The White House has insisted that President Donald Trump was visiting Georgia to promote the economy. But in the opening minutes of his first stop at a local restaurant, the president raised the prospect of voter fraud without evidence and talked up his plan to require voters to show identification before casting ballots. He was visiting the congressional district previously represented by Marjorie Taylor Greene, a former supporter who resigned in January after feuding with Trump. The White House has long said Trump would focus more on the economy, but recent months have been dominated by other issues, including deportation efforts in Minneapolis, military action in Iran, and his false claims about the 2020 election.

An FBI search of the elections hub in Fulton County, Georgia, is part of an investigation into possible "deficiencies or defects" in the vote count in the 2020 contest lost by President Donald Trump, according to an affidavit unsealed Tuesday. The allegations outlined in the affidavit are largely based on claims that have long been made by people who assert that there was fraud in the 2020 election. Audits, state officials, courts and Trump's own former attorney general have rejected the idea that there was widespread fraud in the 2020 election that could have altered the outcome.

A racist post on President Donald Trump's social media account depicting former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, as primates in a jungle has been taken down. The White House initially defended the Republican president's Thursday night post. But the post was deleted Friday after widespread backlash for its treatment of the nation's first Black president and first lady, who are Democrats. Black and white Republicans joined civil rights advocates in criticizing the post as racist. An Obama spokeswoman says the former president has no response.

The search warrant FBI served at Fulton County elections office near Atlanta on Wednesday seeks records tied to the 2020 election, a county spokesperson said. Fulton spokeswoman Jessica Corbitt-Dominguez declined to comment further, saying the search was still underway. declined to comment further, saying the search was still underway. An FBI spokesperson confirmed the search but also declined to provide any additional information. The search comes as the FBI under the leadership of Director Kash Patel has moved quickly to pursue the political grievances of President Donald Trump, including by working with the Justice Department to investigate multiple perceived adversaries of the Republican commander-in-chief.

Former Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith has told lawmakers in a closed-door interview his team "developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt" President Donald Trump criminally conspired to overturn his 2020 election loss. That's according to portions of Smith's opening statement obtained by The Associated Press on Wednesday. Smith says investigators had "powerful evidence" Trump broke the law by hoarding classified documents at his Florida estate from his first term as president and by obstructing government efforts to recover the records. Smith says decisions in the investigations were made without regard to consideration of Trump's Republican candidacy in 2024. Trump has said he'd rather see Smith testify publicly.

Kash Patel positioned himself as a steadfast Donald Trump loyalist well before the president picked him to run the FBI. An Associated Press review of nearly 100 podcasts that Patel hosted or on which he was interviewed over the last four years reveals how Patel has denigrated the investigations into Trump, sowed doubt in the criminal justice system, criticized the decision-making of the institution he's been asked to lead and professed sympathy for jailed Jan. 6 rioters. The vast catalog of provocative public statements, sometimes made in the company of like-minded FBI antagonists, provides an unusually extensive record into a nominee's unvarnished and controversial worldviews.