ATLANTA (AP) — A federal appeals court agreed Sunday to temporarily suspend a lower court order requiring U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham to testify before a special grand jury, which is investigating possible illegal efforts to reverse the 2020 election defeat for then-President Donald Trump in Georgia.
The Republican senator from South Carolina had received a subpoena directing him to testify before the special grand jury on Tuesday.
Federal Judge Leigh Martin May denied Graham’s request to dismiss his subpoena last Monday, and on Friday rejected his attempt to get her to stay her decision on what he appealed. So Graham’s attorneys turned to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.
On Sunday, a three-judge panel of that appeals court ordered a temporary stay of May’s verdict of refusing to vacate the subpoena. The panel sent the case back to May to decide whether the subpoena should be partially vacated or modified due to protections the US Constitution provides for members of Congress.
Once May makes a decision on that issue, the case will return to the appeals court for further review, according to the appeals court order.
Graham’s representatives did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment Sunday. A spokesman for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis declined to comment.
Willis opened the investigation early last year, following a phone conversation Trump had with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Jan. 2, 2021. During that conversation, Trump hinted that Raffensperger might “find” the votes. necessary to reverse his defeat by a narrow margin in the entity.
Willis and his team have said they want to ask Graham regarding two phone calls they say he made to Raffensperger and members of his staff shortly following the 2020 general election. During those calls, Graham asked regarding “reexamining certain ballots in the entity issued in absentia in order to explore the possibility of a more favorable outcome for former President Donald Trump,” Willis wrote in a request for the senator to testify.
Graham also “referenced allegations of widespread voter fraud during the November 2020 election in Georgia, similar to public statements by some close to the Trump campaign,” it added.
Republican and Democratic state election officials across the United States, courts and even Trump Attorney General William Barr said there was not enough evidence of voter fraud to affect the outcome of the election.
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Associated Press writer Meg Kinnard contributed to this report from Columbia, South Carolina.
