Georgia: Gwinnett County renews effort to get minority voting rights suit dismissed | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Gwinnett County, its school district and its elections board have filed new motions arguing for the dismissal of a minority voting rights lawsuit filed against them last fall. The federal suit — filed in August on behalf of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials, the Georgia NAACP and several individual plaintiffs — claims that the way Gwinnett’s Board of Commissioners and school board districts are drawn dilutes the ability of minority voters to elect candidates of their choice. Gwinnett is a minority-majority county but has never had a non-white candidate elected to either board.

Georgia: Who gets to vote in 6th District? Politicians already decided | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Who gets to vote and who doesn’t in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District is more than an accident of geography. It’s also the result of decades of political shenanigans by Democrats and Republicans alike. State legislators have dramatically redrawn the 6th District’s boundaries to gain political advantage, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found. For decades, the district covered several counties west and southwest of Atlanta, all the way to the Alabama line. It never elected a Republican until 1978, when Newt Gingrich was elected to an open seat. But in 1991, Democrats tried to draw Gingrich out of his own district. They gave the 6th an entirely new footprint, centered on Cobb County.

Georgia: Group sues to use paper ballots in Georgia 6th Run-Off | Atlanta Journal Constitution

Georgia’s voting infrastructure is too old, unreliable and vulnerable to be used without a forensic review of its operating systems, according to a lawsuit seeking to require voters’ use of paper ballots for next month’s 6th Congressional District runoff election. The suit, filed in Fulton County Superior Court, names Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp — the state’s top election official — as a defendant, along with the election directors for all three counties that have communities in the 6th District: Cobb, DeKalb and Fulton. It comes at a crucial time. Early in-person voting for the June 20 runoff begins Tuesday, with all eyes on Georgia ahead of the hotly contested race between Republican Karen Handel and Democrat Jon Ossoff. … The Colorado-based Rocky Mountain Foundation filed the suit in conjunction with two Georgia voters, Donna Curling and Donna Price. Both Price and Curling are members of the foundation, which focuses on fair elections and government transparency, as well as a group called Georgians for Verified Voting.

Georgia: Johns Creek Election May Be Illegitimate, Voting Group Alleges | Johns Creek Patch

The results of a special Johns Creek City Council election held April 18 may not be legitimate, according to a report by the nonprofit group VoterGA. The report focuses its critique on alleged security flaws in voting machines and says the election was improperly scheduled. Three separate elections were held that night: the Johns Creek City Council election, the Roswell City Council run-off and the Sixth District Congressional race. … But there were problems in the Johns Creek election, according to VoterGA.

Georgia: As millions pour into Georgia’s congressional runoff, the voting machinery is among the worst in America | Salon

There are so many disturbing aspects to the special election happening in Georgia’s sixth congressional district, it’s hard to know where to begin. For starters, the election runs on Microsoft Server 2000. That is not a typo. “That’s a crap system,” said Douglas Jones, a computer science professor at the University of Iowa in a phone interview; adding that the database in use, Microsoft Access is a “toy database” that should never be used for industrial applications. nFulton County Elections Director Richard Barron acknowledged in testimony on the troubled first round of the election, that the system is “inflexible.” But delving into his testimony further, and speaking to both local and national computer experts it’s evident that the results of the first round of the election on April 18th are legitimately suspect and that no election running on this type of computer system can be verified as accurate.

Georgia: Watchdog: 6th District runoff latest skirmish in voting rights war | Atlanta Journal Constitution

These past two weeks have been great for shareholders in the clipboard industry as an army of volunteers canvassed Georgia’s 6th Congressional District registering voters ahead of the June 20 runoff between Republican Karen Handel and Democrat Jon Ossoff. The last-minute push for new voters came as a result of a federal lawsuit brought against the state by a coalition of civil rights groups claiming the state violated federal law by closing down registration for the special election too early. The constitutionality of Georgia’s voter registration law is still undecided, but a federal judge issued an order reopening registration for the race for two weeks while the case grinds forward. The lawsuit is another salvo in the endless back-and-forth over voting rights in the state, a battle that has its roots in Georgia’s darkest history.

