(NEW YORK) — While the benefits of exercise are becoming increasingly well known, new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggests that more than one-fifth of Americans remain physically inactive.
In the study, being physically inactive meant no physical activity at all over the past month — anything from running to gardening.
“Getting enough physical activity could prevent 1 in 10 premature deaths,” Dr. Ruth Peterson, director of CDC’s Division of nutrition, physical activity and obesity, said in prepared remarks. “Too many people are missing out on the health benefits of physical activity such as improved sleep, reduced blood pressure and anxiety, lowered risk for heart disease, several cancers and dementia.”
The CDC specifically warned about higher rates of inactivity in the South compared with the rest of the country. Meanwhile, more than 29% of Hispanic, African American and Native American adults were inactive compared to 23% of non-Hispanic white adults.
But doctors said that for many Americans, getting more active isn’t as simple as it sounds.
“What this map shows us is that there are disparities, but we have to be better about tailoring our strategies to different populations,” said Dr. Alok Patel, an ABC News special correspondent and a clinical assistant professor of pediatrics at Stanford Children’s Health.
“It’s important that any message we send is met with equity, inclusiveness and relatability, so that individuals can understand how to adopt and integrate practices into their own unique lives,” Patel added. “Even a walk in the neighborhood can be sufficient, but not everyone has access to safe environments. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a teenage patient tell me there’s no park within a mile of where they live.”
This is partly why experts including Patel emphasize that public health and community-based programs need to be individually tailored. Language barriers and cultural beliefs play an integral role as well. Early education though school-based programs and community-based research used to shape public health initiatives can prove especially critical.
And, Patel said, programs able to “listen” to their communities are at the crux of improving health literacy: “It’s not a one-size fits all solution.”
Nitya Rajeshuni, M.D., M.S., a pediatrics resident at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania, is a contributor to the ABC News Medical Unit.
(WASHINGTON) — Cybercriminals could use altered Quick Response (QR) codes to steal personal and financial information of unsuspecting customers, the FBI warns.
QR codes are all around us these days, and they’re used for everything from restaurant orders to donations. During the pandemic, many restaurants began using QR codes in place of paper menus.
How it works: A code is scanned via a phone camera app, and the user is then redirected to the relevant website.
Troubles can arise, the FBI says, in cases where the codes have been altered. Unwitting users can be directed to malicious sites that prompt them to enter their financial and login information or expose them to malware.
“While QR codes have been around for a very long time, certainly in recent years, they’ve gained more widespread use,” Dave Ring, section chief of the FBI’s Cyber Division told ABC News. “Part of that is with the pandemic and a drive toward being as contactless as possible, QR codes give people the opportunity to just use their phone camera and scan a QR code.”
Police in San Antonio, Texas, warned that fake QR codes were found on parking meters throughout the city. “People attempting to pay for parking … may have been directed to a fraudulent website and submitted payment to a fraudulent vendor,” a tweet from the department said.
Ring said the San Antonio scam was the “perfect example” of people exploiting a simple, daily exercise, and the FBI warned that criminals could be taking advantage of people through other similar tactics.
“A cybercriminal can swap out a completely innocuous legitimate QR code for one that directs people to a malicious site, and that malicious site may prompt someone to click a link and could potentially download malware onto their device,” Ring said.
The redirect can also take users to what appears to be a banking website but is actually fraudulent, he added.
“Malicious QR codes may also contain embedded malware, allowing a criminal to gain access to the victim’s mobile device and steal the victim’s location as well as personal and financial information,” the FBI bulletin said. “The cybercriminal can leverage the stolen financial information to withdraw funds from victim accounts.”
To avoid any trouble, the agency urges people to use caution by checking the URL of the code, and when entering financial and other personal information.
“Just always practice caution when you’re looking at putting in any login information, personal information or financial information when you navigate from a QR code or from any link that you that you don’t know for sure is where you’re trying to go,” Ring said.
(WASHINGTON) — Several state lawmakers are looking to expand abortion access this legislative session while a challenge to Roe v. Wade is before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Two bills out of Maryland and Washington aim to increase the pool of abortion providers operating in the states, which will likely see an increased demand for the service should the conservative-leaning high court overturn or limit Roe in the coming months through its decision on the Mississippi case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health.
