Georgia News

"Pro-Trump Georgia Election Board Invites Chaos By Requiring Hand Count Of Ballots"

By Thomas

September 21, 2024

From the Huffpost:

Pro-Trump Georgia Election Board Invites Chaos By Requiring Hand Count Of Ballots

(Excerpts)

A 3-2 Republican majority on Georgia’s State Election Board voted September 20 to require local election offices to hand count the state’s millions of ballots, inviting chaos as experts warned the task would prove impossible in the state’s largest counties, which lean Democratic.

The rule was just the latest in a string of partisan votes from the board, members of which Donald Trump praised by name at a rally in Georgia last month. A few weeks ago, the board empowered county election officials — many of whom have challenged election results in the past — to personally investigate election results and demand reams of election-related documentation, potentially delaying the certification of the state’s results.
Experts and election officials warned that the election board’s new rule could be used to sow doubt about election results.

Even prominent Georgia Republicans have spoken out against the Board's decision, according to media reports.

The office of Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr, a Republican, previously warned the GOP-run board that this move would likely be unlawful because state laws don’t allow local election workers to hand-count ballots before the votes are officially counted.

“These proposed rules are not tethered to any statute — and are, therefore, likely the precise type of impermissible legislation that agencies cannot do,” his office wrote.
These conclusions echo concerns raised by Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who has previously blasted the GOP-dominated board as a “mess.”
“We’re too close to the election,” Raffensperger, a Republican, told CNN on Thursday. “We’re 50 days out before we have our election. In fact, we’re really just three weeks before we start early voting, and it’s just too late in the cycle.”

IndieDems Comments:

The new rule is another brazen Republican effort to create confusion in the election process, giving Republicans immense leverage to exploit to frustrate the will of the people. For all intents and purposes, a repeat of January 6 by another method.