Officials Voted Down a Controversial Georgia Election Rule, Saying It Violated the Law. Then a Similar Version Passed.

The rule, which was pushed by nationally prominent election deniers, only changed in minor ways between being voted down in May and approved in August. Those adjustments made it even less compliant with existing law, experts say.

by Doug Bock Clark
Aug. 27, 5 a.m. EDT

The members of the Georgia State Election Board could not have been clearer. Back in May, four of them voted down a proposed rule that would have given county election boards a new way to delay or reject election results, which could throw the November vote count into chaos.

“You run counter to both the federal and the state law,” said Ed Lindsey, a Republican board member and attorney who practices election law, to the woman who proposed the rule.

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Three months later, a new draft of the rule came back for a vote. This time, it passed 3-2.

How much did the rule change between drafts? A review by ProPublica shows: hardly at all. In fact, election law experts told ProPublica that the small changes made the rule even less compliant with existing law.

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