Washington state Sen. Emily Randall, the majority whip for the Senate Democratic Caucus, is the lead sponsor of a bill under consideration this session that would expand abortion providers recognized under state law to include physician assistants and advanced registered nurse practitioners, in addition to physicians.
“Abortion providers in Washington are rapidly preparing for the increase in women and people … who will drive hundreds of miles to Washington’s borders from our neighbors in Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Nevada, depending on what type of ban the Supreme Court institutes,” Randall said during a media briefing Thursday with the State Innovation Exchange, a strategy center that supports state legislators nationwide in advancing progressive policies. “That’s why this policy is more important than ever.”
Democratic Maryland Del. Ariana Kelly, a former executive director at NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland, also plans to introduce legislation this session that would expand abortion access in the state by allowing qualified health care providers such as midwives and nurse practitioners to provide abortions and increase access to training for abortion providers. The so-called Abortion Care Access Act would also ensure Medicaid covers abortion procedures and eliminate copays and deductibles on abortion care.
“What we want to do is address what we see as a critical provider shortage and also affordability issues,” Kelly said during Thursday’s briefing, held two days before the 49th anniversary of Roe. “As we’re seeing an increased wait time for appointments, we can recognize that there’s a shortage of providers. In today’s climate, six months from now, I think we’re only going to see this getting worse.”
Kelly said that two-thirds of Maryland counties do not have abortion providers, particularly in rural areas, while the state is also seeing increased demand — including from patients flying in from Texas in the wake of a state ban on abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy. Helping Maryland residents access abortion care “more efficiently and effectively” may also help providers care for those coming from out of state, Kelly said.
Georgia Democratic state Rep. Park Cannon said she plans to introduce a resolution next week that addresses abortion access in the state, including for women of color, while a law that would ban abortion as early as six weeks in the state is being challenged in court.
“We need to resolve measures that say that Georgia has a strong commitment to the protection of reproductive health, rights and justice, which of course includes the right to safe and legal abortion care, but also the right to make reproductive decisions on your own,” Cannon said during the briefing.
Other states moving to protect abortion rights while the U.S. Supreme Court considers whether to uphold the Mississippi abortion ban include New Jersey, which last week enacted a bill that codifies the right to an abortion into state law.
The Vermont state legislature is also considering Prop 5, an amendment that would enshrine “reproductive autonomy,” including abortion, in the state constitution. If ultimately passed, the proposal could go before voters in November.
Meanwhile, states looking to restrict abortion rights include Florida, where state legislators are considering a bill that, like the Mississippi law before the Supreme Court, would ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Washington state Republicans have also introduced legislation this session that would roll back abortion access, including a bill that would make providing medical abortion methods a felony.
Additionally, voters in Kansas and Kentucky are expected to decide this year whether to amend their state constitutions to say there is no right to an abortion.
Last year, 108 abortion restrictions were enacted in 19 states, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion rights research organization. That’s the highest total in any year since 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion with its decision in Roe v Wade, the organization said.
After hearing arguments last month over the Mississippi law, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared inclined to scale back abortion rights. A decision on the case is expected by the end of the court’s term in June.
Should the court overturn Roe, leaving the right to an abortion decided on a state-by-state basis, 26 states are “certain or likely” to ban abortion, according to a report published in October by the Guttmacher Institute.
(MANITOBA, Canada) — Four people, including two adults, a teen and an infant, have been found frozen to death about 40 feet from the U.S.-Canada border while being smuggled into North Dakota, according to U.S. and Canadian authorities.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers and law enforcement officers with the Department of Homeland Security performed a traffic stop Jan. 19 on a 15-passenger van about 1 mile from the border when they found two undocumented Indian nationals from Canada inside, according to the Manitoba Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Less than a quarter mile away from the border, law enforcement encountered and apprehended five additional undocumented Indian nationals that walked across the U.S. border from Manitoba, Canada, according to the RCMP.
