Can Georgia’s MAGA election board actually rig the vote for Trump?

Over the next seven weeks until Election Day, the Today, Explained podcast will examine the major themes of the 2024 election by looking at each of the seven swing states. We’ll hear from voters in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, and North Carolina, and dive deep into topics like abortion, the concerns of rural voters, and economic stressors for retirees and Latino voters. We’re kicking it off with Georgia, where “election security” efforts are once again at the forefront for officials and voters alike.

For months, Georgia’s highest-ranking Republican leaders have been speaking out against an obscure, unelected board that has passed a series of controversial rule changes that could make it harder to know who won the state in the likely event of a close race, and facilitate attempts to dispute the election results.

According to WABE reporter Sam Gringlas, one rule allows local election board members to prevent votes from being counted at precincts if board members identify discrepancies, pending an investigation. And if the board members believe the error cannot be corrected, the board “shall determine a method to compute the votes justly.”

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has said rule changes to the certification process that have been advanced by the board are “misguided” and “will delay election results.”

“What they’re talking about is breaking open the ballot boxes,” Raffensperger told NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly last week in an interview about new rules that allow local election board members to review massive amounts of documents before certifying election results. “Instead of [counting votes] in a secure warehouse and under the observation of the county election director … it would be happening at the precinct level.”

Former President Donald Trump, who in 2020 attempted to pressure Georgia officials to flip the state in his favor after losing the state’s electoral college points to President Joe Biden, has celebrated the board’s changes. “They’re doing a great job,” Trump said in August. “Three members are all pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.”

On Friday, the board voted on and passed several more rule changes. The changes require polling places to hand-count paper ballots, significantly slowing the reporting process; provide more access for poll watchers; post daily updates on the number of people in each county to cast a ballot; and post ballot reconciliation reports to a county website.

The latest round of changes is already facing scrutiny; Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr, a Republican, wrote a letter to the State Election Board ahead of their meeting warning them that the proposed rules “are not tethered to any statute — and are, therefore, likely the precise type of impermissible legislation that agencies cannot do.”

To better understand whether moves from election boards like Georgia’s will impact the upcoming election, Today, Explained co-host Noel King spoke with David J. Becker. He’s the founder of the Center for Election Innovation & Research and has served as lead counsel on major voting rights litigation, including the Supreme Court case Georgia v. Ashcroft, which dealt with redistricting in Georgia.

A partial transcript of their conversation, edited for length and clarity, follows. Listen to the full conversation on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find podcasts.

David, we heard about these rule changes that the Georgia State Election Board has been trying to pass. They could, we understand, make disputing the election results easier. How much of a threat is that to the state’s election integrity?

Georgia’s Election Board has some oversight responsibility for directing counties and the county boards on running elections, but they have no authority on actually certifying the vote. And it’s important that we understand what certification of the vote is in every single state.

Certification is just the non-discretionary ministerial act of giving an election legal effect. That’s not to say that there aren’t opportunities to bring legitimate legal challenges if candidates or campaigns think that there has been a problem. But there’s another path for that. And that path is through the courts where they have to bring evidence and they have to subject that evidence to scrutiny and cross-examination. And a court has to hear it.

It’s not the place for political appointees like the Georgia State Election Board to decide they don’t like the election. So the reality is that the State Election Board’s efforts are not going to change the fact that whoever wins Georgia’s electoral votes will get those electoral votes. However, it could be used to fuel disinformation and lies spread by a losing candidate that an election was stolen.

What about after the votes are cast? What kind of protections are in place to make sure all of those votes are counted?

Georgia has all paper ballots. They have audits of those paper ballots to ensure that the machines counted them accurately. And Georgia has early certification dates. Counties are required to certify their votes — again, just reporting up to the state, “These are the votes. We legally say these are the votes.” And letting the state then certify. So if there are any counties or any county board members who decide that they have the power to overturn the will of the people of Georgia and want to delay that effort, the state will be able to act quickly on November 12 to compel them to certify.

There have been other attempts to do this in states like New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and Michigan. And they’ve been dealt with swiftly and decisively on a bipartisan basis. Georgia is prepared to do the same.

This will be resolved well in advance of the key deadline here, which in the presidential race is December 11. December 11 is the date that the new Electoral Count Reform Act, passed by Congress in 2022, requires that electors be what’s called “ascertained,” which means that the governor has to sign a document saying the electors go to whoever won a given state. And I am 100 percent confident that Georgia, and in fact all of the states, will be able to work past efforts to destabilize an election and ensure that their voters in their states, including those who voted for the losing candidate, aren’t disenfranchised in the race for president and their electors are counted.

What should voters be watching out for on Election Day and the day after Election Day this year? Not just in Georgia, but around the country?

First, it shouldn’t be a surprise to us if any given candidate wins. Given how closely divided we are and especially how passions are running high, we’re going to see very high turnout. And that means we should expect on Election Day and night that election officials are going to be working incredibly hard to answer the one question on all of our minds, which is who won?

But we also should recognize that they are counting very complex ballots in every jurisdiction in this country. There are dozens of races on those ballots, not just the presidential race, not just Senate races in some states, not just congressional races, but state races, local races. County races. Ballot measures. There are places where there are as many as six pages on the ballot with dozens of races. And so we should expect that we’re not going to know who won the election on election night because it takes some time, especially when margins are very narrow, to count all the ballots.

That’s one factor that election officials have no impact over — the margin of victory. And if the margin of victory is extremely narrow, it might take several days to get to the point where the media can call it. And that media call is unofficial. But it’s what we often think of as the decisive call. So we should be patient.

I think we should also expect that there’s a very strong likelihood that a losing candidate might declare victory on election night and spread lies about the process. And we should ignore that. If you hear a candidate on election night claim victory before victory has been determined, you should know that that candidate thinks they lost because a candidate who thinks they won has every incentive to support the legitimacy of the process.

David, although you sound very calm because there are protections in place to make sure the election is certified, the votes are counted, it sounds like you also do have some concerns that even though everything should go right, it could go wrong.

What I’m concerned about is that we may have to prepare for an all-out assault on reality, on the reality that a candidate might lose. I mean, we saw that happen in 2020. Donald Trump lost the election. It wasn’t particularly close. And nevertheless, there are tens of millions of people who have believed the lies and that delusion has persisted for four years.

We should make no mistake that those who believe the lies, those who supported the former president are the target for this long-term grift. I have a deep amount of sympathy for people who voted for a candidate who lost and are sincerely disappointed. That’s who most of these people are.

Unfortunately, the former president and many surrounding him have targeted them for a long-term grift, raising money off of their disappointment and lying to them about the outcome of an election that he lost. So I think we have to prepare for the very likely possibility that if former President Trump loses — and by the way, he could win legitimately. And if he does, I will be the first one to say so, as I did in 2016. But if he loses, I think we should expect that we will hear a significant amount of disinformation and lies about that election intended to keep his supporters angry and perhaps violent, and definitely donating.