The Republican-controlled Georgia State Election Board inched toward a possible takeover of elections in Fulton County after a Wednesday vote to appoint a bipartisan panel to investigate Fulton County.
Republicans in Georgia have long sought state control of the election review process in Fulton County, especially after it rendered a key victory for Democrats in the 2020 election. The county was also one of the key locations of former President Donald Trump’s election fraud claims, despite an independent monitor finding no evidence of irregularities.
“The narrative driving this pressure has been influenced by disinformation surrounding the November 2020 election, but the fact remains that Fulton County voters have reported numerous problems for far longer than November 2020, particularly surrounding registration and absentee ballots,” election board member Sara Tindall Ghazal said following a vote to appoint three people to conduct a performance review of Fulton County elections, the Associated Press reported.
GEORGIA REPUBLICANS SET PROCESS IN MOTION FOR STATE TAKEOVER OF FULTON COUNTY ELECTIONS
Members of the three-person panel include Republican Ricky Kittle, chairman of the Catoosa County Elections Board; Democrat Stephen Day, a member of the Gwinnett County Elections Board; and Ryan Germany, general counsel for Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
The review board is assigned to conduct a full and thorough investigation of election equipment, registrations, elections, and compliance with state law. The board will then issue a report sharing its conclusions.
The formation of the review panel comes as Republican lawmakers asked for an investigation into Fulton County’s handling of elections last month. The GOP lawmakers said they want the review to ensure that election officials in Fulton County, which consists of nearly 11% of the state’s electorate, have been appropriately following state voting laws.
The Georgia panel’s investigation will take roughly 90 days from the request before a preliminary hearing is held over the investigation’s results.
The review follows an election integrity-related audit in Phoenix, Arizona, where the state Senate has subpoenaed 2.1 million ballots cast in the 2020 election to ensure that Maricopa County’s election officials properly counted and certified the vote count. Still, the Fulton County review is not a full forensic audit and aims to ensure county election officials have been following proper procedures.
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President Joe Biden received nearly 73% of the vote in Fulton County, while Trump was favored by 26% of residents. Biden garnered 243,904 more votes in the county. Trump lost the state of Georgia by approximately 12,000 votes, and Republican allies of the former president have sought to contest the ballot counts throughout the state, particularly in Fulton County, after election officials were slower to report tallies in the aftermath of the election.
The Washington Examiner contacted the Georgia State Election Board but did not immediately receive a response.
