The Georgia State Board of Elections on Tuesday passed a controversial new rule that gives county election boards more power to investigate vote counts before they are certified – an unprecedented change in the certification of elections in the state of Georgia.

The rule, which the panel’s Republican majority passed on a 3-2 vote, drew sharp criticism from voting rights groups and Democratic activists, who expressed concern that the rule could be weaponized by some members of the county election board who deny that President Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election in the state.

That was just one of numerous proposed rules the committee discussed in two at times chaotic days of meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday. The State Election Board was also criticized for rushing through rulemaking just 69 days before early voting begins on Oct. 15 for the Nov. 5 presidential election, which is important to many.

The three votes for the new rule came from Republican board members whom former President Donald Trump praised at his campaign rally in Atlanta last Saturday as “pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency and victory.”

These members are Janice Johnston, who was appointed by the state Republican Party and attended Trump’s rally, Rick Jeffares, who was appointed by the Republican-controlled state Senate, and Janelle King, who was appointed by the Republican-controlled state House of Representatives.

Voting against the measure were Democratic Party appointee Sara Tindall Ghazal and Republican Governor Brian Kemp appointee John Fervier, who chairs the committee.

What is a “reasonable investigation”?

The new rule changes the definition of a precinct’s election certificate to state that it “certifies, after reasonable examination, that the counting and tabulation of the election are complete and correct and that the results are a true and accurate record of all votes cast in that election.”

However, it does not define what constitutes a “reasonable investigation.” Critics say the rule could be used to refuse to certify election results with little or no basis.

“This makes certification dependent on a committee member’s personal perception of the accuracy of the election results,” said Kristin Nabers, state director of All Voting Is Local, a voting rights advocacy organization. “What an individual or (county election) committee considers to be a reasonable investigation can vary from committee to committee … (in) 159 counties.”

The rule “provides backing for board members not to certify elections if they don’t like the outcome,” she concluded.

The certification function of county election boards has so far been limited to confirming that vote counts for each of their precincts have been accurately reported and counted. County election officials are instructed to report any suspected voter fraud or other irregularities to the district attorney, said Andrea Young, director of the ACLU of Georgia.

“Georgia law has repeatedly affirmed that the role of election boards is administrative. It is not their job to conduct an investigation,” she said.

Critics were especially concerned because a newly appointed Republican member of the Fulton County Election Board refused to certify the results of the May primary election. The board member, Julie Adams, belongs to an activist group opposed to the election. (Fulton’s other four board members, including another Republican, voted to certify the results.)

The rule appears to contradict the state’s current election law, which requires county election officials to certify election results by the Monday following the election.

Georgia’s 2021 Election Integrity Act requires counties to certify election results by 5 p.m. the Monday after the election, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger emphatically explained in a post on X on Wednesday morning. “We fully expect counties to comply with the law,” he said.

An “unprecedented” board

Historically, State Board of Elections legislation has been a dry, bureaucratic process designed to provide guidance and standardization to individual counties in conducting their elections.

“I’ve been going to State Election Commission meetings for a few years now, and until about a year ago, they were pretty boring…more than half the seats were empty,” said Nabers of All Voting Is Local.

After Georgia voted Democrats in the 2020 presidential and Senate elections, the Republican-dominated state legislature passed a 2021 election bill that gave the state new oversight powers over county election offices. The panel then ordered a lengthy investigation into the Fulton Elections Authority.

The persistence of debunked claims that Trump won the 2020 election in Georgia and the addition of new committee members sympathetic to the unproven claims of widespread voter fraud have radically changed the State Elections Board’s approach to rulemaking, voting rights activists say.

“All of this is truly unprecedented,” said Young of the ACLU of Georgia. “We have never seen this level of activity in the state election board.”

Create chaos

The flood of rule proposals presented to the panel at the last minute in the summer before a vote is “an abuse of the system” that creates an “impossible situation” for election administration, Young said.

Because the Georgia Board of Elections rules do not take effect until 40 days after they are passed, some rules may not take effect until ballots have already been printed and mailed, she added.

The ACLU of Georgia, Young said, is “exploring options” to legally challenge the new rule, which gives county election boards more discretion in their investigations.

But that raises another problem, says Madeline Summerville, a Democratic attorney and political strategist. Even if such election rules clearly violate the law, a plaintiff only has standing to sue if he or she can prove that a rule would harm him or her.

And that probably wouldn’t happen until the election is held. “Especially at this stage, it’s going to be almost impossible to maintain your position,” Summerville said.

Are there more rules to come?

Several other proposed election rules, still under review, would change the training of poll workers, the regulation of ballot boxes and the labeling of mail-in ballots.

Critics complained that these last-minute changes would incur significant costs and would be a task for county election officials that would be difficult to accomplish in such a short period of time.

“I just want to make sure we go into the mess we’re creating with our eyes open,” Ghazal, the board’s only Democrat, said of one of the many rules the board again passed by a 3-2 majority at its Aug. 7 meeting.

Adding to the potential election chaos is SB 189, a new law passed in the last legislative session that allows individual citizens to challenge the legality of a voter’s registration.

The State Election Board will meet again on August 16. Among other things, it may consider establishing other legislation and also resume the establishment of an election monitoring group for Fulton County.

One of the watchdog groups under consideration is made up entirely of Republicans. One member, Heather Honey, was a consultant to Cyber ​​Ninjas, who investigated wild election conspiracies during a controversial audit of the 2020 election in Arizona – such as whether fake ballots made from bamboo fibers came from China.