ATLANTA (AP) – A judge who last month ordered absentee ballots in Georgia’s most populous county to be unsealed as part of a lawsuit alleging fraud during the November election is now set to hear arguments over whether the case should be dismissed.
Originally filed in December, the lawsuit says there is evidence of fraudulent ballots and improper ballot counting in Fulton County. As part of the suit, the nine Georgia voters who filed it are seeking to inspect some 147,000 absentee ballots to determine whether there are illegitimate ballots among them.
The ballots and scanned ballot images are kept under seal in the custody of the clerk of Fulton County Superior and Magistrate courts. Henry County Superior Court Chief Judge Brian Amero, who is presiding over the case, in April ordered the court clerk to release the scanned absentee ballot images. At a hearing last month, Amero ordered that the paper ballots themselves be unsealed so that the petitioners who filed the lawsuit can inspect and scan them.
Amero had scheduled a meeting for May 28 with the parties to sort out the logistics of how that review and scanning of paper ballots would proceed. But in the days before that meeting was to be held, Fulton County, the county board of elections and the county courts clerk all filed motions asking the judge to dismiss the lawsuit. The judge canceled the logistics meeting, saying those motions needed to be dealt with first and scheduling a hearing that is to happen Monday.
The ballot review effort in Georgia is one of several around the country pushed by supporters of former President Donald Trump and others who allege fraud during the 2020 election. State and federal authorities have repeatedly said there was no evidence of widespread fraud in the election.