ATLANTA — Georgia's top election official is testifying on Tuesday before the Jan. 6 Committee in Washington, where he will recount the events of the 2020 election and the campaign to overturn President Joe Biden's victory in the Peach State.
Brad Raffensperger is Georgia's secretary of state, a position that puts him in charge of the state's elections.
In 2020, he found himself in the middle of accusations that Georgia's election results in favor of Biden were fraudulently manipulated, and Raffensperger spent much of November and December that year defending the integrity of the election results.
Perhaps the most infamous episode he got swept up in came just days before Jan. 6, when former President Donald Trump pressed him in a phone call to "find" the votes that would flip Georgia's election result.
Here's a little background on the Georgia secretary of state:
Who is Brad Raffensperger?
Brad Raffensperger was first elected Georgia's secretary of state in 2018, in a tight race that went to a runoff. The Republican ultimately defeated Democrat John Barrow with about 52% of the vote.
The secretary is currently running for re-election this year, holding off a primary bid from Georgia Congressman Jody Hice, a deeply conservative Trump ally who pushed fraud narratives in 2020, to earn the Republican party nomination.
Before running for secretary of state, Raffensperger served two terms in the Georgia House of Representatives, serving the 50th House District.
According to his biography on the Secretary of State's Office website, before entering office Raffensperger built a career in engineering and contracting. He is a licensed engineer in more than 30 states.
He is the CEO and owner of Tendon Systems, LLC, described as a specialty firm with roughly 150 employees. Raffensperger also owns a specialty steel manufacturing plant in Forsyth County, according to the bio.
He is an alumnus of Western University with a degree in civil engineering and got an MBA from Georgia State and has been married to his wife, Tricia, for more than 40 years.
