Illinois pastor charged in pressure scheme against Georgia poll worker in Trump indictment

A former police chaplain was among three individuals charged with trying to influence a Georgia poll worker to provide evidence of fraud in District Attorney Fani Willis' Monday night indictment.

The Rev. Stephen Cliffgard Lee, a pastor within the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod denomination, was charged along with Donald Trump and 17 others in the wide-ranging scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in the state, and Religion News Service reported that police body cam video showed the faith leader in December 2020 outside the home of poll worker Ruby Freeman.

“I’m a pastor, and I’m also working with some folks who are trying to help Ruby out — and also get to some truth of what’s going on,” Lee tells officers after Freeman calls to report him knocking on her door and later parking his car in her driveway.

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Lee admits he had knocked on Freeman's door and told officers he was "prior law enforcement" as "a sergeant out in California," and he asked police to allow him to speak with the poll worker so he could offer some "pro-bono service" to her, and she then turned him down.

“I’m not interested,” Freeman says in a separate body cam video. “I have a pastor.”

The indictment alleges that the incident was part of an effort involving Willie Lewis Floyd III, the head of Black Voices for Trump, and publicist Trevian Kutti, publicist for the rapper previously known as Kanye West, to encourage Freeman to attest to evidence of fraud Trump and his attorney Rudy Giuliani had falsely attributed to her and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss.

Lee contacted Floyd after Freeman turned down his offer, the indictment alleges, saying that she wouldn't talk to him because he was white. Kutti met with Freeman on Jan. 4, 2021, and threatened her with jail time unless she provided evidence of election fraud.

That encounter was also recorded on video.

Lee preached as recently as Sunday at Living Word Lutheran Church in Orland Park, Illinois, but a spokesman for the denomination told RNS said the pastor was retired with emeritus status.

The church and the denomination declined to comment to RNS on Lee's indictment.