Georgia: Voters seek review of Georgia voting system before 6th District runoff | Atlanta Journal Constitution

Eleven voters have asked Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp to review the state’s voting system ahead of next month’s hotly contested 6th Congressional District runoff. The request is allowed under state law. It comes after one of the three counties in the district — Fulton — experienced a technical snafu on April 18 that delayed reported election results in the race. It also follows a letter to Kemp in March from a group of voting advocates who recommended that the state overhaul its elections system and begin using a system with a paper audit trail.

Georgia: Voter registration backlog ahead of Georgia’s 6th District runoff | Atlanta Journal Constitution

Local counties under order to reopen voter registration in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District face a backlog of tens of thousands of applications and have already begun working overtime to process them all in time for the June 20 runoff election. Still, despite concerns that a federal judge’s order would back them into a corner, no problems have been reported so far as the counties themselves appear to have hit the ground running. “Everything has been going very smoothly,” said Candice Broce, a spokeswoman for Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, the state’s top elections official. All three counties that have areas in the 6th District — Cobb, DeKalb and Fulton — had contingency plans in place in anticipation of Thursday’s ruling. The first of tens of thousands of backlogged registration applications have already begun to be processed, although officials said it is impossible to know how many of them involve residents in each county who actually reside in the district itself. That’s because it’s not readily apparent on the applications themselves.

Georgia: Republican accuses Democrat of voter registration ‘trick’ | The Hill

Karen Handel, the Republican nominee in Georgia’s closely watched 6th District special election, is accusing Democrats of a “trick” by convincing a federal judge to extend voter registration in the district. Handel, who faces Democrat Jon Ossoff in a runoff next month, lampooned Thursday’s federal court decision to reopen voter registration in a Monday fundraising email signed by the candidate. … Democrats fell just short of flipping the historically Republican seat in April when Ossoff fell short of the 50 percent threshold needed to win the jungle primary outright. While the outcome is giving Republicans a chance to reorganize and coalesce behind one candidate, Ossoff’s strong performance gave his party hope that he could flip the seat and send a chill through Republicans ahead of the 2018 midterms.

Georgia: 6th district runoff: Judge orders Georgia to reopen voter registration | Atlanta Journal Constitution

A federal judge on Thursday ordered Georgia to temporarily reopen voter registration ahead of a hotly contested congressional runoff in the 6th District. U.S. District Judge Timothy Batten made the ruling as part of a broader lawsuit by a Washington-based advocacy group, which last month accused Georgia of violating federal law by reducing the amount of time residents have to register to vote. Voter registration shut down March 20 ahead of the deciding runoff June 20 for the 6th District election, which is being held in the northern suburbs of metro Atlanta. Batten, however, ordered registration immediately reopened until May 21.

Georgia: Elections offices flooded with voter registrations | The Macon Telegraph

Elections offices across Georgia have seen a dramatic increase in the number of voter registration applications in recent months. A change with the state’s Department of Driver Services has spurred about 464,000 more applications this year compared to the most recent nonpresidential election year. And that means elections employees are spending more time sorting through them, including weeding out duplicates of people who are already registered. Statewide, there have been 559,179 voter registration applications through the Department of Driver Services since Jan. 1. During the same period in 2015, there were 95,102 voter registration applications from the Department of Driver Services, according to the Secretary of State’s Office.

Georgia: Lawsuit: 2015 Redistricting Violated Black Voters’ Rights | Associated Press

Georgia lawmakers violated federal voting rights law by moving black voters out and white voters in to two state House districts in 2015, according to a lawsuit filed Monday that calls the mid-decade redistricting an effort to protect white Republican incumbents. The Washington, D.C.-based Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law filed the federal lawsuit against the state of Georgia on behalf of the state chapter of the NAACP and five residents of the affected districts. Secretary of State Brian Kemp, the state’s top elections official, also is named in the suit. “Lawmakers firmly placed their thumb on the scale by redrawing district boundaries in ways that would preserve their incumbency and freeze the status quo in place,” said Kristen Clarke, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee. “They seek to disregard the demographic changes occurring across Georgia by putting pen to paper mid-decade.”

