The atmosphere has grown so contentious, Raffensperger said, that both he and his wife, Tricia, have received death threats in recent days, including a text to him that read, “You better not botch this recount. Your life depends on it.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/brad-raffensperger-georgia-vote/2020/11/16/6b6cb2f4-283e-11eb-8fa2-06e7cbb145c0_story.html?tid=ss_tw

“Other than getting you angry, it’s also very disillusioning, particularly when it comes from people on my side of the aisle. Everyone that is working on this needs to elevate their speech. We need to be thoughtful and careful about what we say.”

The normally mild-mannered Raffensperger saved his harshest language for U.S. Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.), who is leading the president’s effort to prove fraud in Georgia and whom Raffensperger called a “liar” and a “charlatan.”

The recount, Raffensperger said, will “affirm” results of the initial count. He said the hand-counted audit will also prove the accuracy of the Dominion machines; some counties have already reported that their hand recounts exactly match the machine tallies previously reported.

“I’m an engineer. We look at numbers. We look at hard data,” he said. “I can’t help it that a failed candidate like Doug Collins is running around lying to everyone. He’s a liar.”

Lindsey Graham questioned Raffensperger about the state’s signature-matching law and whether Raffensperger had the power to toss all mail ballots in counties found to have higher rates of nonmatching signatures, Raffensperger said.

Raffspenger was stunned Graham appeared to suggest he find a way to toss legally cast ballots. Absent court intervention, Raffensperger doesn’t have power to do what Graham asked as counties administer elections. “It sure looked like he was wanting to go down that road,” he said.

On the day Graham asked Raffensperger about throwing out mail ballots in counties with high rates of signature problems, a lawsuit was filed in federal court in GA challenging the way county election officials check signatures & allow voters a chance to fix ballots with errors.

Also that day, Trump tweeted: “Georgia Secretary of State, a so-called Republican (RINO), won’t let the people checking the ballots see the signatures for fraud. Why? Without this the whole process is very unfair and close to meaningless. Everyone knows that we won the state.”