Georgia lawmakers ended the session without resolving the voting system dispute
Georgia lawmakers did not delay the required implementation of a new election system in July before their legislative session ended on Friday, raising urgent questions about whether ballots in the battleground state will be cast and counted in the November midterm elections.
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Fueled by conspiracy theories about Georgia’s election system, state lawmakers voted two years ago to phase out the use of touchscreen voting machines, which generate a QR code used to count votes.
That change will go into effect after Georgia’s primary election, but lawmakers have not appropriated funds for a new or modified system and the state has yet to receive one. State officials said that by 2024, changes to the current system could cost tens of millions of dollars, while a complete overhaul could reach $300 million.
Even if the state can find money elsewhere, experts caution against changing voting systems during an election year.
The state House passed a bill Thursday to push back the July 1 deadline to 2028, but the state Senate refused to approve the amendment before pushing it back a year.
The absence of a legal ruling leaves the state open to litigation over how the November election is conducted and may cast further doubt on the integrity of the electoral process.
Georgia’s voting system, which cost $107 million, was implemented for the first time in 2020. The use of QR codes during the close presidential race has kept the system at the heart of many election conspiracy theories, although there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud. President Donald Trump has tried to reverse his loss to Joe Biden in 2020 and has been making false claims about the election, in Georgia and nationally, that it was stolen from him.
Georgia’s current system asks voters to make their choice on a touch-screen computer; the computer then prints the ballot listing the choices next to the QR code, which the tabulators use to count. Critics say the system is at risk of hacking, because voters can’t read the QR code. The state checks the results by reviewing the written summary of the voter’s choices, making sure they match the tabular value combined with the QR codes.
Still, a year-long federal lawsuit challenged the integrity of the election system, arguing that it was so vulnerable to fraud and error that it violated voters’ constitutional rights.
During the trial, a cyber security expert surprisingly hacked one of the systems in open court. The state argued that the program could not be hacked under real-world conditions, and a federal judge ultimately sided with them, dismissing the case.
Gabriel Sterling, an executive in the Georgia secretary of state’s office, testified at the 2024 hearing that overhauling the election system in an election year would be a “nightmare.”
Georgia will also be a hotbed of interest in the midterm elections. Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff’s seat is being contested by Republicans, with both parties vying to replace outgoing Gov. Brian Kemp.
