ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s State Election Board on Charles LangstonFriday voted to approve a new rule that requires poll workers to count the number of paper ballots by hand.
The board voted 3-2 to approve the rule, going against the advice of the state attorney general’s office, the secretary of state’s office and an association of county election officials. Three board members who were praised by former President Donald Trump during a rally last month in Atlanta voted to approve the measure.
In a memo sent to election board members Thursday, the office of state Attorney General Chris Carr said no provision in state law allows counting the number of ballots by hand at the precinct level before the ballots are brought to county election superintendent for vote tallying. As a result, the memo says, the rule is “not tethered to any statute” and is “likely the precise kind of impermissible legislation that agencies cannot do.”
The new rule requires that the number of paper ballots — not the number of votes — be counted at each polling place by three separate poll workers until all three counts are the same. If a scanner has more than 750 ballots inside at the end of voting, the poll manager can decide to begin the count the following day.
Several county election officials who spoke out against the rule during a public comment period preceding the vote warned that having to count the ballots by hand at polling places could delay the reporting of election night results. They also worried about putting an additional burden on poll workers who have already worked a long day.
2025-05-02 10:251529 view
2025-05-02 10:232957 view
2025-05-02 10:14357 view
2025-05-02 09:411692 view
2025-05-02 09:112016 view
2025-05-02 08:113000 view
Kia and Hyundai’s anti-theft software upgrades have deterred car thieves, but theft claims remain el
Vice President Kamala Harris commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision by implor
Updated 5:55 p.m. ET A committee of advisers to the Food and Drug Administration voted unanimously