Fulton County challenges DOJ subpoena targeting 2020 election workers
The Fulton County court in Atlanta, Georgia, US, on Monday, Feb. 13, 2023 (Dustin Chambers/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
(FULTON COUNTY, Ga.) — The Department of Justice last month demanded the names and contact information for every election worker in Fulton County, Georgia, involved in the 2020 election, according to court filings disclosed this week.
The Fulton County Board of Registrations and Elections is now asking a federal court in Atlanta to quash the grand jury subpoena from federal agents, which requested the names, addresses, phone numbers and emails for any staff member who worked the 2020 election.
“Its purpose is to target, harass, and punish the President’s perceived political opponents; it is grossly overbroad and untethered to any reasonable need; it cannot yield any evidence that could result in a criminal prosecution,” lawyers for the Fulton County officials said in the motion filed Monday with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
The subpoena appears to escalate the Trump administration’s pressure on Fulton County amid an ongoing federal investigation into purported irregulates in the 2020 election.
Driven in part by Trump allies who unsuccessfully sought to use debunked theories to overturn the election, federal agents in January seized all the ballots and records from the 2020 election.
For months, Fulton County officials have urged a federal judge to order the records be returned, though that judge has not yet issued a ruling.
DOJ attorneys have insisted that the search was based on evidence of potential misconduct and accused Fulton County officials of speculating about “some kind of grand conspiracy.”
In the motion filed on Monday, lawyers for Fulton County called the recent subpoena the “latest effort to target and harass the President’s perceived political enemies.” They argue that the statute of limitations for any alleged crime has run out and that the investigation lacks a legitimate basis.
“Grand juries do not exist to conduct roving inquiries untethered to a prosecutable criminal case,” the motion said.
Robb Pitts, the chairman of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, described the subpoena as an “outrageous federal overreach designed to intimidate and to chill participation in elections” in a statement.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
National Guard members Sarah Beckstrom and Andrew Wolfe. (U.S. Department of Justice)
(WASHINGTON) – -The two West Virginia National Guard members shot in November will receive the Purple Heart, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Friday while addressing troops at the base of the Washington Monument.
Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, died of her injuries on Nov. 26, the day before Thanksgiving. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe was shot in the head and remains in recovery, with skull reconstruction surgery scheduled for March.
“One lost, one recovering, both soon to be Purple Heart recipients,” Hegseth said, “because they were attacked by a radical.”
The suspected gunman, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national who previously worked with the CIA in Afghanistan, was arraigned on nine charges Wednesday, including first-degree murder, assault with intent to kill and illegal possession of a firearm.
Prosecutors say they are seeking additional charges that would make Lakanwal eligible for the death penalty. He has pleaded not guilty.
Purple Hearts are typically reserved for troops wounded or killed by clearly identified enemy combatants in war zones, with awards for attacks on American soil relatively rare.
The question of eligibility resurfaced after the 2015 shootings in Chattanooga, Tennessee, when Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez opened fire on a Navy Reserve center and a nearby recruiting station. Four Marines and a sailor died, Abdulazeez was killed by law enforcement.
For months, that attack sat in a bureaucratic gray zone for the Purple Heart. FBI Director James Comey eventually determined the shootings were motivated by foreign terrorist propaganda.
The determination cleared the way for then- Navy Secretary Ray Mabus to announce Purple Hearts would be awarded to the victims of the shooting.
The Trump administration has labeled Lakanwal a terrorist, though it has not publicly produced evidence tying him to any designated terrorist organization.
Lakanwal was among thousands of Afghans evacuated to the United States after the Taliban’s takeover in 2021, and his asylum application was approved in 2025 during the Trump administration.
In Afghanistan, Lakanwal was affiliated with a so-called Zero Unit that worked closely with the CIA and elite special operations units, ABC News reported in December.
Officials with direct knowledge of the matter said he was considered a trusted member of the unit, which carried out American counterterrorism missions.
Investigators also believe Lakanwal was under financial strain after his work permit expired and may have been experiencing a mental health crisis.
“This announcement brings long-overdue honor to their service, offers meaning and reassurance to their families, and stands as a solemn reminder that West Virginia will never forget those who sacrifice in defense of others,” West Virginia GOP Gov. Patrick Morrisey, who called for Purple Hearts to be awarded after the ambush, said in a statement to ABC News.
U.S. President Donald Trump greets Chinese President Xi Jinping ahead of a bilateral meeting at Gimhae Air Base on October 30, 2025 in Busan, South Korea. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — When President Donald Trump arrives in Beijing next Thursday, he’ll be the first U.S. president to set foot in China in nearly a decade. The last visit was Trump’s own, in 2017.
