2020 election denial is on the ballot in Georgia this year. These are the candidates.
Out of Georgia’s eight Republican congressional representatives, six voted against certifying the 2020 election.
Other candidates in Georgia races also question the validity of the election and some had even called for an election do-over.
Other federal and statewide officials, such as Republican Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, have actively pushed back against false allegations by former President Donald Trump that there was widespread fraud in Georgia.
One congressman who voted against certifying the election in 2020, Jody Hice, ran against Raffensperger in the Republican primary, but lost with just 33% of the vote.
The Paste BN Network contacted the campaigns of the Republican candidates for Senate, governor and lieutenant governor, as well as 12 of the 14 GOP congressional candidates, to ask the candidates' official position on the results of the 2020 election. None of them responded.
The remaining two Republican candidates for Congress — Reps. Drew Ferguson and Austin Scott — are incumbents who voted to uphold the results of the 2020 election.
Six current Republican congressional representatives also signed onto a friend-of-the-court, or amicus, brief in Texas v. Pennsylvania, a filing in the Supreme Court by the Texas Attorney General to stop four states, including Georgia, from casting electoral college votes for Joe Biden. Georgia's attorney general opposed the lawsuit in court.
Two incumbent congressional representatives won their election in 2020 and were not in office when the brief was filed.
Here are candidates who have supported the false narrative that the 2020 election was fraudulent and who have not yet clarified or retracted their statements.
Herschel Walker, candidate for U.S. Senate
Bio: 60 years old, former college and professional football player, associated with various businesses.
Walker was a legendary running back for the University of Georgia, winning the Heisman Trophy and helping lead the Dawgs to a national championship. He is challenging incumbent Democratic senator Raphael Warnock.
Actions: Prior to announcing his Senate run, Walker cast doubt on the results of the 2020 election.
A CNN fact check at the time of his announcement listed multiple public occasions when he questioned the results of the 2020 election, including on FOX news and in multiple Tweets.
"Instead of us fighting and going to court, why don’t we have Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin vote again? We can have it done within a week, and maintain our democracy," he Tweeted on Nov. 6, 2020, days after the election.
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On Jan. 4, 2021 he tweeted support for baseless conspiracy theories from attorney Lin Wood that there was "Country wide election fraud."
He also mentioned conspiracy theories about votes being altered.
Since becoming a candidate, Walker has largely avoided the question of voter fraud, instead focusing on praising Georgia's new voting law and asking people to turn out to vote.
In April of 2022, Walker was asked about whether he thought there were issues with the 2020 vote in Georgia during a radio interview with WDUN.
"I don't know if there were problems with the 2020 election, what I do know is that right now I'm going to win this seat," he said. "Everyone has complained, even Stacey Abrams complained that her race wasn't fair, and I've heard a lot of people saying a lot of things. One thing I've got to worry about right now, that I'm going to have a fair election, that people can believe in the election when I run."
In an interview on FOX 5 Atlanta in May, Walker also questioned whether Trump ever claimed the election was stolen, before re-iterating some of the same points.
"I think reporters say that, I don't know whether President Trump has ever said that, he never said that to me," Walker said. "I think something happened, I don't know what it was, but I said something happened so people are angry."
Editor's note: On Oct. 14 during the only Senate debate in Georgia and after this story published, Walker gave an unequivocal answer on the results of the 2020 election. “President Biden won, and Sen. Warnock won, that’s the reason I decided to run,” he said.
U.S. Rep. Andrew Clyde
Bio: 58 years old, retired Naval officer and owner of a gun store in Athens, Georgia.
Clyde is the incumbent congressional representative for Georgia’s 9th Congressional District and won the Republican primary in the spring to run for the seat again.
Actions: In January 2021, Clyde objected to certifying the 2020 presidential election results in Arizona and Pennsylvania.
In March 2021, Clyde was one of 12 members of the House to vote against awarding congressional gold medals to the United States Capitol Police for their actions during the insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021. In June, one of the officers who was beaten unconscious said that Clyde refused to shake his hand.
Clyde, who objected to creating a panel to investigate the Capitol riot, said during a House Oversight Committee hearing that Jan. 6 was not an insurrection and for the most part was "similar to a normal tour visit."
In a recent email to constituents, Clyde wrote that in a recent hearing he raised concerns about some of the changes that had been made before the 2020 election due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
And in November 2020, Clyde signed onto a letter saying he was “deeply concerned by continued, serious allegations of voting irregularities in our state."
U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene
Bio: 48, worked at a family construction company and later founded a CrossFit gym.
Greene is the incumbent congressional representative for Georgia’s 14th District and won her primary to run as the Republican candidate again with 69.5% of the vote.
Actions: Greene repeatedly tweeted that the 2020 election was fraudulent.
On Dec. 14, 2020 she tweeted a statement that without fraud, “President Trump wins our state in a landslide,” naming a number of unproven acts of election fraud in Georgia.
On her campaign website, Greene lists “Expose the Stolen Election” as one of her policy issues, writing “Marjorie led the objection to the stolen 2020 election, and Joe Biden's fraudulent electoral college votes on the House floor.”
Greene is a staple of media political coverage for her willingness to state outlandish, often unsubstantiated, views.
More: Democrats strip Georgia U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of committee assignments
Dr. Rich McCormick, candidate for House
Bio: McCormick, a Marine veteran and emergency room physician, is the Republican nominee for the 6th Congressional District.
Actions: He has repeatedly questioned the use of absentee ballot drop boxes in the 2020 election.
