Third Georgia county conducts audit as MAGA distrust of elections grow

Republicans in Georgia keep going far out of their way to convince Donald Trump's MAGA base that there is a reason to vote in spite of his continued lies about massive election fraud.

"The elections board in rural Pickens County voted Tuesday to ask a judge to unseal ballots from this year’s primary, the latest attempt in heavily Republican areas to audit Georgia election results," The Atlanta Journal-Constitutionreported Wednesday. "If a court agrees, election workers would conduct a hand count of over 7,600 ballots cast in Republican races for governor and secretary of state to check the accuracy of results tabulated by voting computers. Election board members said they sought the audit in response to residents who distrust Georgia’s election equipment, manufactured by Dominion Voting Systems, which uses touchscreens to print out paper ballots."

The audit comes as Trump continues to lie about his effort to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger "find 11,780 votes" as he sought to claim the state's electoral votes even though he lost the election to Joe Biden.

"My two Georgia phone calls were PERFECT," Trump falsely claimed in a Wednesday Truth Social post. "It is the election itself that should be under investigation, not those seeking the truth!"

IN OTHER NEWS: 'Irrelevant': Steve Bannon trial judge rules against Trump's 'executive privilege'

The Pickens County audit is Georgia's first.

"In Bartow and Oconee counties, audits showed identical results when comparing hand and computer counts," The Atlanta Journal-Constitution noted.

The chairman for the Pickens County Republican Party defended the county spending money on the audit.

“We saw a good-sized number of people saying, ‘I don’t care, I’m not going to show up if my vote doesn’t matter,’ ” Chris Mora said. “Not to get into conspiracy theories, because that stuff drives me nuts, but it was more about how to prove to the citizens that their vote is going to count.”

READ MORE: MAGA world is going to have a hard time attacking Thursday's witnesses at Jan. 6 committee: Former Trump aide

Republicans have worried Trump's MAGA base will sit out the midterms because they don't think their votes count after being brainwashed by the former president's elections delusions.

The situation is particularly dire in Georgia, with Republicans outraged Trump publicly trashes GOP Gov. Brian Kemp as he faces re-election. The issue was further compounded when Trump said Democrat Stacey Abrams may be a better governor than Kemp.

Many Georgia Republicans blame Trump's lies about voter fraud depressing turnout in the 2021 Georgia runoff elections for U.S. Senate, which Democrats swept, resulting in them gaining control of the U.S. Senate.

One year ago, Trump described the dynamic at a campaign rally.

"And what happened is we had two senators running, a couple of months later, and you know what happened to them? The Republicans said, 'We're not going out to vote, because this was rigged, this election was rigged,'" Trump explained.