He arrives in a very different position than he expected: the trip was originally scheduled for earlier this spring, then postponed because of the Iran war.
Trump had said the war would only last four to six weeks. Instead, there’s no end in sight with the the Strait of Hormuz remaining closed and U.S. gas prices surging — as the president faces record-low approval ratings.
That backdrop has flipped the leverage dynamic, according to experts who study the region.
The leverage flip
Beijing would have preferred this war never started — the energy disruption and the hit to global demand are real headaches for an export-dependent economy, experts say. But they say the conflict has handed Xi a relative advantage: Trump now has too many fires to put out at home and abroad to risk another escalation cycle with China.
“China is a relative bright spot in Trump’s foreign policy right now,” said Jon Czin, a former director for China at the National Security Council.
The longer the Iran war drags on, Czin argued, the more it minimizes the chance of another economic confrontation — Beijing has also already demonstrated it can retaliate — as it did with tariffs and rare earth export controls — and the administration backed down before.
Both sides are still trying to eke out an edge in the run-up. The Treasury Department recently sanctioned Chinese oil refiners and shipping firms tied to Iranian crude to cut off funding. In an unprecedented move, Beijing invoked a “blocking rule” for the first time, directing Chinese companies not to comply with sanctions on Chinese oil refiners.
Daniel Shapiro, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East, points out the war has reduced the U.S. military posture in the Indo-Pacific with long-term consequences for deterring China and defending Taiwan.
“Trump’s position and leverage at the summit is considerably weaker if he goes to Beijing with the war still unsettled, or even with renewed escalation. And the Iranians know that. So they are whittling down the terms to end the war to something much more modest than what Trump originally envisioned,” Shapiro wrote in a post on X.
What Trump wants
The administration clearly wants Beijing to use its influence over Tehran. Secretary of State Marco Rubio this week urged Beijing to use the Iran’s foreign minister’s visit to China earlier this week to press Tehran on reopening the Strait of Hormuz.
“I hope the Chinese tell him what he needs to be told,” Rubio said when asked about China’s top diplomat meeting with Iran’s foreign minister. “And that is that what you are doing in the strait is causing you to be globally isolated. You’re the bad guy in this.”
Beyond the war in Iran, Trump will be looking for wins on trade and investment: For instance, Chinese commitments to buy Boeing planes and U.S. agricultural goods as well as an extension of the trade truce reached during the last Trump-Xi meeting in South Korea last year, according to experts.
The administration also wants China to continue its pause on rare earth export controls, analysts say. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer has also proposed a “Board of Trade” to manage economic ties between the countries and goods the two sides are trading.
What Beijing wants — and what it doesn’t
Here’s the gap between the administration’s public framing and what analysts who study China most closely are saying: Beijing doesn’t actually plan to deliver much on Iran or get deeply involved.
Beijing’s statement after the meeting with the Iranian Foreign Ministry was carefully worded to not blame Iran for the crisis while also calling for greater efforts to open the Strait of Hormuz.
“The Chinese are not interested in assuming any kind of direct role in the conflict,” according to Patricia Kim, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “They see this as a problem that the United States needs to solve, and they have no interest in intervening on Tehran’s behalf.”
Czin’s read is similar. While Beijing’s meeting with the Iranian foreign minister this week let it “posture as peacemakers,” he says the Chinese don’t want Iran to take up too much summit time. His analog: even on North Korea, right on China’s doorstep, Beijing rarely puts real pressure on Pyongyang.
China’s energy buffer is part of why the urgency is lower than the Trump administration assumes. Beijing has built strategic oil reserves, invested heavily in green energy, and can shift to domestically produced coal. The bigger risk for China isn’t the energy crunch itself.
“The bigger issue for China is the secondary and tertiary effects from this conflict,” Czin said — such as a war-driven global slowdown that hits the Southeast Asian and European consumers that Chinese exports depend on.
What Beijing actually wants from the summit is more stability: lock in the trade truce, push back on U.S. export controls on advanced technology and ease restrictions on Chinese investment in the U.S.
What’s unclear is how hard Xi will push Trump on Taiwan. Any small shift in U.S. declaratory language on Taiwan would be significant, though Czin is skeptical Trump would stick with new wording even if he agreed to it.
Bottom line
Expect fanfare, expect deliverables on the margins — purchase commitments or a possible Board of Trade announcement — and don’t expect breakthroughs on the hard issues, experts say.
The summit’s significance is less in what it produces than in what it preserves: a tenuous stability that both leaders, for different reasons, want to keep intact through the rest of the year.
Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Rep. James Comer (R-KY) speaks to reporters as he arrives for a House Republican Conference meeting at the U.S. Capitol on February 03, 2026 in Washington, DC. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — House Oversight Chairman James Comer has set a noon deadline Tuesday for Bill and Hillary Clinton to agree to the GOP’s specific terms for depositions that the Clintons signaled Monday night they generally would comply with, warning that if they do not then Republicans will reconvene to move contempt resolutions toward a full House vote.
“The Oversight Committee is seeking clarification the Clintons accepted the standard deposition terms that they were subpoenaed for: transcribed, filmed depositions in February with no time limit pursuant to the committee’s investigation. The depositions are pursuant to the Committee’s investigative purpose as laid out across its letters and contempt reports,” a person familiar with the matter told ABC News.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, in a news conference Tuesday alongside House GOP leadership, said Comer was “in the middle of a negotiation with the Clintons.”
“They have until noon today to fully comply, otherwise we will move contempt tomorrow against the Clintons,” Scalise reiterated.
Former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton agreed on Monday evening to sit for closed-door depositions in the committee’s Jeffrey Epstein investigation.
“They negotiated in good faith. You did not,” Clinton spokesperson Angel Ureña posted on X. “They told you under oath what they know, but you don’t care. But the former President and former Secretary of State will be there. They look forward to setting a precedent that applies to everyone.”
For months, the Clintons had insisted that the subpoenas were without legal merit. Comer, a Republican, has pushed back, saying the Clintons are not above the law and must comply with a subpoena.
Besides defying the subpoenas to testify before the House committee, neither Bill Clinton nor Hillary Clinton has been accused of wrongdoing and both deny having any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes. No Epstein survivor or associate has ever made a public allegation of wrongdoing or inappropriate behavior by the former president or his wife in connection with his prior relationship with Epstein.
In a letter dated Jan. 31, the Clintons’ legal teams wrote the committee to lay out the parameters of a prospective interview — alongside a request for the committee to withdraw its subpoena and contempt resolution — proposing a four-hour transcribed interview in lieu of a deposition conducted under oath.
The letter states the interview should occur in New York City — open to all committee members — while the scope of questions would be “confined to matters related to the investigations and prosecutions of Jeffrey Epstein.” The president also asked to designate his own transcriber, alongside a court reporter employed by the House.
“This framework is consistent with your priorities as communicated by Committee staff and as identified during the business meeting on January 21st,” the letter, signed by Clinton attorneys Katherine Turner and Ashley Callen, stated. “Pursuant to your request for this comprehensive written proposal, we ask that you respond in kind should there remain any specific area of disagreement to continue this good-faith effort to avoid legal proceedings that will prevent our clients from providing testimony in addition to the sworn statements they already submitted.”
Comer wrote back Monday, citing “serious concerns with the offer,” beginning with the proposed scope restriction — predicting President Clinton “would refuse to answer questions” related to his personal relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
Comer also balked at the proposed four-hour time limit for the interview, and the president’s bid to break blocks of questioning into 30-minute periods — rather than 60-minute periods — that alternate between Republicans and Democrats.
“A hard time-limit provides a witness with the incentive to attempt to run out the clock by giving unnecessarily long answers and meandering off-topic. This is a particular concern where a witness, such as President Clinton, has an established record of being a loquacious individual,” Comer said.
“Limiting President Clinton’s testimony to four hours is insufficient time for the Committee to gain a full understanding of President Clinton’s personal relationship with them, his knowledge of their sex-trafficking ring, and his experience with their efforts to curry favor and exercise influence to protect themselves,” he added of President Clinton’s relationship with Epstein and Maxwell.
Finally, Comer took umbrage with the proposition for a transcribed interview, not a sworn deposition.
“A transcribed interview is voluntary, meaning that the subject may refuse to answer questions absent any assertion of privilege or constitutional right,” Comer noted. “The conditions requested thus would enable President Clinton to refuse to answer whatever questions he wanted for whatever reasons he wanted and leave as the Committee’s only recourse to again subpoena President Clinton’s testimony, effectively restarting this entire process from the beginning.”
As for Hillary Clinton, the lawyers’ letter echoes her sworn declaration, stating she “never held an office with responsibility for, or involvement with, DOJ’s handling of these investigations or prosecutions,” adding “the same is true as a private citizen after leaving office in 2013.”
The lawyers also requested that Comer withdraw the subpoena and resolution of contempt “so that we may continue to work in good faith toward an agreement that meets the Committee’s needs while accounting for the limited information Secretary Clinton can provide.”
In response, Comer emphasized “the necessity” of Hillary Clinton’s in-person testimony juxtaposed against the “unacceptability of simple sworn declarations.”
Comer concluded that the Clintons’ “desire for special treatment is both frustrating and an affront to the American people’s desire for transparency.”
