Fact-check: hidden suitcases of ballots in Fulton County Georgia
disproven
Claim: In Fulton Count (Georgia), hidden suitcases full of ballots were pulled out and counted, after observers were asked to leave.
Rebuttal: These are normal ballot bins. They were not hidden, they had been placed there less than an hour before.
Verdict: disproven, thoroughly and conclusively disproven, of the many disproven Trumpist claims, this is one of the most disproven
The basis for this claim comes from surveillance videos from State Farm Arena, whose offices were where rented by Fulton County for counting ballots during the 2020 election. Fulton County is most populous county in Georgia, with over a million people. The surveillance videos are widely available for anybody to see what happened. Some claim they saw suitcases containing ballots pulled out from hidden locations.
An example is this picture, where the man in the red shirt pulls that box out from underneath the table.
First, these are not “suitcases”. These are instead official “ballot bins”. These bins have handles. The following is a closeup picture of a ballot bin, where you can see the protruding handle facing the camera:
You can see the same ballot bins around the area, some are underneath desks (out of the walkways), some are in the walkways.
There are two teams at work, the “cutters” who open the mail-in envelopes to access the ballots, then the teams that scan the ballots. They use the ballot bins to transfer ballots from one team to the other. Around 10pm, the cutters were done for the night, and packed up all the (now open) ballots, sticking some underneath or in front of that table. Counting would continue for several more hours.
The CBS “60 Minutes” program (h/t) has a detailed walkthrough of the entire process, showing the ballots being put under that table, then pulled out again, but reviewing many hours of surveillance footage from different angles. At the timestamp 2:55 into the video, they show the ballot bins being sealed and placed under the table.
Many, many fact-checkers have covered this, such as LeadStories, CNN, FactCheck.org, and PolitiFact.org. It’s one of the most fact-checked and debunked issue. It’s been thoroughly investigated by Georgia state election officials, who are predominately Republicans.