A judge in Georgia blocked at the last minute an order to hand count ballots in the upcoming November presidential election. The ruling by Judge Robert McBurney followed concerns that poll workers would not get adequate training to handle millions of ballots manually, which could have led to significant administrative chaos. The hand-count mandate arose from a pro-Trump majority on the state’s election board pushing the requirement for poll workers to open sealed ballots and count them manually, in addition to the machine-tabulated results.
The critics of the rule, which include Democratic hopeful Kamala Harris, fear that these changes may result in delay and even instill doubts during the election process. Judge McBurney mentioned that public’s confidence might be shaken by such a late introduction of such a drastic change, especially with the still-bloody memory of the January 6 Capitol attack.
Early voting in Georgia had already begun, and more than 328,000 cast their votes on the very first day—a record, with twice as many voters as were recorded on the first day of voting in the 2020 presidential election. It is all part of a wider legal fight involving electoral issues in Georgia, a crucial swing state in this presidential election between Trump and Harris.
He also issued an independent order instructing the state’s election board members to certify a vote tally, following the refusal by one of the Republican appointees on the board to do so for the presidential primary. Cases such as this one, along with others, will determine the course of the election in Georgia in 2024.
