Federal Judge Orders Georgia To Scrap Old Voting Machines

ATLANTA, GA — Georgia must scrap its old voting machines after this year's municipal elections, a federal judge ruled on Thursday. U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg said the state must be ready to use hand-marked paper ballots if a new system isn't in place by Georgia's 2020 presidential primary on March 24.

Georgia's secretary of state has already awarded a contract to Dominion Voting Systems to provide a new, verified paper ballot voting system in time for next year's primary elections. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said his office has already partnered with the Department of Homeland Security and private cyber-security companies to provide network monitoring, cyber-hygiene scanning, and cyber-security assessments. Several Georgia counties have also worked with the department to provide physical security assessments of their election offices.

"Elections security is my top priority," said Raffensperger. "We look forward to working with national and local elections security experts to institute best practices and continue to safeguard all aspects of physical and cyber-security in an ever-changing threat environment."

Gov. Brian Kemp signed a measure earlier this year to replace Georgia's electronic voting system with a $150 million touch-screen and paper ballot system. Georgia's former system, in use for almost 20 years, didn't provide paper ballots. The new voting machines are known as ballot-making devices.

Election and voting security were major issues in last year's gubernatorial election in which Kemp narrowly defeated Democrat Stacey Abrams. Besides accusing Kemp and Republicans of suppressing the minority vote, they also said Georgia's voting system was susceptible to hacking and other forms of election fraud.

In late July, a U.S. Senate intelligence committee report said while it has found no evidence any votes have been changed or that any voting machines have been manipulated, election security should remain top priority as the nation heads into the 2020 elections.

"As Georgia's chief elections official, I agree that even though the Senate Intelligence Committee found no evidence that any votes were changed or voting machines manipulated, election security should remain my office's top priority," said Raffensperger. "We will continue to do everything necessary to protect our election from bad actors, both foreign and domestic."