Most people will debate this like it’s just “did 2020 have fraud?” That’s the wrong frame.
A narrower, and more provable, question is: what guardrails exist when federal power escalates from “audit/court access” to physically seizing ballots, years after an election that’s already been counted, recounted, and litigated?
On Wednesday, January 28, 2026, the FBI executed a warrant at Fulton County’s election center and seized ballots, tabulator tapes, digital data, and voter rolls. County officials immediately raised chain-of-custody concerns: once the materials leave local custody, the county can’t assure they’re still secure.
Here’s the additional detail that sharpens the “machinery” question:
According to Bloomberg Law, the St. Louis-based U.S. attorney Thomas Albus (Eastern District of Missouri) appeared on the warrant instead of the Northern District of Georgia’s U.S. attorney—and had received a special appointment from Attorney General Pam Bondi to run election integrity matters nationwide under 28 U.S.C. § 515.
That matters because it’s not just a search. It’s a model:
- Centralized remit + local seizure: a nationwide designee can coordinate cases across districts, while local election materials get physically removed.
- Legitimacy laundering: “court-authorized” becomes the headline, while the underlying predicate stays opaque to the public.
- Trust damage as a byproduct: even if investigators act in good faith, chain-of-custody doubt is the predictable output.
Concession + boundary: yes, election records laws exist and investigations can be legitimate. But federal investigative power aimed at re-proving a fraud narrative—after the claim-space already collapsed in court—is a different category of risk.
Replacement frame: if the goal is election integrity, focus on transparent predicates + court-supervised access + minimal intrusion, not ballot seizures that function like political oxygen for a “rigged” storyline.
What would change my mind: a publicly testable showing that (1) there’s a specific crime predicate not derived from circular “anomalies” talk, and (2) seizure was necessary versus supervised imaging/inspection under a protective order.
The question: what safeguards would you write so any administration can’t normalize “ballot raids” as a post-election pressure tool?
Sources:
ProPublica | Bloomberg Law | 28 U.S.C. § 515 | AP | Reuters
What was the warrant predicated on?
Probable cause of violations of 52 USC 20701 (record retention) + 52 USC 20511 (fraudulent registrations/ballots). The factual basis is in a sealed affidavit, so we can’t see the “why” yet.
First thing to have done was put authenticated voting results on the blockchain using Simpleproof. That would at least handle the chain of custody concern because you know the next move is for Trump minions to modify the voting results to "show" the fraud they could never prove. And even if they did uncover a problem, which they wouldn't, their claims can't be accepted because chain of custody and authenticity is now destroyed.