RALEIGH, N.C. (CN) — The North Carolina Court of Appeals on Friday ruled in favor of a Republican judge challenging more than 60,000 ballots cast in his race.
The court directed the state board of elections to throw out some ballots and demand cures for thousands of others.
In a 2-1 ruling along partisan lines, two Republican appeals judges found that the results of the North Carolina Supreme Court Associate Justice race must be recalculated. The sole Democrat on the panel, Judge Toby Hampson, offered a fiery dissent.
Jefferson Griffin, a Republican judge on the North Carolina Court of Appeals, has for months disputed more than 65,000 legal ballots cast in his 2024 election bid to join the North Carolina Supreme Court. His Democratic opponent in that race, state Supreme Court Associate Justice Allison Riggs, leads him by 734 votes.
Per Friday’s ruling, the state elections board must require military and overseas voters to cure their ballots if they want them to be counted.
Griffin claimed these voters should have been required to provide photo identification while casting their ballot. The state appeals court agreed, concluding that these ballots “have not been properly cast.”
These voters will be given 15 business days to cure their ballots by verifying their eligibility as voters. Any voters that aren’t able to do so in 15 days will have their votes removed from the final vote count.
Before a lower court in February, attorney Terence Steed for the state board of elections warned that the elections board is aware of at least one military service member who has died since the election and whose ballot is now being challenged.
“That person cannot be given adequate notice now. They cannot provide an ID or a drivers license or a social security number. They cannot defend the manner in which they voted or explain that they simply followed the guidance provided. And they will not be the only one,” he said. “People die, people move, people can’t be contacted, and so people will be disenfranchised after the fact, based on the law[s] as they were during the election.”
The vast majority of disputed votes — more than 60,000 — come from people with data missing in the state’s voter roll database. Although North Carolina has a voter photo ID law, Griffin argues missing state data could allow ineligible people to cast ballots.
Attorneys for the state board have contended that any discrepancies in voter rolls aren’t indicative of voter ineligibility. All affected voters voted either early in-person or by absentee ballot.
As Chris Cooper, a political scientist at Western Carolina University, explained to Courthouse News, that’s because it isn’t possible to identify the ballots of voters who did not vote early or absentee, as the ballots are not retrievable once cast.
“Had these voters waited until election day to cast their vote — rather than voting early or by absentee ballot — their vote would not be subject to petitioner’s challenge and, thus, not currently at risk of being discounted,” Hampson wrote in his scathing dissent.
Separately, Griffin also challenged the constitutionality of “never residents,” U.S. citizens who have never resided in the United States but who vote in North Carolina.
The Republican appeals judges agreed on this front, too. “The North Carolina Constitution provides only lawful residents of North Carolina, who are eligible and properly registered to vote, are entitled to vote in our state and non-federal elections,” the majority concluded in their unsigned opinion.
Judges John Tyson and Fred Gore directed the state elections board to remove any such votes cast in the Supreme Court race. (All other races in the state have been finalized, so votes cast by these voters in other, unchallenged 2024 races will still be counted.)
Riggs on Friday vowed to appeal the decision, saying she would stand up for voters’ rights and “in the way of those who would take power from the people.”
“We will be promptly appealing this deeply misinformed decision that threatens to disenfranchise more than 65,000 lawful voters and sets a dangerous precedent, allowing disappointed politicians to thwart the will of the people,” she said.
The decision reverses a ruling from a Raleigh court, which refused to invalidate the thousands of ballots. Griffin argues it was the state board of elections that failed to follow the law by not imposing requirements.
In his dissent, Hampson, the lone Democrat, emphasized that the election was already a settled matter. He said challenged voters followed “every instruction they were given” and decried what he called an “act of mass disenfranchisement.”
“Their ballots were accepted. Their ballots were counted,” Hampson wrote of these voters. “The results were canvassed. None of these challenged voters was given any reason to believe their vote would not be counted on election day or included in the final tallies.”
Griffin’s unusual legal argument has drawn criticism across the board, with even many Republicans condemning his attempt to change the results of his race.
If the decision stands, it would be a significant win for Griffin in his attempt to secure the Supreme Court associate justice seat, as well as for others attempting to challenge election results through the court system. The judge, who has remained tight-lipped through the legal challenges, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The case has ping-ponged between state and federal court for months, having already been heard in Raleigh court, the state Supreme Court and the Fourth Circuit in the nearly five months since the election. The elections board has attempted to retain federal jurisdiction, so that it can take up any remaining issues after the case has been exhausted state court.