing my job. The same thing I’ve been doing forever,” said Moss, who had been
an election official for 10 years.
Freeman was
eventually advised by the FBI to leave her house ahead of January 6 for her own
safety.
“The point
is this: Donald Trump didn’t care about the threats of violence,” Rep. Liz
Cheney, R-Wyo., the vice chair of the committee, said in her opening remarks
Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. “He did not condemn them, he made
no effort to stop them; he went forward with his fake allegations anyway.”
Corroborating
the claims of threats of violence against election officials, Raffensperger,
Georgia’s top election official, and his deputy, Gabe Sterling, also testified
about the relentless attacks they and their colleagues faced as Trump falsely
claimed widespread voter fraud in Georgia, according to The Associated Press.