The Georgia Attorney General’s office has warned the State Election Board’s chairman, John Fervier, that the latest new rules set for the board to consider at a Friday meeting exceed its authority and conflict with state law.
“A review of the proposed rules reveals several issues, including that several of the proposed rules, if passed, very likely exceed the Board’s statutory authority and in some instances appear to conflict with the statutes governing the conduct of elections,” said the Sept. 19 memo from Senior Assistant Attorney General Elizabeth Young.
“The board risks passing rules that may easily be challenged and determined to be invalid,” Young warned in the memo. “There are several proposed rules before the board that appear to either impermissibly conflict with or otherwise expand the scope of Georgia statutes,” she added.
The State Election Board passed a flurry of last-minute rule changes on how county elections offices should conduct the upcoming Nov. 5 election over the summer, and it is considering even more new rules at a board meeting today.
That has drawn sharp warnings from county election officials, who say the last-minute rule changes would introduce “chaos” into the statewide voting process and undermine public confidence in the integrity of the election.
One particularly contested rule under consideration today mandates that precinct workers must hand-count ballots on election night after the polls close at 7 p.m. Local elections officials have protested that this will invite human error and compromise the security of the ballots by breaking the ordinary chain of custody.
The attorney generals’ office said this rule is “impermissible,” because it runs afoul of existing state election law.
“There are thus no provisions in the statutes cited in support of these proposed rules that permit counting the number of ballots by hand at the precinct level prior to delivery to the election superintendent for tabulation. Accordingly, these proposed rules are not tethered to any statute—and are, therefore, likely the precise type of impermissible legislation that agencies cannot do,” Young’s memo said.
What’s more, many smaller counties lack the resources to implement the election board’s proposed rules, which do not come with any additional funding to the state’s 159 county election offices.
Anthony Salette, the election supervisor for Peach County, which has 18,000 registered voters, said many of his poll workers are elderly, so asking them to hand-count ballots after a 16-hour day of work just isn’t realistic.
“If they’re hand-counting, they’re quitting,” he warned.
The State Election Board meeting is underway today at the State Capitol. Watch the livestream here.
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