caught on tape. technicians from the data services firm sullivan strickler were let into the elections office by kathy latham, who at the time was the chairwoman of the republican party in coffee county and who a couple weeks earlier had served as one of the 16 fake electors in georgia. reporter: latham initially denied the election equipment had been accessed, until security footage proved otherwise. and evidence now shows latham communicated directly with the then elections supervisor in coffee county about getting access to the office. you see on the surveillance video they spend hours inside this restricted room in the elections office. reporter: they being scott hall and paul maggio. hall is an atlanta-area bail bondsman who served as a poll watcher and is an ardent trump supporter. maggio works for sullivan strickler, the data firm hired to gain access to the records. in a statement to cnn sullivan strickler said the firm was
presidential election of 2024. did voters deserve an answer to this question before donald trump became, you know, announced candidate again? i don t think there is any question about that. i mean, so from a national perspective, no question about it. from a local perspective here, no question about it. do you see any risk in moving forward with indictment of the former president? are we setting any kind of a dangerous precedent? i think we re setting a dangerous precedent if we don t move forward. if we don t hold him accountable, the risk is much more significant. you saw former president trump lie to the american people. you saw him gin up this outrage. is it a remedy if he is charged with a crime in georgia? if they indict him and they can t convict him, it will be an exoneration. is that better or is that worse? i don t know. what message does it send if they don t, though, if you don t bring charges against someone
playing host to rudy giuliani and many of these election deniers related to the trump campaign. god bless you ottoo. never give up. we love you, rudy. distinguished members of the committee, thank you very much for giving us this hearing. i represent president trump along with jenna ellis. reporter: rudy giuliani wasn t the only surprise appearance. the news media were not the usual characters. people like the epic times, newsmax, oan, all of these various news outlets that had a very particular view in terms of how they were covering the election post-november. and it was incredibly troubling. do you remember having any other kind of committee proceeding where all of a sudden news mix and oan were there? no. i mean, why are you flying down from d.c. on december 3rd to the georgia state capitol for some nothing subcommittee hearing?
breaking news in to cnn this hour, prosecutors in georgia have opened a criminal investigation. investigation into former president trump. why? because of his january phone call to the georgia secretary of state. focus on the former president s attempts to influence the administration of the 2020 georgia general election. donald trump got beat by joe biden. handily. there s no way we lost georgia. that was a rigged election. he went on a warpath like a scolded child to do anything he possibly could to overturn that election. they defrauded us out of a win in georgia. and we re not going to forget it. i underestimated his willingness to push the envelope as far as he did, to just boldfaced lie again and again and again. three months after the election the district attorney in fulton county, georgia, fani willis, officially opened an investigation into former president donald trump s efforts to overturn the state s
vile, you know, personal kind of stuff. state patrol and heightened security and bomb-sniffing dogs. there was a website that formed that put a picture of my house and my address and my name and my kids names. you should go to jail, you are judas, you re a traitor, you ve committed treason. reporter: the december 3rd hearing would bring even more chaos to the state in the aftermath of the election when a then little-known attorney app appeared. what do you remember about john eastman s presentation that day? i thought it was ridiculous. these significant statutory violations are in my view more than enough he saw it as the duty of the legislature to step in and basically throw out the will of georgia voters and for the legislature to convene a special session and appoint their own republican alternate electors. i don t think it s just your authority to do that but quite frankly i think you have a duty to do that, to protect the integrity of the election here in georg