A judge threw out a recent South Georgia school board election decided by just two votes, ruling in favor of a Democratic candidate who worked with the conservative group True the Vote to prove errors.
The redo election is needed because election officials assigned voters in an apartment complex to the wrong school board district, according to an order Friday by Tift County Superior Court Judge Howard McClain. Those voters received ballots for the wrong race during the May primary.
Democratic school board candidate Ambrose King Jr. said all eligible voters should be able to decide between him and incumbent Marilyn Burks, who is also a Democrat. There are no Republicans in the race.
“When elections are flawed or biased against us or engineered against us, we lose that aspect that makes us true Americans,” King said. “Election integrity is truly a bipartisan issue.”
True the Vote is known for supporting Republican efforts to challenge the eligibility of voters nationwide, an initiative opposed by voting rights groups who say legitimate voters could be disqualified. True the Vote defeated a lawsuit alleging that its Georgia voter challenges in 2020 amounted to voter intimidation.
“Ambrose King Jr.’s election challenge highlights the broader issues plaguing our national electoral system — issues that True the Vote is dedicated to addressing,” said Catherine Englebrecht, the Texas-based organization’s CEO. “Ambrose’s victory demonstrates that vigilance can indeed restore justice.”
True the Vote also promoted allegations of illegal ballot-stuffing of Georgia drop boxes in the election conspiracy movie “2000 Mules,” but the organization failed to provide evidence to back up the claim in response to a subpoena from the State Election Board. The board dismissed cases accusing voters of illegally returning ballots in 2022.
True the Vote contributed $15,000 to King’s election challenge and researched problems with Tift County’s school district maps, he said.
While King is a Democrat, he said he wants to “keep the schools conservative” by regulating books in elementary school libraries and preventing transgender people from participating in women’s sports. King is currently a science and special education teacher at Chamblee High School near Atlanta, 195 miles north of rural Tift County.
During the primary election in May, King appeared to lose to Burks, 156-154.
King said he learned that a cousin who lives in Casey’s Court Apartments wasn’t able to vote in his election. King said he thought that was wrong because he had campaigned in the apartment complex based on maps that showed it was within his school board district’s lines.
There are currently 139 registered voters in the apartment complex, though only six of them voted in the primary. McClain wrote in his order that the number of ballots cast was sufficient to place the result of the election in doubt.
The error appeared to have occurred during mapping of new districts divided by a road in Tift County, and voters in Casey’s Court Apartments were placed in a neighboring school board district.
“This is a big win for the candidates and the voters, both of whom deserve fair elections,” said Jake Evans, an attorney who represented King.
The Tift County election board acknowledged the mistake and didn’t object to the judge’s order, according to court documents.
Burks, a retired teacher, didn’t respond to an email seeking comment.
Mapping errors have overturned elections in the past, including in a North Georgia race for the state House that had to be held three times.
In that case, a judge found ineligible voters in Habersham County had participated in a close race between Republicans Dan Gasaway and Chris Erwin. All three elections ended with Erwin receiving the most votes, and he took office in 2019.
The do-over election in Tift County will be held Nov. 5, the same day as the presidential election. Because no Republican is running, the second election will decide the winner.