One of the travelers who was taken into custody was carrying a backpack containing children’s items, such as clothes, diapers and toys, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. He told authorities he was carrying the backpack for a family that was traveling with their group but got separated from them as they traveled to the border during the night.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, coordinating with the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, began a search on both sides of the border for additional travelers when they found the bodies of four individuals on the Canadian side of the border in Manitoba.
The adult male, adult female, teen male and infant were found “frozen,” according to Canadian authorities, and are believed to have died due to exposure.
The DOJ said, according to the group of travelers, the border crossing took an estimated 11 hours. Two of the travelers were transported to a hospital with serious injuries, the DOJ said.
The low temperature in Emerson, Manitoba, which is at the U.S.-Canada border, dipped to minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit on Wednesday.
Steve Shand, 47, a U.S. citizen from Florida who was driving the van, was arrested by U.S. Border Patrol and charged with one count of knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that an alien had come to, entered, or remained in the United States in violation of law, having transported and moved or having attempted to transport and move such aliens, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Shand made his first court appearance Thursday and is due back in court on Jan. 24. He is currently being held in custody in Grand Forks County in North Dakota.
An autopsy will be conducted to determine cause of death of the victims. The four travelers who died have not yet been identified.
The Mounted Police said it plans to continue searching for any additional people who may have been illegally crossing the border.
(MINNEAPOLIS, Minn.) — Opening statements in the joint federal trial of three former police officers accused of civil rights violations in the death of George Floyd are expected to begin next week after a jury was seated on Thursday.
Fired Minneapolis police officers J. Alexander Kueng, 28, Thomas Lane, 38, and Tou Thao, 35, are set to fight charges stemming from their alleged roles in the 2020 death of the 46-year-old Black man who their one-time senior officer, Derek Chauvin, was convicted of murdering.
All three are charged with using the “color of the law,” or their positions as police officers, to deprive Floyd of his civil rights on May 25, 2020, by allegedly showing deliberate indifference to his medical needs as Chauvin dug his knee in the back of a handcuffed man’s neck for more than 9 minutes, ultimately killing him.
Kueng and Thao both face an additional charge alleging they knew Chauvin was kneeling on Floyd’s neck but did nothing to intervene to stop him. Lane, who was heard on police body camera footage asking if they should roll Floyd on his side to help ease his breathing, does not face that charge.
The three defendants have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The 18-member jury, including six alternates, was impaneled in just one day, chosen from a pool of 256 potential jurors. The jury is comprised of 11 women and seven men, none of whom are Black.
The trial, expected to last at least two weeks, is being held at the Warren E. Burger Federal Building in St. Paul. Opening statements are expected to begin Monday.
U.S. District Court Judge Paul Magnuson, who is presiding over the case, has instructed attorneys that he wants the trial to move quickly to lessen the possibility of people involved in the proceedings coming down with COVID-19 as the omicron variant continues to spread across the country.
The trial will commence a little over a month after Chauvin, 45, a former Minneapolis police officer, pleaded guilty to federal civil rights charges stemming from Floyd’s death and the abuse of a 14-year-old boy he bashed in the head with a flashlight in 2017. He admitted in the signed plea agreement with federal prosecutors that he knelt on the back of Floyd’s neck even as Floyd complained he could not breathe, fell unconscious and lost a pulse.
The guilty plea came after Chauvin was convicted in Minnesota state court in April of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. He was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison in the state case and is facing an even stiffer sentence in the federal case.
Kueng and Lane were rookies being trained by Chauvin at the time of Floyd’s fatal arrest.
The May 25, 2020, police encounter with Floyd was recorded on video from start to finish and included multiple angles taken by bystanders with cellphones, police body cameras and surveillance cameras.
The footage showed Chauvin grinding his knee into the back of Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds while Kueng helped keep Floyd down even after he stopped resisting by placing his knee on the man’s back and holding and lifting one of his handcuffed hands. Lane, according to the videos, held down Floyd’s feet.
Thao, according to footage, stood a few feet away, ordering a crowd to stand back despite several witnesses, including an off-duty firefighter, expressing concern for Floyd’s well-being.
