Georgia’s Supreme Court rejects Republican attempt to quickly reinstate invalid election rules

ATLANTA — Georgia’s Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an effort by national and state Republicans to immediately reinstate adopted election rules that a judge said were invalid.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thomas Cox ruled last week that the State Election Board did not have the authority to adopt the new rules, declaring them “illegal, unconstitutional and void.” The Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of Georgia had appealed this ruling to Georgia’s highest court, asking for it to be expeditiously handled and for the rules to be reinstated while the appeal was pending.

The Supreme Court denied the request for expedited processing and stayed Cox’s order. The court’s order states that once the appeal is filed, it will “proceed in the normal course of business,” meaning it will likely take months before a ruling is reached.

The three-member Republican majority on the State Election Board, which was praised by former President Donald Trump at a rally in Atlanta in August, voted to adopt multiple rules in August and September over the objections of the board’s lone Democrat and the impartial chairman. At least a half-dozen lawsuits have been filed in response, each challenging one or more of these rules. Given the tight timetable with the November general election just weeks away, judges have acted quickly to set up and hold hearings in these cases.

Democrats had celebrated Cox’s ruling. They had expressed concern that the rules could be used by allies of Donald Trump to delay or deny certification or election results, or to cast doubt on the results if the former president loses the presidential election to Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

While some prominent Republicans in Georgia, including Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, have criticized the flurry of last-minute rules introduced by the State Election Board, the state and national Republican parties have supported the board. They say the rules promote transparency and accountability in state elections.

Cox’s ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Eternal Vigilance Action, an organization founded and led by former state Rep. Scot Turner, a Republican. The lawsuit argued that the State Election Board exceeded its authority by adopting the seven rules. In addition to declaring the rules invalid, he ordered the state election board to immediately notify all state and local election officials that the rules are null and void and should not be followed.

But an earlier ruling by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney in a separate case temporarily blocked a rule that required three polling places to each count paper ballots — and not votes — by hand after the polls closed. McBurney blocked the rule while considering the merits of that case. He said it was too close to the general election and implementing that new rule at this point would cause chaos.

Two other new rules that Cox declared invalid were adopted by the state election board in August and have to do with certification. One provides a definition of certification that includes requiring county officials to conduct a “reasonable investigation” before certifying results, but it does not specify what that means. The other includes language that allows county election officials to “examine any election-related documentation created during the conduct of the election.”

The other rules that Cox says are illegal and unconstitutional are rules that:

— Require someone personally delivering a ballot to provide a signature and photo ID.

– Require video surveillance and recording of ballot boxes after polls close during early voting.

– Expand mandatory designated areas for partisan poll workers to stand at tabulation centers.

— Require daily public updates of the number of votes cast during early voting.