Zuckerberg-Funded ‘Safe Elections’ Project Announces Grants for Georgia Senate Runoff Elections

WASHINGTON, DC - OCTOBER 23: Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies before
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The Mark Zuckerberg-funded Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) announced on Tuesday that it will provide additional “safe elections” grants to county election departments in Georgia in advance of the two U.S. Senate runoff elections that will be held on January 5, 2021.

With majority control of the U.S. Senate hanging in the balance, hundreds of millions of dollars are expected to be spent in the two runoff elections in Georgia between incumbent Sen. David Perdue (R-GA) and Democrat challenger Jon Ossoff, and incumbent Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and Democrat challenger Raphael Warnock.

“The COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact American civic life, especially the administration of safe elections. And with the November 2020 general election nearly behind us, CTCL is focusing philanthropic support to directly help Georgia election offices lead a safe and secure runoff election in January 2021,” the CTCL said in a statement released on its website Tuesday morning.

Between September 1 and October 30, Facebook founder Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, donated $350 million to CTCL for its “safe elections” project. Critics charge that the project is simply a Democratic Get-Out-The-Vote effort disguised as charitable good government contributions to a 501 (c) 3 non-profit that acts more like a partisan SuperPAC.

Several lawsuits have been filed since September that make this and related arguments about CTCL, including one filed in a state court in Michigan, another filed in a federal court in Minnesota, one filed in a state court in Pennsylvania, as well as emergency court filings on Election Day, November 3, in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Minnesota “to challenge the management and monitoring of unattended ballot drop-boxes that pose a serious threat to properly cast ballots via the comingling of proper ballots with improperly cast ballots.”

Breitbart News reported last week:

Between September 1, 2020 and October 30, 2020, the CTCL contributed more than $16.6 million for “safe elections” in six Georgia counties, as Ballotpedia reported.

All six counties voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Based on currently available public reports, it appears that no Georgia county that voted for Donald Trump in 2106 received a CTCL grant in 2020.

Breitbart News further reported:

Most of Joe Biden’s 221,751 vote margin gain in Georgia, compared to Hillary Clinton’s performance in 2016, came from three metropolitan Atlanta counties that received more than $15 million from the Mark Zuckerberg-funded Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) “safe elections” project.

Those three counties — Cobb, Fulton, and Gwinnett–accounted for 168,703 of Biden’s 221,751 vote margin gain, or 76 percent.

“Every eligible Georgia election department that is verified as legitimate will be approved for a grant,” according to the CTCL statement released on Tuesday:

The application deadline is Friday, December 4th.

From submitting materials to receiving funds, Georgia counties can expect the process to take about 2 weeks.

Eligible Georgia counties include those “that have previously applied for a CTCL grant” and those that are applying for a CTCL grant for the first time.”

Breitbart asked CTCL how much grant funding will be available for the two runoff elections, but did not receive a response.

As Breitbart News reported last month, former Barack Obama campaign manager David Plouffe worked for the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative from 2017 through 2020:

Former Barack Obama campaign manager David Plouffe served as CZI head of policy and advocacy from 2017 until October 2019, when he “stepp[ed] back from day-to-day operations into a new part-time role as a strategist in residence to help guide the organization’s ongoing issues-based policy work. David has decided to make this transition in part to make time for non-CZI endeavors,” according to a CZI statement released at the time.

A spokesperson for CZI told Breitbart News on Wednesday Plouffe continues to serve in a part-time role as strategist in residence.

Plouffe is the author of Citizen’s Guide to Beating Donald Trump, a book published by Viking in March 2020. In that book, Plouffe highlights the importance of GOTV efforts in beating President Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election in this analysis of the 2016 presidential election.

“If Zuckerberg wants to operate a shadow government he needs to release all communications between he and David Plouffe regarding their grand scheme, as well as all communications between he, David Plouffe, and CTCL, and CTCL needs to release all their communications with every government official in election offices their grants have funded in the 2020 election,” Phill Kline, director of the Amistad Project of The Thomas More Society told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview.

“Zuckerberg needs to also order the employees that he pays to open the door to the process in which the votes are counted. We’ve got a billionaire in the counting room and the American people are not being allowed in,” Kline added.

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