Following the federal trial, Lane, Keung and Thao are facing a state trial on charges arising from Floyd’s death of aiding and abetting second-degree murder, and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter.
The state trial, which had been scheduled to get underway in March, was postponed until June 13 due to uncertainty over how long the federal trial will last.
The three defendants have pleaded not guilty to the state charges.
ABC News’ Whitney Lloyd contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — With voting rights reform now firmly in the rear view mirror, negotiations to reform the Electoral Count Act have ramped up, but it remains far from certain that the talks will bear fruit despite the growing bipartisan interest.
The obscure 19th century law that governs the counting of each state’s electoral votes for president, a process then-President Donald Trump and his allies sought to exploit to secure a victory not won at the ballot box, has long been the subject of bipartisan ire.
The law allows one congressman paired with one senator to object to the results submitted by each state, something both parties have done previously, although Trump allies in 2020 attempted to block the decision of far more states than ever before.
The vice president’s role in what usually is a perfunctory proceeding — counting and announcing the votes — is also extremely unclear, and Trump and his team attempted, in an effort to overturn the election, to exert pressure on then-Vice President Mike Pence to declare some states’ slates of electoral votes in question, pressure that led to the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
“I’ve always thought we should just repeal it,” Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., a former secretary of state, said Thursday. “If you can’t replace it, I’d be just for repealing it. I think it creates more problems than it creates solutions. And so I think there’s a lot of interest in doing something about that. And my guess is that the majority of Republican senators would agree with that.”
But therein lies the problem for Democrats, unsure if GOP interest in electoral law changes is real after the party’s unified, high-profile opposition to federal voting law changes. Republicans are, likewise, suspicious of Democrats whose leader, Chuck Schumer of New York, recently lambasted attempts to reform the ECA as “offensive.”
“If you’re going to rig the game and say, ‘Oh, we’ll count the rigged game accurately,’ what good is that?” Schumer recently scoffed when asked about budding ECA reform efforts. Branding those efforts “the McConnell plan,” since the GOP leader – Mitch McConnell of Kentucky — has expressed an openness to reforming the law, Schumer added, “It’s unacceptably insufficient and even offensive.”
Despite the lack of trust among the parties, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has led bipartisan talks behind closed doors for the past three weeks to try to reform the law, with interest in those negotiations growing “big time” in the wake of the Democrats’ failed effort at broader electoral reforms, according to a Senate aide with knowledge of the matter.
“We’re going to be working hard over the recess,” Collins told reporters. “I’m very encouraged at the amount of interest that there is from both sides of the aisle.”
For his part, McConnell reiterated his support for possible ECA reform and the Collins talks Thursday, but went a bit further, telling ABC News, “I think it needs fixing, and I wish them well, and I’d be happy to talk a look at whatever they can come up with.” Asked for any red lines in those negotiations, the leader said, “I just encourage the discussion, because I think (the ECA) is clearly is flawed. This is directly related to what happened on January 6th, and I think we ought to be able to figure out a bipartisan way to fix it.”
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, an early member of the group, told ABC News, “There are about 10 Republicans and maybe four or five Democrats that are working on it. We exchanged a list of things that we thought ought to be included in an election reform package — some items related to making sure that election officials were not harassed, others related to how elections are certified, others related to what the role of the Vice President is in the electoral accounting process, how you would deal with an objection to a slate of electors.”
The details around how to implement each of these items would be complex, and the negotiation is “just now beginning to talk about which of these we’ll find sufficient support for in a bill,” said Romney.
Both conservative Democrats, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona — who refused to support changing the Senate rules to pass their party’s sweeping voting rights legislation — are working with Collins on ECA changes, along with GOP Senators Thom Tillis, Lisa Murkowski, and Roger Wicker, among others. Some senators, like Blunt, Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and Ben Sasse, R-Neb., have shown interest, according to aides involved in the talks, but have yet to commit to being a part of the group.
Manchin, speaking with reporters about the talks, said he was particularly focused on violence and threats against poll workers which have ramped up in recent years in particular in the wake of Trump’s so-called “big lie” that he won the 2020 election but it was stolen from him by fraud.