Georgia: State Sued Over Alleged Voter Suppression | Law Street

Ever since it was announced that Donald J. Trump was going to be the 45th President of these United States of America, Democrats have been looking to attach themselves to any kind of competition to gain some kind of payback for their defeat (See: Super Bowl LI). Although it didn’t result in an explicit victory, this past Tuesday’s special election for Georgia’s House seat in its Sixth District offered Democrats their first viable taste of victory and vengeance. Wednesday’s special election resulted in Democrat Jon Ossoff narrowly missing out on the 50 percent of the vote that he needed to win the contest outright, thus making a run-off between Ossoff and top GOP vote-getter Karen Handel necessary. The details of the run-off, scheduled for June 20, have already become the subject of controversy and, now, a lawsuit.

Georgia: Group files voting rights suit on hot Georgia run-off election | CNN

Civil rights and voting organizations filed a suit Thursday challenging a Georgia law that affects voting in a hotly contested special election runoff in June. The lawsuit alleges that a Georgia law prohibiting voters who weren’t registered in time for the special election from voting in the runoff violates federal voting law. The case could affect the heated race between Democrat Jon Ossoff and Republican Karen Handel, who are running to replace former Republican Rep. Tom Price, who joined the Trump administration. Ossoff finished in an election this week just shy of the 50% threshold against a crowded field of Republicans, meaning he and second-place vote-getter Handel advanced to a runoff election on June 20.

Georgia: Fulton County vote totals delayed by card error | Atlanta Journal Constitution

A “rare error” with a memory card that didn’t properly upload its vote tallies caused a long delay Tuesday night as Fulton County reported election results. The issue was with a card with vote totals from the 6th congressional district, said Richard Barron, Fulton’s director of registration and elections. While no votes were compromised, the problem delayed counting for more than an hour while the card was identified and reread, Barron said. “While we’re looking for it, we can’t let any more results come through,” Barron said. “When you’re reading memory cards, if you don’t have something right, it can happen.” Barron said when the county moves to export vote totals to its website, it should get a dialog box that says “operation successful.” Instead, the result was “just a line of gobbledygook, just a line of junk, just letters,” Barron said.

Georgia: Stolen voting equipment is safe in landfill, officials say | Marietta Daily Journal

Cobb County detectives have arrested a suspect in connection with the theft of four ExpressPoll polling machines out of a poll manager’s truck days before Tuesday’s elections, according to a county press release. The machines contained names, addresses and driver’s license numbers for every voter in Georgia. They are the devices poll workers use to scan IDs when voters enter the polling place. The detectives served a warrant on a Clayton County residence at 1 a.m. Wednesday. According to Cobb County spokeswoman Sheri Kell, the suspect and several accomplices told detectives the polling equipment was deemed useless and thrown in a dumpster. That dumpster has since been emptied and its contents taken to a landfill.

Georgia: Poll theft discussed in private by Cobb commissioners and secretary of state’s office officials | Marietta Daily Journal

In the wake of Saturday’s theft of polling equipment out of a poll manager’s parked truck, the Cobb Board of Commissioners met with officials from the secretary of state’s office Monday to discuss how to handle the matter in what may have been a violation of Georgia’s open meetings laws. The unannounced meeting occurred at about noon Monday in a conference room in the basement of Cobb County State Court on East Park Square in downtown Marietta. Commissioners typically hold meetings in the Cobb Government Building on Cherokee Street, either in the second-floor commission chamber that can hold members of the public, or the third-floor commissioners’ boardroom, which is much smaller.

Georgia: Voters’ data at risk after electronic pollbooks stolen in Cobb County | Atlanta Journal Constitution

State officials are investigating the theft last week of equipment from a Cobb County precinct manager’s car that could make every Georgia voters’ personal information vulnerable to theft. The equipment, used to check-in voters at the polls, was stolen Saturday evening, Secretary of State Brian Kemp said Monday. Cobb County elections director Janine Eveler said the stolen machine, known as an ExpressPoll unit, cannot be used to fraudulently vote in Tuesday’s election but that it does contain a copy of Georgia’s statewide voter file.

Georgia: KSU data breach investigation has concluded in Georgia | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Federal investigators say a “security researcher” was behind a data breach at Kennesaw State University’s Center for Election Systems, and his probing of the system broke no federal law. University officials announced the finding Friday after being briefed by investigators from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, ending a monthlong probe over a potential hacking case that had raised alarms over the security of the state’s election system. In a statement, university officials acknowledged what they called “unauthorized access” to a server used by the center, which helps the state prepare elections information and has access to millions of Georgia voter records. No student data were involved in the case. They said the incident has prompted a review of the university’s digital security efforts.

