If election board officials in Georgia are thinking about refusing to certify election results they don't like, a judge has now told them they can't.
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/judge-georgia-must-certify-election-results-regardless-outcome-rcna175460
Arguably no state has taken more provocative pre-election steps than Georgia, where conspiratorial Republican officials on the Georgia State Election Board have recently created a series of unnecessary “reforms” that might very well create election-administration problems next month. That’s not, however, the only area of concern in the Peach State.
After the 2020 elections, several local Republican election board members refused to certify elections for a variety of assorted and dubious reasons, and there are plenty of concerns that there will be related tactics in this year’s cycle. It’s against this backdrop that a Georgia judge issued a ruling this week rejecting this as a possibility. The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported on Tuesday:
Certifying elections is a required duty of county election boards in Georgia, and they’re not allowed to refuse finalizing results based on suspicions of miscounts or fraud, a Fulton County judge ruled Tuesday. Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney rejected claims brought by Fulton County election board member Julie Adams, who voted against certifying this spring’s presidential primary. McBurney ruled that Georgia law requires certification, and county election boards don’t have any discretion not to do so.
......Indeed, my colleague Lisa Rubin published a report last month in which she characterized this case as one of the “most critical” trials of the 2024 election season. Lisa explained:
Imagine a world in which local election board members are empowered, through the guise of doing their own “research,” to delay or refuse the certification of county results. That could hold up the certification of the entire state’s results and even potentially its certificate appointing electors. And if that were to happen, Georgia’s missing electors would be subtracted from the total needed to win the electoral college. Put another way, the failure to certify thousands of votes could end up depriving the rightful winner of a presidency voted upon by nearly 200 million.
With this in mind, it’s a big deal that McBurney ruled that Georgia law requires certification, and the matter is not discretionary for members of local election boards.
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