Conservative Group Achieves Legal Victory on Georgia’s 2020 Voting Challenges

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that a conservative group’s efforts to challenge the eligibility of hundreds of thousands of voters in Georgia’s runoff Senate election in early 2021 did not violate the Voting Rights Act, under a clause that prohibits voter suppression prohibits.

In a 145-page opinion, the judge, Steve C. Jones of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, wrote that the court “maintains its prior concerns” about the way the group, True the Vote, attempted to canvass voters to challenge. ‘ suitability. But he said Fair Fight, the liberal voting rights group that filed the lawsuit against True the Vote, had failed to prove the effort was illegal.

The decision was relatively narrow, applying only to Judge Jones’ district in northern Georgia, and will do little to change the status quo: right-wing election groups have already tried to fix thousands of voter registration issues in states across the country .

But the advice is likely to embolden conservative activists hunting for voter fraud in the 2024 presidential election. Election officials and voting rights groups have raised concerns about these efforts, warning that an expanded campaign to en masse voters could intimidate people away from the polls . True the Vote and similar groups, following the lead of former President Donald J. Trump, have often spread false theories about election fraud.

“Each of these decisions that allow for this kind of mass challenge emboldens that movement,” said Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the Voting Rights Project at the ACLU.

In his opinion, Judge Jones wrote that evidence from Fair Fight and individual voters in the lawsuit did not amount to intimidation under a key part of the Voting Rights Act known as Section 11(b), which prohibits any attempt to “intimidate, threaten , or coerce, or attempt to intimidate” a voter or voting act.

“Although the court finds that actions that increase the difficulty of voting when accompanied by other conduct may in some circumstances give rise to a violation of Section 11(b), an increase in difficulty does not, by itself, constitute voter intimidation ,” Judge Jones wrote.

Voting rights experts said the ruling could raise the bar on what constitutes voter intimidation under the Voting Rights Act, saying it was yet another court decision that stripped away protections in the landmark law.

“He had a very narrow view of what constitutes harassment,” Ms. Lakin said. “But raising the bar on what you have to show makes it harder to demonstrate claims of voter intimidation, at least in Georgia’s northern district.”

In a footnote to the decision, Judge Jones, who was appointed to his post by President Barack Obama, was careful not to give his blessing to tactics like those of True the Vote.

“In reaching this conclusion, the court in no way condones TTV’s actions in facilitating a host of seemingly frivolous challenges,” he wrote. He added: “TTV’s list was not reliable at all. It indeed borders on recklessness.”

Fair Fight sued True the Vote three years ago after the conservative group organized challenges in December 2020 questioning the eligibility of more than 250,000 registered voters in Georgia. To encourage right-wing activists to challenge voters, True the Vote has created a $1 million reward fund and offered bounties for evidence of “election crimes.”

Fair Fight argued in its lawsuit that finding actual fraud or ineligible voters was only a secondary concern for True the Vote, and that the real intent was to scare Democratic-leaning voters into participating in what was expected to be razor-thin runoff elections become. would determine control of the United States Senate.

Catherine Engelbrecht, the president of True the Vote, celebrated the ruling as “an answer to the prayers of loyal patriots across America.”

“Today’s ruling sends a clear message to those who would attempt to control the direction of our nation through legal action and intimidation,” Ms. Engelbrecht wrote in a statement. “American citizens will not be silenced.”

Fair Fight said in a lengthy statement that federal courts were not adequately protecting Americans from stepped-up attacks on voting rights.

“While there is much to be said about the court’s 145-page opinion, Fair Fight is disappointed that Georgians and voters across the country must continue to wait for our federal courts to impose accountability in light of the widespread and increasing intimidation efforts of voters,” Cianti Stewart said. Reid, the executive director of Fair Fight, said in the statement.

It was unclear whether the group planned to appeal the decision.