DeKalb County asks judge to block new State Election Board rules
Georgia Board of Elections meeting on August 6, 2024.
DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. - DeKalb County is going to court against Georgia's controversial State Election Board on Friday over several of the board's recently-passed rules.
The county has petitioned the court to block the board's rules of requiring hand-counting votes, adding more locations for poll watchers, and requiring daily reports of which voters have cast ballots early.
In their petition, DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond and the DeKalb County Board of Registration and Elections say the rules require new training and hiring that would divert resources needed during the run-up to the general election on Nov. 5.
"One rule in particular – the ‘Hand Counting’ rule – threatens to serve as a ‘poison pill,’ delaying the county’s statutorily mandated certification process by forcing a time-consuming and costly hand count of ballots at the precinct level that will likely stretch into the days following Election Day itself, eating into the one-week certification period," attorneys for the county wrote in the petition.
Calling the rules "last-minute changes," the county is asking a judge to declare all three rules to be invalid.
A hearing will take place at 10 a.m. on Friday at the DeKalb County Courthouse.
Judge blocks new Georgia election rules, Republicans appeal
DeKalb County's petition comes at the same time as a Fulton County judge blocked seven of the Georgia State Election Board's rules, including the three DeKalb County is fighting, calling them "illegal, unconstitutional, and void."
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thomas Cox issued the order Wednesday after holding a hearing on challenges to the rules.
Cox found that the rules are "unsupported by Georgia’s Election Code and are in fact contrary to the Election Code." He also wrote that the State Election Board did not have authority to pass them. He ordered the board to immediately remove the rules and to inform all state and local election officials that the rules are void and not to be followed.
National and state Republicans appealed Cox's ruling on Thursday, with RNC Chairman Michael Whatley accused the judge of "the very worst of judicial activism."
"By overturning the Georgia State Election Board’s commonsense rules passed to safeguard Georgia’s elections, the judge sided with the Democrats in their attacks on transparency, accountability, and the integrity of our elections," Whatley said. "We have immediately appealed this egregious order to ensure commonsense rules are in place for the election — we will not let this stand."
The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Eternal Vigilance Action, an organization founded and led by former state Rep. Scot Turner, a Republican. The suit argued that the State Election Board overstepped its authority in adopting the rules.
"Seeing the Republican Party argue that unelected bureaucrats should have the power to make new law is certainly a departure from traditional conservative values," Turner wrote in a text to The Associated Press. "But we expected them to appeal and are prepared to fight on behalf of reining in this administrative-state power grab as long as we need to."
The Georgia Supreme Court has not said whether it will hear the appeal.