Judge Quashes Trump DOJ's 'Staggering' Subpoena for Names of 2020 Georgia Election Workers

A federal judge has rejected the Justice Department's attempt to obtain the names, addresses and phone numbers of the people who administered the 2020 election in Fulton County, Georgia — the Atlanta-area county at the center of President Donald Trump's long-running and unfounded claims that the election was stolen from him.

U.S. District Judge William Ray II, a Trump appointee who sits in the Northern District of Georgia, quashed the grand-jury subpoena in a 28-page order issued Tuesday, calling the scope of the personal information the department sought "staggering." Releasing such data, he wrote, "threatens to chill participation in future elections, which will surely impact Fulton County," where officials rely on thousands of temporary and volunteer workers to run polling places and count ballots.

The judge also pointed to a fundamental legal obstacle: even if the records could help identify workers who might support the theory that the 2020 election was conducted unfairly, the statute of limitations for any potential crime arising from that election has long since expired. In other words, the information could not be used to bring charges, undercutting the stated justification for demanding it.

The ruling landed amid a broader federal effort to reexamine the 2020 vote in Georgia, more than five years after it was certified. The FBI has surged personnel to the state as part of a renewed inquiry, and the Justice Department has sent letters to election officials across the country warning of potential criminal exposure — moves that voting-rights advocates have described as an intimidation campaign aimed at the workers who keep elections running.

Fulton County has been a flashpoint since 2020, when election workers there — including two who were falsely accused of ballot fraud in viral conspiracy theories — faced harassment and threats after being named publicly. That history loomed over the judge's reasoning, which emphasized the real-world consequences of exposing the identities of people who take on the often thankless task of administering elections.

Legal experts said the decision represented a significant check on the administration's use of grand-jury subpoenas to pursue the president's grievances about an election he lost. By refusing to turn over the workers' personal details, the court signaled that even a judge appointed by Trump was unwilling to endorse a demand it viewed as both legally futile and dangerous to the democratic process. The Justice Department could appeal, but for now the names of Fulton County's 2020 election workers will remain shielded.