Georgia judge blocks rule requiring hand counting of ballots

Photo: Jeff Amy Associated Press People vote early Tuesday in Tucker, Georgia.

Agence France-Presse in Washington

Published at 7:18

• Middle East

A judge in Georgia, one of the US states where the outcome of the presidential election in November could be decided, blocked a measure on Tuesday requiring the manual counting of ballots, while the first day of early voting was very well attended.

In his ruling, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney said the new rule would upend the electoral process just weeks before the Nov. 5 election and that it was “too late” to accept it.

“Anything that adds uncertainty and disorder to the electoral process is detrimental to the public,” said McBurney, who ruled to temporarily suspend the measure.

In September, the Georgia State Board of Elections, led by a pro-Trump majority, issued a controversial rule requiring ballots to be counted by hand, a move that could have significantly delayed the reporting of results.

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According to Georgian officials on both sides of the aisle, hand counting is unnecessary because machines already count ballots, but it is also a potential tool to sow doubt by slowing down the process and creating space for disinformation if discrepancies arise.

After the last presidential election, Donald Trump was indicted for attempting to illegally reverse the results of the 2020 Georgia election in order to overturn his defeat.

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Record turnout

On Monday, Judge McBurney rejected a lawsuit by a Republican election official in Fulton County, Atlanta, seeking recognition of her “discretionary” power not to certify results if there is suspicion of error or fraud.

Certification is not within the discretionary power of election officials, who are required to do so within the time limits prescribed by law, the judge said.

If they have doubts or concerns about the fairness of the results, they should refer the matter to the appropriate prosecutor, he said.

“If election officials were given the discretion, as the petitioner claims, to act as fact-finder, prosecutor, jury and judge and thereby — by unilaterally concluding error or fraud — refuse to certify the results, Georgia voters would be silenced,” the judge said.

“Our Constitution and our Election Code do not allow that to happen,” he added.

With three weeks to go until the U.S. presidential election, Georgia opened polling stations on Tuesday so that people could vote in person, without waiting until November 5. Both candidates, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, have urged residents to get out to the polls now.

“With the first day of early voting breaking all records and the absences accepted, we've had over 328,000 votes cast so far,” Gabriel Sterling said on X.

The previous record for the first day of early voting was set in 2020, when 136,000 votes were cast.

Voters across the United States can cast their ballots by mail or in person early before Tuesday, November 5. More than five million have already done so, according to the University of Florida's tally.