ATLANTA (CN) — A federal judge on Thursday denied Georgia officials’ request to dismiss civil challenges over the state’s newly passed, Republican-backed voting restrictions.
On March 25, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed a Senate bill, titled SB 202, into law. Civil rights groups say the law is discriminatory and violates free speech and voting rights.
A federal judge in Georgia on Thursday agreed that it may have been designed with discriminatory purposes.
“We are pleased that the court has denied every motion to dismiss before it and approved our legal challenge of Georgia’s anti-voter law SB 202 to move forward to discovery on all of the claims within the litigation,” said Poy Winichakul, staff attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center, in a statement following Thursday’s ruling.
The Republican Governor’s move solidified a rule that imposed new voter identification requirements, altered early voting hours and limited areas where ballot drop-boxes could be located.
Additionally, the rule sought to criminalize any attempt to approach voters in line — even if supplying food or water to those waiting in long queues.
In a 36-page order released Thursday evening, Judge Jean-Paul “JP” Boulee, a federal judge for the Northern District of Georgia, denied an effort to throw out the case, allowing the challenges against the new voting law to proceed.
“Taking as true plaintiffs’ allegations that SB 202 establishes what type of conduct and communication is permissible while engaging with voters who are waiting in line and construing those allegations in the light most favorable to plaintiffs, the court finds that plaintiffs have plausibly alleged that SB 202’s restrictions on line warming impinge on speech and/or expressive conduct in some way,” wrote Judge Boulee, who was appointed in 2018 by former president Donald Trump.
He said he won’t answer the question of whether “line warming,” or providing refreshments to voters standing in line to vote at a polling place, is OK.
“In any event, answering the questions of whether line warming occurs in a public versus a nonpublic forum; whether the associated speech or conduct is of the type protected by the First Amendment; what standard of review should apply; and whether the state has identified interests sufficient to meet the requisite standard requires the type of substantive merits inquiry that is not appropriate on a motion to dismiss,” Boulee wrote.
Once considered a comfortably red state, Georgia voters turned out in record-breaking numbers during the 2020 presidential election, leading to a narrow victory for President Joe Biden in the state by just more than 12,000 votes.
During that election period, Peach State voters also promoted two Democratic candidates to office following U.S. Senate runoffs.
“As the litigation proceeds, we believe it will become even clearer how SB 202 was based on a false and dangerous narrative about past elections, erects unlawful barriers to voting and places undue burdens on Georgians,” Winichakul said Thursday.
Groups that brought challenges against the state’s law include the Georgia State Conference of the NAACP, Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda, League of Women Voters of Georgia and GALEO Latino Community Development Fund.
Common Cause, Lower Muskogee Creek Tribe and the Urban League of Greater Atlanta also cooperated to bring a case against Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and other leaders responsible for implementing the voting legislation.
The Republican National Committee and other campaign branches of the Republican Party had intervened in the case to request dismissal.
“The right to vote is one of the most fundamental freedoms of a democracy and one of the most important ways people can advocate for themselves and their communities,” Winichakul said. “Through their vote, citizens can direct social and economic policies that impact their daily lives and hold elected officials accountable.”
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