Texas county election head who was targeted by Sidney Powell quits after lynching threats

Heider Garcia announced he is resigning as head of elections for Tarrant County, Texas — home to the city of Fort Worth — after a flood of death threats provoked at least in part by a pro-Trump attorney pushing conspiracy theories about him, reportedThe New York Times on Tuesday.

"Mr. Garcia oversees elections in a county where, in 2020, Donald J. Trump became only the second Republican presidential candidate to lose in more than 50 years. Right-wing skepticism of the election results fueled threats against him, even though the county received acclaim from state auditors for its handling of the 2020 voting," reported Neil Vigdor. "With Mr. Trump persistently repeating the lie that he won the 2020 election, many of his supporters and those in right-wing media have latched on to conspiracy theories and joined him in spreading disinformation about election security. Those tasked with running elections, even in deeply Republican areas that did vote for Mr. Trump in 2020, have borne the brunt of vitriol and threats from people persuaded by baseless claims of fraud."

"Mr. Garcia detailed a series of threats as part of his written testimony last year to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which he urged to pass better protections for election officials," said the report. "He testified that he had repeatedly been the target of a doxxing campaign, including the posting of his home address on Twitter after Sidney Powell, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, falsely accused him on television and social media of manipulating election results."

Among the threats he received were messages calling him a "traitor," a Twitter user urging people to "hunt him down," and one person who wrote online, “Hang him when convicted from fraud and let his lifeless body hang in public until maggots drip out his mouth.”

This is not the first elections official in Texas who stepped down over safety fears. Last year, the entire election staff of Gillespie County, home to the small town of Fredricksburg, resigned after a series of threats and stalking incidents, even though former President Donald Trump carried the county by 59 points.

There remains no evidence of any kind that any aspect of the presidential election was impacted by notable irregularities, or that any result in any state was illegitimate.