Rich. Co. BOE Director calls on Georgia State Elections Board to halt rule changes ahead of November Election

AUGUSTA, Ga. (WJBF) – We are now less than three months away from the 2024 Presidential Election.

The Georgia State Election Board (SEB) wants to impose new rules that would go into effect for the November Election.

But the Georgia Association of Voter Registration and Election Officials (GAVREO), which consists of election staff from around the state, are taking a stand on what could be a major issue.

“We’ve been using this voting equipment for 4 years now. We’ve been certifying elections since elections first began. So, there’s no emergency about this,” said Augusta Elections Director Travis Doss.

Doss serves as President of GAVREO and says they are urging the SEB to halt these new rules from taking effect.

One of the major changes would require poll workers to hand-count all paper ballots on election night after the polls close.

Currently, poll workers take ballots out of the ballot box, seal them, and bring them to the elections office.

This change would need three poll workers to verify the total off the machine, even after ballots are verified when ballots are pulled out.

Doss says this extra step would only add more confusion and stress for election officials.

“If you assume that you’ve got three people that have been working 14 hours, all day long, and now they’re having to count thousands of pieces of paper – and those three have to come up with the exact same number– they’re gonna be there a while,” said Doss. “It’s going to delay election returns, and it could possibly call the election into question on why it’s taking so long to get those election results.”

Another rule would require Boards of Elections to meet on the Friday after Election Day before 3 PM to check vote totals, even though voters have until 5 PM to get their ballots in.

“The rule is calling for this ‘pre-meeting’ to look at vote totals, when all the votes are not in yet,” Doss said. “It’s asking that all of this paperwork and information be given to boards, and it’s not determined what the boards are even going to ask for. So, it’s very ambiguous.”

We reached out to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger about the issue, and his office describes the situation and the state election board as “a mess”.

Doss says the real mess is that the SEB continues to add new rules to the process.

“The state elections board has another meeting next month. Rules were proposed at the meeting on Monday, so they’re still in the rulemaking process. So when is this going to stop? Are we just going to keep going until the day of the Election and propose more rules? There needs to be a stopping point,” said Doss.

He also says it’s a matter of abiding by federal law, which puts a moratorium on changes to voting process 90 days out from a federal election.

“If we can’t change polling places, if we can’t move voters, if we can’t delete voters within 90 days of a federal election, maybe we shouldn’t be making rules that are going to affect those same elections,” Doss said.

Early voting begins on Tuesday, October 15th, with Election Day set for Tuesday, November 5th.

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