“They’re scared now, because of the highly charged political atmosphere. We do want to make sure that we can raise this to the level of a federal crime if you accost, if you threaten anyone who works at the polls, you’ll be dealt with with the harshest penalties,” said Manchin, who is leading the talks for Democrats. “You’re not going to fool with the count and our voting people.”
The Collins-Manchin group plans to meet by Zoom in the next few days, with an eye toward potentially producing a legislative proposal at the end of next week’s recess, according to Romney, though Collins offered a more sober estimate. “I think we don’t know how long it’s going to take. We’ve done a lot of research. We’ve talked to election experts, professors, the election assistance commissioners, all sorts of people to make sure we get this right.”
Collins said the scope of her group’s work will go beyond just the 150-year old Electoral Count Act, like additional grant funding for states to improve the quality of their voting systems, and that she was encouraged by President Joe Biden’s comments expressing a willingness to work with Republicans to get this done.
A parallel effort is happening among a group of senior Democrats, including Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Angus King – – led by Schumer’s number two, Dick Durbin of Illinois. Durbin said he planned to talk to Sen. Collins about her efforts to see what might be done together.
“We wouldn’t necessarily merge our efforts, no. We just want to see what they are doing and talk it through,” Durbin told reporters this week.
In the House, a staff report from the Administration Committee, outlined in a 31-page report potential changes to the law which the group says is “badly in need of reform.” Their proposal could provide a foundation for the special committee investigating the Jan. 6 attacks from which to recommend legislative changes, the panel’s chair, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., told NPR.
(APPIATSE, Ghana) — A town in Ghana was rocked by a huge explosion Thursday that sent several people to the hospital, the authorities said.
The Ghana Police Service announced that the explosion took place around 3 p.m. local time in the town of Appiatse, between Bogoso and Bawdie. Buildings and structures were gutted, and debris was scattered in the streets.
A preliminary investigation has determined that the explosion appears to have been caused by a mining vehicle carrying explosives, traveling from Tarkwa to the Chirano mines, colliding with a motorcycle, police said.
“The public has been advised to move out of the area to nearby towns for their safety while recovery efforts are underway,” police said in a statement.
First responders and residents scrambled to find victims, with some using construction vehicles to clear debris. Smoke from the explosion could be seen miles away.
Police said victims had been taken to area hospitals but didn’t provide any details on the number of victims or the extent of their injuries. The number of fatalities isn’t immediately known.
“An appeal is also being made to nearby towns to open up their classrooms, churches, etc. to accommodate surviving victims,” police said.
(MIAMI) — A first-class passenger who allegedly refused to wear a mask disrupted a London-bound American Airlines flight Wednesday night and prompted the pilot to turn back to Miami so the customer could be booted off the aircraft, police and airline officials said.
American Airlines Flight 38, with 129 passengers and 14 crew members aboard, was over the Atlantic Ocean when the passenger allegedly refused to obey instructions to wear a mask and became disruptive, a spokesperson for the airline said.
The flight departed Miami International Airport at about 7:40 p.m. local time. About an hour into the flight, the pilot decided to turn the Boeing 777 aircraft around and head back to Miami, according to the airline.
The flight was ultimately canceled and the passengers needed to rebook on future flights, the airline’s spokesperson said.
“The flight landed safely at MIA where local law enforcement met the aircraft. We thank our crew for their professionalism and apologize to our customers for the inconvenience,” American Airlines said in a statement.
Steve Freeman, a passenger on the flight, told ABC Miami affiliate WPLG the woman was verbally abusive to the flight crew.
“She sat behind us in first class — she was a first-class passenger and was extremely abusive to the stewards,” said Freeman, who was flying home to London. “I could see the writing on the wall — they gave her a lot of warnings, so we were kind of ready for it.”
He said flight attendants tried to offer the passenger several different masks.
“She complained about each mask,” Freeman said.
Det. Argemis Colome of the Miami-Dade Police Department told ABC News on Thursday that police were contacted by American Airlines about a disruptive female passenger refusing to wear a mask.
Colome said police officers met the plane when it returned to the Miami International Airport. He said officers escorted the passenger off the plane, but she was not arrested or charged.
