Judge sides with conservative group in Georgia voter intimidation case

ATLANTA (CN) — A federal judge on Tuesday sided with the Texas-based conservative group True the Vote on claims it engaged in voter intimidation.

After hearing testimony and evidence over a 7-day bench trial this past October, U.S. District Judge Steve Jones ultimately decided the plaintiffs "provided no compelling evidence that Truth the Vote’s election-related activities in the period preceding the Senate runoff election had any effect or reached any Georgian voter."

National voting rights group Fair Fight and three Georgia voters brought the suit nearly three years ago claiming that True the Vote unlawfully "launched a massive, multifaceted campaign" of voter intimidation and suppression in an attempt to disqualify voters based on questionable addresses.

The suit focused on the late 2020 lead-up to the contentious Jan. 5, 2021, U.S. Senate runoff election in Georgia that would determine whether Democrats or Republicans dominated the upper chamber. True the Vote challenged more than 360,000 voters' eligibility in the state. At the same time, former President Donald Trump and his campaign was spreading false claims that voter fraud had cost him the presidential election.

Under Georgia law, “Any elector of the county or municipality may challenge the right of any other elector of the county or municipality." The law does not limit the number of voter challenges or their proximity to an election. However, the judge noted in his ruling that such challenges do not ultimately determine a voter's eligibility or immediately removes them from a voter registration list.

"For a Section 230 challenge, the ultimate decision to pursue an inquiry into a voter’s eligibility to vote rests in the county board of elections," Jones wrote.

The Barack Obama appointee added there was no evidence suggesting that True the Vote and other individuals who submitted voter challenges had any control over or took any action to affect the board's decisions.

County election boards ultimately rejected the vast majority of the challenges, which relied on spreadsheets that listed voters who had submitted change-of-address forms with the U.S. Postal Service.

"Defendants’ lack of success in these Section 230 challenges highlights the lack of control defendants and its volunteers had over the challenges once they were submitted," Jones wrote.

Fair Fight had argued that True the Vote's recruitment efforts for "citizen watchdogs" to monitor voters as they returned their ballots and its $1 million reward fund to incentivize individuals to report instances of "election malfeasance," violated the Voting Rights Act by subjecting Georgia voters, particularly those of color, to harassment and threats.

But Jones dismissed these claims, finding that Fair Fight failed to show any connection with the group's actions to any particular voter in Georgia. There was no testimony provided of any voter hearing of or personally reading True the Vote's voter challenge announcements, or that any voter had direct contact from the group, Jones wrote in the ruling.

"Not only have plaintiffs failed to overcome the fact that their actions did not result in any direct voter contact or alone include or direct county boards of elections to pursue an eligibility inquiry, but there is no evidence that defendants’ actions caused (or attempted to cause) any voter to be intimidated, coerced, or threatened in voting," Jones wrote.

"Consequently, the court concludes that the Section 230 challenges made by defendants do not support finding a violation of Section 11(b) of the Voting Rights Act."

Jones noted that under some circumstances, actions that make it more difficult to vote could violate the Voting Rights Act if paired with other conduct, but increased difficulty alone is not enough to constitute voter intimidation.

Attorneys representing Fair Fight did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling.

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