Mark Zuckerberg’s foray into election-influencing, particularly during the 2020 cycle, has been a prominent target of scrutiny by conservatives. Will there finally be some accountability in one of the states most contested states?
In Georgia, the DeKalb County Board of Registration and Elections may have broken state law when it accepted $2 million from the Zuckerberg-linked organization.
The board recently announced that it was given $2 million from the U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence for becoming one of the organization’s Centers for Election Excellence.
“As a Center for Election Excellence, DeKalb County was awarded $2 million and will join a select bipartisan group of election officials to share best practices and strategies in their ongoing pursuit of excellence,” wrote the DeKalb County Board of Registration and Elections in their press release.
As the release itself notes, the “U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence launched in 2022 and is a five-year, $80 million nonpartisan program that brings together election officials, designers, technologists, and other experts to envision, support, and celebrate excellence in U.S. election administration.”
Notably, among the “launch partners” of the U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence is the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL).
According to a letter that the Honest Elections Project, a watchdog group, shared with Fox News, CTCL received a $250 million donation from Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, with the ostensible goal of helping jurisdictions guarantee voting amid the COVID-19 outbreak by funding ballot drop boxes, voting equipment, and other election-related items.
But most of this money went toward heavily-Democrat areas, leading to accusations that the organization was merely trying to tilt the election in Democrats’ favor. As a result, after the 2020 election, Georgia passed a state ban on private funding for elections.
“No superintendent shall take or accept any funding, grants, or gifts from any source other than from the governing authority of the county or municipality, the State of Georgia, or the federal government,” the 2021 law states.
The Honest Election Project claims the DeKalb board’s receipt of the $2 million is a violation of that law.
“We’re now fairly well convinced this is an attempt to do two things,” said Honest Elections Project Executive Director Jason Snead to Fox News. “To get around those bans on private funding by doing either what they did in DeKalb County, by looking for loopholes and end-a rounds, doing what they can to get money into these offices; or by doing what I think they feel is even more important work, which is to pump influence into these offices.”
Snead added, “They are trying to gather data and reshape the way these offices function so that they essentially become left-wing outposts for progressive voting reform. All of what they do is a ruse in order to get into these offices and accomplish that goal.”
The Honest Elections Project is calling for an investigation by the state attorney general, secretary of state and state elections board.
But the Georgia Attorney General’s Office told Fox News that it lacks the authority to investigate allegations of violations of the state election code. The AG’s office said it’s up to the Georgia Secretary of State or the Georgia Bureau of Investigations to look into the matter.
The DeKalb elections board defended its receipt of the $2 million donation. Chairwoman Dele Lowman Smith, a Democrat, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that “The DeKalb County Finance Department applied for the grant in accordance with state law, and our county attorneys conducted a diligent review to ensure the grant award met the letter of the law.”
There is currently a push within the Georgia legislature to close loopholes that still allow private funding to make its way into elections. One such solution is S.B. 222, which was introduced in the Georgia Senate last week.
The legislation has the support of former Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler and her group, Greater Georgia. In a statement, Loeffler said: “Thankfully, Lt. Governor Burt Jones and our lawmakers have taken swift action to fortify existing laws that ban outside funding for local boards of election through SB 202, which will ensure that our elections are never bought and paid for by special or partisan interests.”
As Fox News reports:
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said in a statement to Fox News Digital that he has asked the legislature to close the loophole and suggested S.B. 202 would do just that.
“It was the will of the General Assembly that if outside organizations wanted to help supply funding for counties, it would actually be channeled through the state election board so that it could then disburse the funds on an equitable basis,” Raffensperger said. “It would be a legislative remedy. We are in session now, so it is something they can address pretty quickly.”
A spokesperson for Raffensperger’s office also told Fox News Digital on Thursday afternoon that there is “an active investigation at the direction of the State Elections Board.”
This latest development demonstrates that while passing election integrity is an important first step, it is likewise imperative to have officials in the executive and judicial branches who are willing to enforce these laws and prosecute violators.
