The Georgia State Election Board will allow checks for discrepancies on ballots for the 2024 presidential election before the results are certified, a move praised by allies of former President Donald Trump .
The five-member board, which includes three conservative members, voted 3-2 Monday to allow county election board members to investigate even slight discrepancies between the number of cast ballots and the number of voters in each precinct before certifying the results.
Former Republican National Committee and Trump spokeswoman Liz Harrington lauded the decision as "great news" in a post to X, saying, "If discrepancies are found, they must be investigated and resolved before certifying."
Conservative lawyers, including Ken Cuccinelli, a former Department of Homeland Security official under Trump, and the Heritage Foundation's Hans von Spakovsky, encouraged the board to approve the discrepancy checks, pushing back against criticism from Democrats that the measure would undermine voter confidence.
Trump lost to then-candidate Joe Biden by nearly 11,000 votes in the Peach State's 2020 election, prompting him to place a January 2021 call to Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger . During the call, Trump asked Raffensperger to "find" enough votes to help offset his defeat amid his concerns about widespread voter fraud. The outcome of that call led to Trump's pending racketeering indictment, where he has pleaded not guilty to state charges stemming from allegations that he sought to subvert the election in Georgia.
Notably, Raffensperger issued a statement last week ahead of the board's decision to make election discrepancy checks available ahead of certification, saying changes made "outside of the legislative process undermine voter confidence and burden election workers."
"Georgia voters reject this 11th hour chaos, and so should the unelected members of the State Election Board," Raffensperger said.
State House Democrats also sent a letter to Georgia Republican House Speaker Jon Burns on Monday calling for him to replace his board appointment, Janelle King, saying that the majority of conservatives on the board "have formed a majority voting bloc that has repeatedly approved rules that are unlawful, exceed the Board’s authority, and are poor public policy," according to a local PBS affiliate.
A separate rule was advanced on Monday to require hand counts of ballots in every precinct after the polls close, and the board will vote on that proposal in September.
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Monday's vote came two weeks after the board also approved a separate rule that allows county election boards to conduct "reasonable" inquiries into irregularities before certifying results.
The former president is slated to face off against Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, in the Nov. 5 election. Polls presently show a tight race, with Georgia among seven states that will likely determine the national victor.
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