Georgia: Elections bill with 26-month voter verification deadline passes | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Georgians could continue to use federal tribal identification cards as proof of citizenship but would face a 26-month deadline to correct any discrepancies on their voter registration forms under a bill sent to Gov. Nathan Deal for his signature. House Bill 268, sponsored by state Rep. Barry Fleming, R-Harlem, is generally considered a cleanup of the state’s election code but has drawn the ire of some voter advocacy groups. They want Deal to veto the measure because they claim it violates the spirit of a recent legal settlement over how Georgia verifies voter registration information. A federal lawsuit last year accused Georgia of disenfranchising minority voters because of an “exact match” requirement used by the state on registration forms that critics said blocked thousands of them from voter rolls. Among concerns the suit cited was that the federal and state databases used to match the information may contain errors that cause applicants to be wrongly flagged in the system.

Georgia: Voter information hack not malicious, officials say | The Hill

A breach of the Kennesaw State University (KSU) Center for Election Systems was not malicious, according to the Georgia university. Last month’s hack raised alarms because the center handles much of the infrastructure for federal and state elections in Georgia. The center designs the ballots, houses the voter rolls and tests all voting machines used by the state. According to the press statement from university on Friday, the FBI determined the hacker was actually a security researcher whose identity has not been released. There is “no indication of any illegal activity and no personal information was misused following unauthorized access of a dedicated server for the Center for Election Systems,” the school added.

Georgia: A bipartisan attempt to force Trump to file tax returns | Atlanta Journal Constitution

A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced a measure that would require President Donald Trump and future White House candidates to file their federal income tax returns with the state. Let’s be clear: This measure is going nowhere this year. The legislative session wraps up with a marathon session Thursday and Republican leaders have little appetite for tweaking the president. But House Bill 640 gives Democrats – and other Trump skeptics – a bit of red meat to take home with them when they depart the statehouse and return to their districts sometime early Friday.

Georgia: Prior to suspected breach, KSU voting center received warning | Atlanta Journal Constitution

Kennesaw State University officials received a warning before the presidential election that a server system used by its election center may be vulnerable to a data breach. But they only notified state officials that they could have a problem after a second contact from a potential hacker raised alarms about the security of millions of Georgia voter records, according to top state officials briefed on the issue but not authorized to speak on the record. It is not clear whether the university acted to address the potential problem identified by the hacker last fall, those officials said. KSU hasn’t publicly discussed the alleged breach, citing an open investigation. It is also not clear the hacker had any ill intent and ever actually accessed the records, which the university keeps on behalf of the state as part of its Center for Election Systems.

Georgia: Critics warn Republican redistricting plan in Georgia is ‘likely illegal’ | Atlanta Journal Constitution

A coalition of left-leaning organizations urged Gov. Nathan Deal and lawmakers to scuttle a House Republican plan to redraw the district boundaries of eight Republicans and one Democrat, warning it could be ruled unconstitutional because it shifts thousands of minority voters out of the areas. In a letter sent Tuesday to state leaders, the groups said the redistricting plan outlined in House Bill 515 is “likely illegal” and urged legislators to wait until after the 2020 U.S. Census to make major revisions to the maps. (You can read the letter here.) “If HB 515 is signed into law, Georgia will likely be in violation of the Voting Rights Act and subject to litigation that has cost states like Virginia and Texas millions of dollars,” the groups wrote. “This would cast a dark shadow over our state.”

Georgia: Judge dismisses suit alleging Georgia wrongly bumped voters off rolls | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A federal judge in Atlanta late Friday dismissed a lawsuit that had accused Secretary of State Brian Kemp of illegally bumping Georgia voters off the state’s rolls ahead of the 2016 presidential election. In the 21-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Timothy C. Batten Sr. said the state had taken a “reasonable and nondiscriminatory” approach in trying to reach voters who had not cast a recent ballot to confirm their addresses. Under state law, registered voters are mailed a confirmation notice following a more than three-year period of “no contact” with election officials. If voters do not respond to the notice within thirty days, they are designated as inactive — something that does not prevent them from voting and does not change their registration status.

