The Federal Bureau of Investigation is assigning an army of 260 investigative analysts to a “priority” investigation related to the 2020 election in Fulton County, Ga., a reflection of President Trump’s ongoing push to prove his baseless claims that the 2020 election there was rigged.
The effort is outlined in an internal memo obtained by The New York Times and confirmed by a person familiar with the investigation. The memo says that the surge is part of a “priority” effort by Kash Patel, the director of the F.B.I. The analysts will work to complete “approximately 708 records checks,” according to the memo. The type of records being checked is unknown.
The deployment of such a large number of F.B.I. personnel to the most populous county in Georgia comes amid the Justice Department’s ongoing criminal investigation into the 2020 election in the state. In January, the F.B.I. raided an election warehouse in Fulton, seizing more than 600 boxes of election materials — including original ballots from the 2020 election.
But an unsealed affidavit that was used to obtain the search warrant for that raid relied heavily on debunked claims about ballot anomalies in 2020. Those claims have been revived inside the White House by Kurt Olsen, an election denier who works in the Trump administration and who set off the current investigation, according to the affidavit.
Few presidential contests in modern American history have been as thoroughly investigated as the 2020 election. Over more than five years, every conspiracy theory from Mr. Trump and his allies — including false claims about election workers, mail ballots and election machines — has been investigated and debunked by election officials from both political parties and, in many cases, by members of Congress, judges and law enforcement.
That hasn’t stopped Mr. Trump or his allies from continuing to try to prove their many baseless claims. In the process, they have sowed doubt and distrust in American elections, and called for the passage of federal election legislation known as the SAVE America Act, which voting rights advocates say would make it harder for many Americans to vote.
A spokesperson for the F.B.I. and officials in Fulton County did not respond to requests for comment.
The surge drew criticism from local and federal officeholders.
Robb Pitts, chairman of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, said he could not imagine what the F.B.I. might be up to.
“I have no clue, nor have I been notified of any of this,” Mr. Pitts said. “They’ve had these documents since the night of Jan. 28. And presumably they haven’t just been sitting in a closet someplace. So I have to assume they’ve been looked at.”
Mr. Pitts described the F.B.I.’s move as a “Hail Mary” to keep a sham investigation alive, though he did not know what was being sought.
Senator Mark Warner, the top Democratic member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, criticized the surge.
“If these reports are accurate, they raise serious questions about whether the F.B.I. is diverting extraordinary resources to pursue claims about the 2020 election that have already been repeatedly examined and rejected by courts, election officials, and bipartisan investigations,” Mr. Warner said in a statement. “Politicizing federal law enforcement in service of relitigating a settled election risks eroding public trust and casting a shadow over the integrity of the 2026 elections before a single vote is cast.”
And Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state in Georgia, issued a statement saying that elections there are secure.
“Georgia runs the most secure elections in the nation, and our office stands ready to assist law enforcement in any investigation that will reassure Georgians that their votes are cast securely and counted accurately,” he said.
The memo, first reported by MSNOW, carried an urgent tone, indicating the investigation’s importance to the administration, and noted that “overtime (including weekends and holidays) has been authorized,” and that “all records checks need to be completed” by July 17.
The memo also said that the F.B.I. field office in Atlanta would “provide training” for the operation. Those being assigned to the case are investigative analysts, who are experts in record checks and not special agents.
A former senior F.B.I. official could not recall an investigative surge of this magnitude occurring previously outside of a sustained command post around an event like an election or inauguration or a major violent episode, such as a terrorist attack.
In typical federal cases, surges would demand about five to ten analysts, the former official said, adding that even mass shootings generally would not demand as large a deployment of resources as this.
The surge comes after months of inactivity in the investigation, at least publicly. No criminal charges resulted from the raid, and the F.B.I. has offered no public update about the investigation. A state judge in February issued terse rulings that made clear his frustration with the seizure in January.
“We are left to hope that the bureau and the Department of Justice handle the ballots and related records with the care required to preserve and protect their integrity,” Judge Robert C.I. McBurney of the Superior Court of Fulton County wrote in a ruling.
In May, the Justice Department demanded the identities of every worker who staffed the 2020 election in Fulton, according to court records. The county quickly filed a motion to quash those demands. The judge in the case agreed to block the request temporarily, while litigation continues.
