Federal judge says Democrat’s North Carolina election win must stand
Federal judge says Democrat’s North Carolina election win must stand
(about 2 hours later)
Republican Jefferson Griffin had sought to throw out votes for Democrat Allison Riggs in supreme court election
Republican Jefferson Griffin had sought to throw out votes for Democrat Allison Riggs in supreme court election
Disputed ballots in the still unresolved 2024 race for a North Carolina supreme court seat must remain in the final count, a federal judge ruled late on Monday, a decision that if upheld would result in an electoral victory for the Democratic incumbent, Allison Riggs.
North Carolina election officials must certify Democrat Allison Riggs as the winner of a state supreme court election, a federal judge ruled on Monday, a significant development in the only race that has remained undecided from last year.
US District Judge Richard Myers agreed with Riggs and others who argued it would be a violation of the US constitution to carry out recent decisions by state appeals courts that directed the removal of potentially thousands of voter ballots deemed ineligible. Myers wrote that votes could not be removed six months after election day without damaging due process and equal protection rights of the affected residents.
Riggs, who currently sits on the court, defeated Jefferson Griffin, a Republican appellate judge, by 734 votes last November. Multiple recounts confirmed her win. But after election day, Griffin challenged more than 60,000 votes, mostly in Democratic-leaning counties, saying that election officials had wrongly allowed them to count.
Myers also ordered the state board of elections to certify results that after two recounts showed Riggs the winner – by just 734 votes – over her Republican challenger, Jefferson Griffin. But the judge delayed his decisions for seven days in case Griffin wants to appeal the ruling to the fourth US circuit court of appeals.
Richard Myers II, a district judge and Trump appointee, agreed with Riggs and said that Griffin was essentially trying to change the rules of the election after election day.
The board “must not proceed with implementation of the North Carolina court of appeals and supreme court’s orders, and instead must certify the results of the election for [the seat] based on the tally at the completion of the canvassing period”, wrote Myers, who was nominated to the bench by President Donald Trump.
“This case concerns whether the federal constitution permits a state to alter the rules of an election after the fact and apply those changes retroactively to only a select group of voters, and in so doing treat those voters differently than other similarly situated individuals. This case is also about whether a state may redefine its class of eligible voters but offer no process to those who may have been misclassified as ineligible,” Myers wrote in his opinion. “To this court, the answer to each of those questions is ‘no.’”
More than 5.5m ballots were cast in what has been the nation’s last undecided race from November’s general election. Griffin, himself a state court of appeals judge, filed formal protests after the election in hopes that removing ballots he said were unlawfully cast would flip the outcome to him.
Griffin’s challenges focused on three groups of voters. The largest was tens of thousands of people whose voter records lacked a driver’s license number or the last four digits of their social security numbers. A few thousand more were overseas voters who had failed to provide photo ID. There was also a smaller group of voters who were labeled “never residents” – people who had turned 18 while living abroad and claimed North Carolina as their residence.
Griffin’s legal team was reviewing Myers’s order on Monday night and evaluating the next steps, a Griffin campaign spokesperson, Paul Shumaker, wrote in an email.
It was clear from the start that many of the challenged voters were eligible to cast a ballot. Riggs’ parents were among those challenged. The Guardian and other news outlets spoke to several challenged “never residents” who said they were temporarily abroad, had lived in North Carolina, and were confused about why they were being challenged.
Riggs was more assured in her statement: “Today, we won. I‘m proud to continue upholding the constitution and the rule of law as North Carolina’s supreme court justice.”
What was seen as a quixotic effort quickly turned into concern for voting advocates when the North Carolina court of appeals ruled in Griffin’s favor, saying more than 60,000 voters had to prove their eligibility. The North Carolina supreme court later narrowed the number of ballots at issue to around 1,500.
Griffin wanted Myers to leave undisturbed the state courts’ decisions, which also directed that most of the voters with otherwise ineligible ballots get 30 days to provide identifying information for their race choices to remain in the tally.
The fact that courts were even willing to entertain a post-election effort to challenge rules set well in advance of voting, experts said, is an alarming development and may lay out a playbook to overturn future elections.
Riggs, the state Democratic party and some affected voters said Griffin was trying to change the 2024 election outcome after the fact by removing ballots cast by voters who complied with voting rules as they were written last fall.
“You establish the rules before the game. You don’t change them after the game is done,” Myers wrote. He also paused his opinion for seven days to give Griffin a chance to appeal. Griffin’s campaign told the Associated Press Monday night they were evaluating the ruling.
Myers wrote that Griffin’s formal protests after the election, which were rejected by the state board of elections, constituted efforts to make retroactive changes to the voting laws that would arbitrarily disenfranchise only the voters who were targeted by Griffin. Griffin’s challenges over voters not providing photo identification only covered at most six Democratic-leaning counties in the state.
“Today, we won. I’m proud to continue upholding the constitution and the rule of law as North Carolina’s supreme court justice,” Riggs said in a statement.
“You establish the rules before the game. You don’t change them after the game is done,” Myers wrote in a 68-page order.
“Permitting parties to ‘upend the set rules’ of an election after the election has taken place can only produce ‘confusion and turmoil’” that “‘threatens to undermine public confidence in the federal courts, state agencies, and the elections themselves,’” he added while citing other cases.
Democrats and voting rights groups raised alarm about Griffin’s efforts. They called it an attack on democracy that would serve as a roadmap for the GOP to reverse election results in other states. The state Republican party said Griffin was seeking to ensure that only legal votes are counted.
One category of ballots that state appeals courts declared violated the state constitution were cast by overseas voters who have never lived in the US but whose parents were declared North Carolina residents. A state law passed in 2011 had authorized these persons to vote in state elections.
The other category covered military or overseas voters who did not provide copies of photo identification or an ID exception form with their absentee ballots. A state rule exempted them from the requirement. The appeals courts had permitted a “cure” process for the voters who did not provide IDs so their ballots could still count in the race.
While North Carolina can certainly establish rules for future state elections, Myers wrote, they cannot be applied after the fact to only a select group of voters.
Griffin filed formal protests that appeared to cover more than 65,000 ballots. Ensuing state court rulings whittled down the total to as few as 1,675 ballots or perhaps as many as 7,000, according to court filings.
Riggs is one of only two Democrats on the seven-member state supreme court, and winning an eight-year term would improve the party’s efforts to retake a majority on the court later in the decade. Griffin and Riggs have not participated in deliberations in their respective courts about their election.