Colome said the woman, whose name was not released, was turned over to American Airlines officials to handle administratively.
A spokesperson for American Airlines told ABC News on Thursday that the woman has been placed on the airline’s internal no-fly list pending an investigation. Such incidents are referred to the Federal Aviation Administration as part of a standard reporting process, the spokesperson said.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden announced the nomination of Nusrat Jahan Choudhury to the federal judiciary Wednesday, who, if confirmed by the Senate, would become the first Muslim American woman to serve as a federal judge. She is also the first Muslim American woman to be nominated to the federal judiciary.
Choudhury was nominated to sit on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York and is also the first Bangladeshi American to be nominated to the federal bench. She would be the second Muslim American appointed to a federal judgeship, according to the White House announcement.
“These choices also continue to fulfill the President’s promise to ensure that the nation’s courts reflect the diversity that is one of our greatest assets as a country,” the statement read.
Choudhury is currently the legal director at the Illinois division of the American Civil Liberties Union and previously served as the deputy director of the national ACLU Racial Justice Program. She is a graduate of Yale Law School, Columbia University and Princeton University.
The other nominees include Arianna Freeman, who would be the first African American woman to serve on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals; Ana Isabel de Alba, who would be the first Latina to serve on the Eastern District of California; and Nina Nin-Yuen Wang, who would be the second Asian American to serve the United States District Court. Tiffany Cartwright, Robert Steven Huie, Natasha Merle and Jennifer Rearden round out the president’s first set of nominees for 2022 and the 13th of his presidency.
The selections align with Biden’s goal of nominating more women and people of color to serve on the bench, jobs that come with a lifetime appointment. The trend is in stark contrast to his predecessor.
Former President Donald Trump’s nominees were 85% white and 76% of them were men, according to the Alliance for Justice advocacy group. To date, 78% of Biden’s confirmations have been women and 53% have been people of color, according to the White House.
Democrats have pushed Biden to make federal court nominations a priority after Trump and former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made a concerted effort to shape the nation’s courts.
Over the course of one term, Trump had 245 judges confirmed compared with Former President Barack Obama’s 334 confirmed judges across two terms according to the United States Courts.
As of Jan, 1, however, Biden had gotten the most federal judges confirmed in a president’s first year in office since former President Ronald Reagan.
(ATLANTA) — A Georgia prosecutor investigating possible criminal behavior by former President Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election has officially requested to seat a special grand jury, according to a letter obtained by ABC News.
The development is a major step forward in the only publicly known criminal investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
In a letter Thursday to Fulton County Chief Judge Christopher Brasher, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis wrote that the move is needed because “a significant number of witnesses and prospective witnesses have refused to cooperate with the investigation absent a subpoena requiring their testimony.”
Willis officially launched the probe last February, after Trump was heard in a recorded phone call pushing Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to help him “find 11,780 votes,” the exact number Trump needed to win Georgia in the 2020 presidential election.
Willis says that Raffensperger is one of those who will not comply with the investigation without a subpoena, based on comments he made in an interview with NBC.
In response to Willis’ request, Trump, in a statement, said, “My phone call to the Secretary of State of Georgia was perfect, perhaps even more so than my call with the Ukrainian President, if that’s possible.” The reference was to the phone call Trump made to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky ahead of the 2020 election asking him to dig up dirt on his political rival Joe Biden; Trump was ultimately impeached for that call, but the Senate did not convict him.
“I didn’t say anything wrong in the call,” Trump said of his call to Raffensperger. “No more political witch hunts!”
If empaneled, the special grand jury will not have the authority to return an indictment, according to the Willis’ letter. Instead it may “make recommendations concerning criminal prosecution as it shall see fit,” the letter said.
A majority of the judges on the Fulton County Superior Court will have to vote to approve the request in order for the special grand jury to be seated, according to Georgia state law.
Describing his Jan. 2 call with Trump in an exclusive interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos last year, Raffensperger said that Trump “did most of the talking.”
“We did most of the listening,” Raffensperger said. “But I did want to make my points that the data that he has is just plain wrong.”
ABC News’ Steve Osunsami and Brandon Baur contributed to this report.
