(This Feb. 21 story has been refiled to add dropped word ‘recommended’ in paragraph 2)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The foreperson of a Georgia grand jury that investigated former U.S. President Donald Trump's attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in the state told media on Tuesday that the panel recommended multiple criminal indictments.
The foreperson of the recently concluded Fulton County, Georgia, special grand jury, Emily Kohrs, did not discuss specific charges that the grand jury recommended in interviews with outlets including CNN and the New York Times.
"There may be some names on that list that you wouldn't expect. But the big name that everyone keeps asking me about – I don't think you will be shocked," Kohrs told CNN.
Reuters was not immediately able to reach Kohrs.
A Georgia judge last week ordered the release of some excerpts of the special grand jury's final report, which concluded that some witnesses may have lied under oath and delivered recommendations to prosecutors on possible indictments for election interference, the document showed.
The special grand jury did not have the authority to issue indictments. To do that, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis would need to seek a regular grand jury's approval.
Willis opened the special grand jury investigation shortly after Trump's January 2021 phone call to a state official asking him to "find" more votes to overturn Democratic President Joe Biden's election victory.
Trump continues to assert falsely that the 2020 election was stolen from him through widespread voting fraud. He has denied wrongdoing and accused Willis, an elected Democrat, of targeting him for political reasons.
Trump called Georgia's top election official, Brad Raffensperger on Jan. 2, 2021, and claimed falsely that the election results were fraudulent. A recording of the call was leaked.
"I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state," said Trump, referring to the margin of 11,779 votes by which Biden won.
Four days later, a mob of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in a failed bid to stop Congress from certifying Biden's victory.
Willis has also examined a scheme in which a slate of alternate electors falsely asserted that Trump had won Georgia in an unsuccessful effort to award the state's electoral votes to him rather than Biden.
(This Feb. 21 story has been refiled to add dropped word ‘recommended’ in paragraph 2)