According to Georgia Public Broadcasting, McCormick claims his race in 2020, when he lost to Democrat Carolyn Bourdeaux in the 7th Congressional District, was rigged.
"No one was hurt by voter fraud more than myself," he said during a Republican primary debate this spring. "At the end of the night, at the end of the election in 2020, I was told I won the election, that we were 5,000 votes up. And then we were eventually told we lost the election."
In May, he retweeted election denier Dinesh D’Souza, a documentary filmmaker, and said his campaign had sought to obtain video from cameras around ballot drop boxes.
“We were told it would cost $15,000 and take 3 weeks. Wouldn’t be available until after the election was certified,” he tweeted.
He also tweeted support of D’Souza’s film "2,000 Mules," which claimed voter fraud in Georgia and alleged his primary opponent supported methods of voting that would allow for more supposed fraud.
Mike Collins, candidate for House
Bio: Collins is the owner of a trucking company and is the Republican nominee for the 10th District of Georgia. He is running to replace Rep. Jody Hice, who declined to run again for Congress and instead launched a failed Trump-endorsed primary challenge for the Georgia secretary of state's post, held by Raffensperger. Hice ran his race based on election denial, and now Collins is trying to replace Hice with some of the same messaging.
Actions: On his campaign website, Collins lists election integrity as a key policy goal. "The voting irregularities in Georgia and around the country last year underscore the need for common sense reforms," he noted.
On Twitter, Collins has repeatedly alleged fraud in the 2020 election, including in a video from February where he called on more Republicans to work as poll monitors.
"As Republicans...we trust the process, and unfortunately 2020 taught us you can't always do that. You need to be there to help observe," he said.
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On April 1, he tweeted, "Anyone who thinks there was no fraud or irregularities in the 2020 election is the April Fool."
And in March, when it was announced that a state investigation into possible election fraud had been granted subpoena power. Collins tweeted a link to the story along with "It’s past time we EXPOSE the FRAUD from the 2020 election in Georgia!"
State Sen. Burt Jones, candidate for lieutenant governor
Bio: Burt Jones, 43, founded an insurance agency. He is a Georgia state senator for the 25th District and the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor in Georgia.
Actions: Jones spearheaded efforts to cast doubt on the results of the 2020 election long after President Joe Biden was sworn in.
In January, after Raffensperger announced an investigation into the use of drop boxes in Georgia in 2020, Jones tweeted: “To restore confidence in our elections, we must get to the bottom of what happened in 2020 in Georgia.”
Jones called for both an investigation into the 2020 election and a special legislative session to overturn the results of the election. He was also one of the fake electors that tried to reverse the state's electoral results. He was stripped of a chair position within the Georgia Senate in part due to his efforts to overturn the election.
At an “election integrity” town hall in summer of 2021, Jones boasted about being stripped of his chairmanship, according to reporting in the Atlanta-Journal Constitution.
“We’re still talking because the people are on our side,” he reportedly said.
Jones is also wrapped up in the Fulton County District Attorney's investigation into whether Trump attempted to overthrow the election results in Georgia. A judge has disqualified the district attorney, Fani Willis, from targeting Jones in a grand jury investigation, but can still gather evidence about Jones and his involvement in the election results. Jones
U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk
Bio: Loudermilk was elected to Congress in 2014. He was a small business owner, Georgia state senator and served in the Air Force.
Action: Loudermilk questioned the results of the 2020 election before the U.S. Senate runoff on Jan. 5, 2021; signed on to the Texas v. Pennsylvania amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to stop Georgia and three other states from casting their electoral college ballots for Joe Biden; and voted against certifying the election.
In later November 2020, Loudermilk interviewed with the hard-right news organizations Newsmax, calling for an investigation into Georgia's election.
"Yes, I believe there was fraud in this election," Loudermilk said. "People say, 'Give us the evidence.' Well, you have to investigate to get to the evidence."
On Dec. 2, 2020, Loudermilk tweeted encouraging Georgians to vote in the runoff for the U.S. Senate race.
"As we fight to expose the corruption and malfeasance that took place in this election, it is imperative that every single Georgian who believes in freedom and opposes the radical policies of the Dems make our voices heard," he tweeted, following up with a Tweet saying "All eyes will be on this election, and we will not allow the same tactics we saw in November."
For his 2022 run, Loudermilk does not list election administration or any similar topics on his campaign website issue's page. He has also not tweeted about the 2020 election results on his personal Twitter since the 2021 runoff.
Loudermilk also received scrutiny from the January 6th select committee for leading a tour on Jan. 5, 2021 that included people who entered the Capitol the next day, although the Capitol Police found nothing suspicious in the visit.
U.S. Rep. Rick Allen
Bio: Allen founded a construction company before being elected to Congress in 2014.
Action: Allen voted against certifying the election and signed on to the Texas v. Pennsylvania amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to stop Georgia and three other states from casting their electoral college ballots for Joe Biden.
"We want to bring integrity back to our elections," Allen said during an interview with Newsmax about Georgia's new election law in March 2021. "Some of our voters began to believe that their vote didn't count, that their vote was cancelled, and we don't want that in Georgia."
Allen has been relatively quiet on the election results, although he has asked for investigations into the 2020 election.
In November 2020, he signed a letter along with 38 colleagues to ask the U.S. attorney general to use Department of Justice resources "to ensure the integrity of the 2020 election. If the DOJ has launched any investigative activity into election fraud, it has not been made public," he tweeted. "The American people deserve transparency and confidence in our election process."