A Republican monitor overlooks the opening of absentee ballot envelopes at the Cobb County elections office in Marietta, Ga., on the Monday before the May primary. Matt Vasilogambros/Stateline
A Cobb County election board attorney argued Tuesday against requiring local officials to follow a new ballot-counting procedure and several other new state election rules set to be in place for the Nov. 5 general election.
The latest legal battles over the Georgia State Election Board’s controversial rulemaking issued in recent months is playing out in courts this week. Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney held a hearing Tuesday regarding the Cobb County Board of Elections and Registration lawsuit seeking to overturn six rules adopted by the State Election Board in September.
Cobb officials claim the rules are unlawful and unnecessary changes to implement during this year’s election season. Early voting in Georgia began Tuesday with a first-day record number of voters casting ballots at advanced voting locations.
On Wednesday, Fulton Judge Thomas A. Cox Jr. is set to conduct a hearing on two separate election lawsuits, including several rules also being challenged in court by the Cobb election board.
State and national Republican political organizations have defended the implementation of election rules this close to an election, stating that they are necessary steps toward restoring public confidence in elections after Georgia’s narrow 2020 presidential election win by Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
The Cobb election board filed a complaint on Oct. 2 against the State Election Board for passing new rules on Sept. 20 that would change procedures for hand counting of ballots, vote reconciliation, and public reporting of vote totals. The Cobb officials argue that three state election board members loyal to former President Donald Trump adopted rules that exceeded their legal authority and came with unrealistic expectations for local election officials to enforce several weeks from the Nov. 5 Election Day.
Georgia’s attorney general advised the State Election Board in a Sept. 20 letter that some of their actions exceeded the five-member agency’s legal authority.
Cobb election board attorney Daniel White argued Tuesday that the new ballot reconciliation and reporting rules duplicate procedures already followed by county election offices.
White said that new election rules are usually implemented early enough in an election year for local election staff to adapt to them before the general election. New election rules are usually implemented over several months of ongoing communication between state election officials and county election directors and training full-time staff and poll workers on the changes.
“It’s not reasonable to implement a rule one month before an election, and in this case, two weeks before an election after it’s already started,” White said.
Under the new election rules, county election staff would be required to verify the final day vote total by hand after the polls close on Election Day. Another challenged rule would require counties to publish reports detailing the number of total votes recorded by machine counts and to rectify any discrepancies.
Another rule change would expand the locations that partisan poll watchers can access in polling places and while ballots are being tabulated.
Since the state switched to electronic touch screen voting in 2020, Cobb county has followed several protocols to verify vote totals and correct any discrepancies, White said.
McBurney is expected to rule in the next several days on the plaintiffs request to invalidate the six rule changes. McBurney ruled on another lawsuit prior to Tuesday’s hearing, that local election board members are mandated by law to certify election results.
After Trump lost the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, conspiracy theories spread among many Republicans attributing the former president’s loss to widespread fraud, which many court rulings, multiple recounts and audits determined were unfounded.
Attorney Kevin Kuchar, who represented the Georgia Republican Party intervening on behalf of the Georgia election board, argued Tuesday that the state board’s rulemaking complies with their legal duties to “enact rules that they believe will lead to greater confidence in election security” and ensure the integrity of results.
“Georgia, as we all know, has had its election integrity called into question in the recent past,” he said. “Certainly I would suggest that a rule, which is intended to promote fidelity in this upcoming election, that gets kicked out at the last minute will severely undermine voter confidence.”
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