Georgia’s GOP-led elections board OKs controversial voting change that local officials warned against

The Republican-controlled Georgia State Election Board has given the green light to a controversial voting measure that local officials warned against.

The new rule requires local precincts to hand count the upcoming November election results and match them to the machine counts before certifying them.

Three Trump-backed Republican members have been the majority on the board since May. They passed the measure despite being told by Republican Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr that the board would illegally be seizing the power of the state legislature, board Chair John Fervier said, according to USA Today.

“We know the legislature is not shy of passing laws,” he said. “This board needs to take seriously the guidance that we’ve received from the attorney general, from the secretary of state’s office, and from the election professionals across the state.”

Board member Janelle King supported the rule and said that Fervier was “welcoming lawsuits” which she said would be dismissed.

At a rally in Atlanta in early August, former President Donald Trump called King and her fellow members Janice Johnston and Rick Jaffares “pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.”

Carr said in a Thursday letter obtained by USA Today that the new rule is “likely the precise type of impermissible legislation that agencies cannot do.”

Carr added that new rules regarding how elections are conducted “are disfavored when implemented as close to an election as the rules on the September 20 agenda.”

In total, 11 new rules were proposed on the agenda.

In a letter on Tuesday, the Georgia Association of Voter Registration and Election Officials, a group with more than 500 members, shared their concerns about the new proposed rules.