A Cobb Superior Court judge on Monday issued an emergency consent order that will enable several hundred voters who didn’t get absentee ballots to return them after Tuesday’s general election deadline.
Judge Kellie Hill said those voters will have the same Nov. 14 deadline as military and overseas voters to return their ballots.
The Cobb Board of Elections and Registration was the subject of a lawsuit filed Sunday by the American Liberties Union of Georgia and the Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of four absentee voters who were never mailed ballots they requested.
The suit sought the deadline extension and replacement ballots sent to affected voters, and Cobb Elections agreed in a Monday hearing before Hill.
The court order instructs Cobb Elections to count returned absentee ballots that are postmarked by 7 p.m. Tuesday and received on or before Nov. 14.
Those affected voters also can vote in person on Tuesday and have their absentee ballot request cancelled at their precinct.
They also can fill out a federal write-in absentee ballot and mail it in by 7 p.m. Tuesday.
Cobb Elections acknowledged over the weekend that a total of 1,036 requested absentee ballots were not mailed on Oct. 13 and Oct. 22 because elections workers failed to upload ballot information to a mailing machine.
At a press conference Monday, Cobb Elections director Janine Eveler repeated her apology for what she called “a human error” and Daniel White, the agency’s attorney, said “we were being transparent” in working quickly to identify the affected voters and get ballots sent to them.
The ACLU blamed a new Georgia elections law that reduces the window for requesting and receiving absentee ballots.
“The anti-voter law put tremendous pressure on elections officials to accomplish a number of responsibilities under a very tight deadline, and in Cobb County, that pressure has resulted in a huge error and hundreds of voters at risk of being disenfranchised,” ACLU of Georgia senior voting rights attorney Rahul Garabadu said in a statement.
Dozens of those affected voters cancelled their requests and cast ballots in-person during the early voting period. Cobb Elections has already sent 247 absentee ballots via overnight delivery and more were being sent Monday in similar fashion.
The consent order indicated that “as many as 469 voters” may not have received their replacement ballots.
Cobb government spokesman Ross Cavitt said in a release late Monday afternoon that the latter figure is now 276, after Cobb Elections analyzed in-person early-voting figures.
The only place to deliver an absentee ballot on Tuesday is at the Cobb Elections office (995 Roswell Road) between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.
Related:
- Cobb Elections fails to mail 1K+ absentee ballots
- East Cobb 2022 general election day voting guide and info
- Open-seat campaigns highlight East Cobb legislative elections
- Cobb Elections to offer ‘last call’ absentee ballot returns
- Candidate profile: David Chastain, Cobb school board Post 4
- Candidate profile: Catherine Pozniak, Cobb school board Post 4
- Accusations intensify in bitter Cobb school board race
- Candidate profile: JoAnn Birrell, Cobb Commission District 3
- Candidate profile: Christine Triebsch, Cobb Commission District 3
- Contested Post 4 seat on Cobb school board heats up
- Cobb 2022 general election sample ballot available
- East Cobb News Politics & Elections page
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