Georgia: Advocates Call for Paper Ballots in Georgia Amid FBI Review | Associated Press

A group of technology experts said Tuesday that Georgia’s top elections officials should stop using electronic voting machines as the FBI reviews a suspected data breach. Secretary of State Brian Kemp and Kennesaw State University this month confirmed a federal investigation focused on the school’s Center for Election Systems. The center tests and certifies Georgia’s voting machines and electronic polling books used to check in voters at polling locations. Employees also format ballots for every election held in the state. The center isn’t part of Kemp’s office or connected to its networks, including Georgia’s database of registered voters maintained by the secretary of state’s office. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution first reported the investigation into the suspected cyberattack. In a letter to Kemp on Tuesday, 20 technology experts and computer science professors affiliated with the national Verified Voting organization said paper ballots will preserve voters’ confidence in the results of an upcoming special election to fill Georgia’s 6th District congressional seat. The letter said using equipment maintained by the center while it is the focus of a criminal investigation “can raise deep concerns.”

Georgia: Election officials reject advocacy groups’ call for paper ballots | Marietta Daily Journal

Georgia and Cobb election officials are rejecting calls from advocacy groups for voters to use paper ballots while the FBI investigates a data breach at Kennesaw State University. Voters will continue to use electronic voting machines during upcoming elections, said Candice Broce, spokesperson for Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp. The use of paper ballots is reserved as a backup system in case there is a problem with the voting machines, she said. Cobb voters will also use the voting machines in next week’s special elections for the 1 percent special purpose local option sales tax for education and the vacant Marietta school board Ward 6 seat, said Janine Eveler, director of Cobb elections. Earlier this month, KSU announced a federal investigation at the Center for Elections Systems located on the Kennesaw campus to determine if there was a data breach that might have affected the center’s records, according to Tammy DeMel, spokesperson for the university.

Georgia: Democrats turn to KSU for answers on voter data hack | Atlanta Journal Constitution

The Democratic Party of Georgia appealed to Kennesaw State University for details about an alleged breach of confidential data that could affect millions of Georgia voter records, after the state’s top elections official rebuffed a similar request. Party chair DuBose Porter demanded Thursday that KSU president Sam Olens reveal data about the extent of the attack, and urged him to accept help from the Department of Homeland Security to secure the elections infrastructure. The FBI launched an inquiry into the suspected cyberattack this month at the request of state officials after they received notice that records kept by the Center for Election Systems at KSU may have been compromised. State officials have released few details amid the pending investigation, and KSU didn’t immediately respond to Porter’s request.

Georgia: Senate Backs Voter-Registration Changes Opposed by Advocates | Associated Press

Information on voter-registration applications would have to exactly match state or federal databases to cast a ballot, under legislation backed by the Georgia Senate on Thursday. Advocacy groups and Democrats slammed the change, warning it will disproportionately affect minority voters and could be subject to legal challenges. Under the bill , people couldn’t be added to the voting rolls unless information on their application exactly matches records tied to their Georgia driver’s license or identification card or the last four digits of a Social Security Number. Without an exact match, people could only cast a provisional ballot and their application could be rejected after 26 months if they’re unable to resolve the conflict.

Georgia: Experts push paper ballot trail after alleged breach of Georgia data | Atlanta Journal Constitution

A group of 20 computer scientists and security experts called on Georgia to overhaul its elections system and begin using a system with a paper audit trail, saying it would assure accuracy and public confidence following an alleged breach of confidential data that could affect millions of Georgia voter records. In a letter sent Tuesday to Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, the group acknowledged that the breach is now under federal investigation and that much is still unknown. But, it said, potential findings “could have dire security consequences for the integrity of the technology and all elections carried out in Georgia” depending on their severity. “While we understand that this investigation is ongoing and that it will take time for the full picture to emerge, we request that you be as forthcoming and transparent as possible regarding critical information about the breach and the investigation, as such leadership not only will be respected in Georgia but also emulated in other states where such a breach could occur,” the group said. Most members of the group are involved with the voting-accuracy organization Verified Voting.