Jason Szep and Linda So

(Reuters) – A member of Donald Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign arranged and participated in a meeting at which a Georgia election worker says she was pressed by a Chicago publicist to falsely admit voting fraud.

The revelation directly ties a senior figure in the former president’s political operation to an extraordinary late-night Jan. 4 meeting in which a $16-an-hour election worker faced pressure to implicate herself in a baseless conspiracy theory, stoked by Trump himself, as he sought to overturn his Georgia election loss.

Harrison Floyd, the executive director for a National Campaign Coalition called Black Voices for Trump (2020), told Reuters that he requested Trevian Kuti from Chicago to travel to Atlanta and speak to Ruby Freeman, 62. Floyd said he then participated by phone in a meeting Kutti held with Freeman at a police station in Georgia’s Cobb County.

Kutti was joined at the meeting in person by Garrison Douglas (a Trump campaign leader from Georgia who led Black Voices for Trump in Georgia during his campaign) and he now serves as the Republican Party’s spokesperson. Douglas told Reuters that he attended the meeting. Floyd stated that Douglas and Kutti were recruited by Floyd because Floyd couldn’t attend.

Douglas made the following statement Monday to Reuters: “On January 4, I was unemployed, and I received a request to be a volunteer driver. I have done this many times before.” Beyond the driving task, I was not involved in this meeting.

In a phone interview Monday, Floyd said he was asked if he’d be willing to set up the meeting by a man he described as a chaplain with “connections” in federal law enforcement. The name of the clergyman was not given. He also declined to give details about those connections. Floyd claimed that the chaplain (who is white) wanted him approach Freeman, a Black man, in order to make an immunity agreement for her. He said this because she was afraid of being manipulated by a stranger. Kutti, Floyd and Douglas are all Black.

Floyd stated that he was out of the Trump campaign’s role before Jan. 4. Trump himself “never asked me to go” to Georgia, he said, and board members of the Black Voices for Trump group “had no involvement in this.”

Floyd stated that he planned the meeting with Freeman in order to aid him. Floyd said that he believed her to be seeking help, and immunity from prosecution for claims by the Trump camp she has committed voter fraud.

Freeman said that, though she spoke for herself, she has never sought immunity from anyone. Von DuBose is her attorney. He declined to provide further information.

Former Justice Department officials in Georgia have confirmed that in December 2020, federal investigators and the state concluded there was no proof that Freeman had committed fraud. As a result, the department never considered offering her immunity, said the official, who had direct knowledge of a Federal Bureau of Investigation inquiry into Trump’s Georgia election-fraud claims.

Floyd declined to answer the question of whether Freeman sought immunity during the meeting. He said Freeman wasn’t willing to “put anything down on paper,” so he had nothing to “run up the flagpole,” referring to his more senior contacts in Trump’s political operation.

Asked if he told Freeman that he was a Trump campaign official, Floyd said: “I’m pretty certain that I made it clear.” He referred to a comment by Kutti, captured on police bodycam video, telling Freeman that “federal people” were involved in offering her help.

“Who was the current president at that time? President Trump,” said Floyd. “If she’s there saying, I’m here to connect you with federal people, well, that’s people in the Trump administration.”

Freeman said in a previous interview to Reuters she didn’t know Kutti was a Trump fan until the meeting at the police stations. Freeman then researched Kutti online.

Robert Barker (Kutti’s lawyer) did not reply to inquiries for comment. Kutti posted an Instagram message last Monday in which she denied that she pressured Freeman into admitting fraud.

Trump’s spokesperson did not reply to our requests for comment. Douglas’ current employer, the Republican National Committee did not respond.

Freeman and Trump campaign officials were present at the meeting. This highlights the unconventional actions taken by former President Trump to reverse Trump’s defeat in the once-reliable Republican state.

Beginning on Dec. 3 last year, Trump and his allies falsely claimed that video of vote-counting at Atlanta’s State Farm Arena proved that Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, another Fulton County election worker, committed election fraud. The mother and her daughter allegedly illegally tabulated ballots out of a suitcase several times in order to generate 18,000 false votes, enough to make Trump lose the Georgia election. The allegation was swiftly disproven by state and county officials. Trump supporters threatened Freeman’s life and harassed her daughter for months over the false accusations.

