Georgia GOP's civil war explodes out into the open as secretary of state blasts party chairman

The civil war inside Georgia's Republican Party exploded out into the open.

The state's GOP chairman David Shafer accused secretary of state Brad Raffensperger of breaking his promise to allow Republicans to observe ballot signature verification and complained that he won't order an impossible-to-perform audit.

"We must restore confidence in the integrity of our elections," Shafer tweeted. "The time for begging elections officials to do their job and obey the law is over. We are grateful to @GOPChairwoman Ronna McDaniel and the Republican National Committee for joining us in this lawsuit. They have been wonderful partners to us in fight for election integrity."

But Raffensperger fired back, saying that no evidence has emerged of irregularities in the signature verification process conducted after ballots arrived -- and flatly denied Shafer's claims about GOP observers.

"[First], there has been no evidence presented of any issues with the signature matching process," Raffensperger tweeted. "[Second], our office repeatedly told the GA Rep Party, including David Shafer himself, that the signature verification process was — and always has been — public and that they could observe it."

"We told him to let us know if counties gave him any issues with access. He never did," Raffensperger added. "It wasn’t because we didn’t issue a bulletin, it was because he didn’t have the organization in place that he needed."

The secretary of state then took a shot at Shafer's leadership of the state GOP as both of Georgia's senators face a runoff election Jan. 5 and President Donald Trump lost the election there to Democrat Joe Biden.

"David Shafer continues to look backwards and focus on blaming others for his failures instead of on the runoffs that decide control of the Senate and the only protection we have from an unchecked liberal, socialist agenda to federalize elections, pack SCOTUS, and raise taxes," Raffensperger tweeted.

"David- from one Republican to another, please start focusing on what matters," he added. "If you put as much effort into the January runoffs as you have put on blaming others for your failures, we can’t lose."