A Georgia judge has declared that seven new election laws recently passed by the State Election Board are “illegal, unconstitutional and void.”
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thomas Cox issued the order Wednesday after holding a hearing on a challenge to the ordinance. The rules Cox overturned include three rules that received a lot of attention – a rule that would have required the number of ballots to be counted by hand after the close of the polls and two rules related to certifying election results.
Cox found that the rule “is not supported by the Georgia Election Code and is in fact contrary to the Election Code.” He also wrote that the State Election Board does not have the authority to certify it. He ordered the board to immediately remove the rule and notify all state and local election officials that the rule is void and should not be followed.
The Associated Press has contacted attorneys for the State Election Board, as well as three Republicans who support the rule, for comment on the judge’s decision. They can appeal but time is running out with less than three weeks left until Election Day.
The State Election Board, controlled by three Republicans backed by former President Donald Trump, has issued a slew of regulations in recent months that largely relate to the process that occurs after the vote. Trump narrowly lost Georgia to Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, but claimed without evidence that widespread fraud cost him victory in the state.
Democratic Party organizations, local election officials and groups led by former Republican state lawmakers have filed at least half a dozen lawsuits over the rules. Democrats, voting rights groups and some legal experts have raised concerns that some of the rules could be used by Trump’s allies to delay or avoid certification or cast doubt on the election results if Trump loses the presidential election next month to Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.
Cox’s decision came in a lawsuit filed by Eternal Vigilance Action, which was founded and led by former state Rep. Scot Turner, a Republican. The organization argued that the State Election Board exceeded its authority in adopting the regulations.
Reached by phone Wednesday evening, Turner said he was “very happy with this win.”
“This is a total and complete victory for the United States Constitution,” he said. “This legislation was opposed by Republicans, Democrats and independents. It’s not about the party. This is about doing what is constitutional and re-establishing the separation of powers, and that is something every conservative in this country should be concerned about and support.”
One of the new rules blocked by the judge would have required three separate poll workers to count the number of ballots on Election Day by hand to ensure the number of ballots matched the electronic tallies on scanners, check-in computers and voting machines.
Voters in Georgia make their choices via touchscreen voting machines that print a sheet of paper containing a human-readable list of voter preferences as well as a QR code. It is a paper ballot that the voter inserts into a scanner, which then records the vote. Manual counting is done based on ballot papers, not vote results.
Critics, including many local election officials, argue that vote counting could slow down the reporting of election results and place additional burdens on poll workers at the end of a long day. They also said there wasn’t enough time to adequately train poll workers.
Proponents of the rule argue that the count would take minutes, not hours. They also noted that scanner memory cards containing vote tallies could be sent to the central tabulation center in each county while the vote count was completing so reporting of results would not be slowed down.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney on Tuesday temporarily blocked the counting of votes in the November election while considering the legal merits. He said vote counting may ultimately prove to be good policy, but it is too close to the election to implement it now.
Cox wrote that the rule “is not authorized” by Georgia law, which “prohibits the duties of poll workers after the polls close. Hand counting is not included in it.”
The other two new rules that Cox rescinded were passed by the State Board of Elections in August and relate to certification. One provides a definition of certification that includes an obligation for local officials to conduct a “reasonable investigation” before certifying results, but does not specify what that means. Another item includes language allowing county election officials “to inspect all election-related documentation created during the conduct of the election.”
Supporters argue that the regulations are necessary to ensure the accuracy of vote totals before county election officials sign them off. Critics say this could be used to delay or deny certification.
The first certification rule is not part of Georgia law and “adds an additional and unspecified step to the certification process,” Cox wrote, saying the rule is “inconsistent and unsupported by” Georgia law, making it “null and void.” not applicable.” The second rule is “directly inconsistent” with Georgia law, “which regulates the time, manner, and method by which election-related documents must be created and maintained,” he wrote.
Other rules that Cox said are illegal and unconstitutional include: requiring someone delivering a ballot in person to provide a signature and photo ID; request video surveillance and recording of ballot drop boxes after polls close in early voting; expanding mandatory designated areas where partisan election observers can stand at the center of tabulation; and require daily public updates on the number of votes cast in early voting.
At least half a dozen lawsuits have been filed challenging some or all of the new regulations. The Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Party of Georgia have filed two lawsuits and joined others. Election boards in some areas and election officials in other areas have also filed suit.
Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who is the state’s top elections official, said the last-minute regulations created confusion for voters and poll workers and could undermine confidence in the election results. An association of local election officials also asked the state board to put the brakes on the new regulations.
And in a memo last month, the office of state Attorney General Chris Carr, also a Republican, warned that some of the regulations appeared to conflict with existing laws.