The district attorney in Fulton County, where Freeman worked on the ballot count, is conducting a criminal investigation into Trump’s alleged interference in Georgia’s election. The district attorney, Fani Willis, has said the probe would examine a now-famous call in which Trump pressed Georgia officials to “find” him enough votes to overturn his loss in the state. On the call, Trump singled out Freeman by name 18 times, calling her a “professional vote scammer,” a “hustler” and a “known political operative” who “stuffed the ballot boxes.”

Two days earlier, Floyd had called Douglas and Kutti to come visit Freeman.

BLACK VOICES OF TRUMP

Floyd and Douglas are part of a very small, but vocal base of Black support for Trump. Kutti was a publicist for the music industry, and managed the campaign to elect a Georgia Republican candidate for the U.S. House.

Floyd launched a bid for Georgia’s 7th District congressional seat in May 2019 but dropped out less than a month later. In July 2018, Floyd joined Black Voices of Trump to become the executive director. He claims that he held this position until November 15, 2020.

Trump campaign records reveal that Black Voices for Trump was an officially part of the campaign. This is similar to other groups targeting specific voters like Latinos for Trump or Evangelicals for Trump. The group’s archived website said the site was “Paid for by Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.”

Floyd told Reuters that he had an office in the same building as the core campaign in Virginia, where he said he worked on the same floor as the most senior staffers of Trump’s political operation.

Trump applauded Floyd as he spoke before the crowd during a rally at Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta, November 2019. “We’re delighted to be joined by Harrison Floyd of our Black Voices coalition,” the president said. “Where’s Harrison? Where’s Harrison?”

Since April of this year, Floyd has worked as a managing partner at Commonwealth Holdings International, a Washington-based investment firm that specializes in helping clients invest in cryptocurrencies, according to the firm’s webpage and Floyd’s LinkedIn page.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Floyd was in the U.S. Marine Corps almost 11 years, ending in 2014. He worked as a fighter instructor and a planner for information operations.

As a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee (RNC), the party’s national organizing body, Douglas regularly posts blog items on the RNC website. He has used that platform to applaud a Republican-backed election law in Georgia that the Justice Department says is “discriminatory” against Black voters. Douglas countered in an RNC blog post that the law, passed this year, “makes it easier to vote and harder to cheat.”

Douglas, according to a Reuters examination of the posts he made on social media between November and August last year, was actively involved in Georgia for Black Voices for Trump during the 2020 campaign. At an event on Aug. 1, 2020, promoted by the Fayette County Republican Party, Douglas introduced himself as the “regional engagement coordinator for Trump victory” and said he was helping to lead Black Voices for Trump in Georgia.

Kutti, a Chicago publicist, has said her clients have included rap star Kanye West; a West spokesperson says Kutti wasn’t associated with the rapper at the time of the Freeman meeting.

Kutti, as her social media histories show, was a supporter for Black Voices for Trump. On Dec. 5, 2020, more than a month after Election Day, she posted a photo on Instagram showing her holding a “Black Voices for Trump” sign at a Trump rally in Valdosta, Georgia. Trump showed snippets from the State Farm Arena surveillance footage of Freeman, her daughter and herself on a large screen at that rally. The footage, he said, revealed a “crime” committed by “Democrat workers.”

TIME RUNNING OUT BEFORE JAN.

The mission for which Floyd recruited Kutti and Douglas came on Jan. 4 – at the height of Trump’s efforts to overturn the November election, and two days before the U.S. Capitol riots on Jan. 6, the day that Congress met to certify Democrat Joe Biden’s election victory.

Floyd spoke out about the feverish atmosphere created by allegations surrounding Freeman’s December arrest in Reuters interview. Trump’s lawyers continued to make false allegations that the election was stolen at the time.

Floyd said he received calls from “across the country” from people saying they could arrange immunity for Freeman if she were to confess to election fraud. “Some of those phone calls that I mentioned were from lawyers and attorneys who were saying, ‘Is this true? Does she really want immunity?’” He declined to identify those attorneys.

