A Republican-appointed judge in Georgia has suggested that a new rule instituted by the state’s election board may be too “vague” to stand.
Georgia’s State Election Board, which is controlled by three Republicans whom former President Donald Trump has praised as “pit bulls,” introduced a rule this year that allows it to conduct a “reasonable inquiry” before any election results are officially certified.
Political experts have warned that the rule and others passed by the pro-Trump board could allow certification of the election to be delayed past a required deadline of November 12 in the event that Trump is defeated in Georgia by Vice President Kamala Harris on November 5.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, an appointee of Republican former Georgia Governor Nathan Deal, held a hearing on Tuesday in a lawsuit over the rule brought by the Democratic National Committee, the Georgia Democratic Party and Democratic members from several county election boards.
A “Vote Here” sign is pictured outside a polling place in Atlanta on December 6, 2022. A Republican-appointed judge on Tuesday suggested that Georgia’s new rule allowing unlimited “reasonable inquiry” before vote certification was too “vague” and “needs clarification.”
Alex Wong
McBurney, who rankled Republicans on Monday by striking down Georgia’s six-week abortion ban, said on Tuesday that the election board’s “reasonable inquiry” rule “on its face” was “vague and needs clarification,” according to CNN.
The judge also reportedly criticized the board for putting into place new election rules that “seem to pop up every 20 minutes,” such as a rule that recently required all ballots in Georgia to be hand-counted three times before votes are certified.
Newsweek reached out for comment to Georgia’s State Election Board via online contact form on Tuesday evening.
Valdosta State University political science professor Bernard Tamas, co-chair of the Georgia chapter of the Scholars Strategy Network, previously told Newsweek that the “reasonable inquiry” rule was “ill-defined at present and could potentially add confusion by creating further delays in the election process.”
“They will likely stretch the capacities of the state’s election officials and cause high levels of chaos,” Tamas said.
Jennifer McCoy, Regents political science professor at Georgia State University, had similar thoughts, telling Newsweek that the rule “not only runs counter to” the board’s “role established by state law but opens the door to Georgia failing to certify its elections and have its votes counted.”
“If that extreme scenario were to occur, it would wreak havoc with the outcome and confidence in the entire national election,” she said.
Georgia, which Trump lost narrowly to President Joe Biden in 2020, is among at least seven battleground states expected to be critical in deciding the outcome of this year’s presidential election.
Trump continues to falsely claim that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him due to massive fraud in Georgia and other states that he lost, although no credible evidence to support his claims have ever surfaced.
Democrats have also sued the Georgia election board over its new hand-counted ballots rule, which some have warned could expose results to human error, especially since the rule may have been put into place too late to properly train election workers.
Republican Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr has said that the board’s changes are “very likely” to exceed the panel’s “statutory authority,” while GOP Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has warned of delays caused by the changes creating “a vacuum that leads to misinformation and disinformation.”
Harris campaign spokesperson Quentin Fulks told The New York Times on Monday that the campaign agrees “with Georgia’s Republican Attorney General and Secretary of State.”
