Election in Georgia’s Fulton County to be observed by independent monitor

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s Fulton County has hired a team of independent monitors to observe its operations for this year’s general election after a selection process that highlighted discord between the deeply Democratic county and a Donald Trump-endorsed majority on the State Election Board.

The monitoring of Fulton’s elections was proposed by State Election Board members earlier this year as they discussed a case against the county that included findings of double-scanning of some ballots during an election recount in 2020 that was closed with a reprimand. The county ultimately chose a monitoring proposal opposed by the Republican partisans who have a 3-2 majority on the State Election Board.

The county was within its rights to do that, according to a legal opinion written by state Attorney General Chris Carr and obtained by The Associated Press. Carr wrote that the State Election Board doesn’t have the authority to order an election monitor and that Fulton’s agreement to propose and pay for a monitoring team was voluntary.

Carr’s opinion, dated Aug. 19, cautioned that if the state board failed to approve the monitoring team Fulton had chosen or if the board tried to reopen the 2020 investigation, it “appears highly likely that no monitoring team will be engaged.”

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