Asked how he knew Freeman wanted immunity, Floyd cited “a lot of chatter and discussion on the internet … People were saying, ‘We’re hearing that this is what she wanted,’” he said. “But no one could confirm anything.”

Floyd talked to Freeman over speakerphone late Jan. 4 at the precinct. He said that he felt there was no time left for a deal as the election would be certified soon on Jan. 6. “If Ms. Freeman wanted to get a message to the president and wanted immunity,” Floyd said, “that’s really important to get to the right people before an election is certified.”

Floyd claimed that he approached Douglas and Kutti to reach Freeman.

“I had spoken to some people that I knew and made arrangements for and secured a place where Ms. Freeman could go,” he said, “a place where no one would know that she was there, and no one would harass her there.”

‘WERE THOSE HONEST BALLOTS?’

Kutti showed up uninvited at Freeman’s door at about 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 4, police records show.

As Reuters reported earlier this month, Freeman told police that during that night’s encounter, Kutti tried to get her to falsely implicate herself in voting fraud. A Cobb County Police report identified Kutti as an “alleged Trump supporter who attempted to get Ms. Freeman to make false claims about the ballot counting.”

Freeman, who’d been subjected to threats, was wary of strangers but wanted to hear out Kutti, so she asked the police to send an officer to watch over them.

According to the police report, Kutti told the responding officer that she had been sent by a “high-profile individual” and that Freeman was in unspecified danger, “due to the election.” Kutti told the officer that Freeman had just 48 hours to “get ahead of the issue” before unknown people were going to show up at her home.

An officer recommended that they meet at the station.

Police bodycam footage shows that Douglas was seated with Kutti, Freeman, and the women spoke in the corner. Kutti switched Floyd’s speakerphone on after just a few moments.

Freeman initially told Reuters she thought Floyd’s name was “Harrison Ford.” The news organization later determined that Kutti had introduced the man on the speakerphone as Harrison “Floyd.” That conclusion was backed by an analysis by an outside forensic expert, Focal Forensics, of that portion of their conversation, which was captured on a police officer’s body camera. Floyd was reassured by Reuters after the news agency presented it to him.

As the meeting began, the footage shows, Kutti told Freeman: “You are a loose end for a party that needs to tidy up.”

Floyd called in via speakerphone and continued the conversation for an additional hour. Large portions of the bodycam audio are not clearly audible, because the officer stepped further away from the conversation at Kutti’s request.

However, you can hear some of the details. Floyd asked Freeman what she had seen in the ballot boxes that were used on election night. He asked her if she needed “to know what was already on those ballots inside those ballot boxes?”

Freeman responded: “No, we don’t look at them. I couldn’t tell you who had the most, who had the least.”

“So let me ask you this,” Floyd said. “Were those honest ballots?”

Freeman responded: “Yeah,” and then went into a detailed explanation of the process for handling and counting the ballots. She said the ballots are in sealed envelopes, so it’s impossible to know which candidate was picked by the voter. “Democrat or Republican,” she said, “you don’t know that.”

‘MY NAME NEEDS TO BE CLEARED’

Floyd stated Monday that the meeting was organized in order to assist Freeman with an immunity agreement. Freeman can be heard saying that she requires a lawyer but not for an immunity deal.

Freeman stated that Fulton County officials publicly cleared her from any fraud. However, she was concerned about another false accusation she made that she did something wrong with the USB drives she used for vote-counting.

Trump’s lawyer, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, had publicly accused Freeman and her daughter of manipulating vote totals while passing USB drives between them, “as if they’re vials of heroin and cocaine” – again, falsely asserting the State Farm Arena video showed a crime.

Kutti & Floyd heard Freeman tell Floyd the USB accusations had been spread on YouTube.

“That’s why I want an attorney,” Freeman said, “because I know my name needs to be cleared.”

Floyd claimed that he had spoken to Freeman one more time, but he refused to give details. The pursuit ended there.

In hindsight, Floyd said, “that initial approach in the police station could have and should have been done better.”