Heritage Foundation's Hans von Spakovsky attacks court decision about officials being required to certify Georgia's election
Published
Citation From the October 17, 2024, edition of Real America's Voice's The Steve Gruber Show
HANS VON SPAKOVSKY (HERITAGE FOUNDATION): This was a bad decision by a bad judge. I just find it astonishing that he would rule that election -- local county election officials who swear an oath to comply with and support the laws of the state -- he's saying they have to certify an election no matter what happens. Can you imagine? All the folks who are suing over this, by the way, were all these Democratic and liberal groups. Can you imagine the situation if it was 1965, and a brave county election official saw that local election officials were preventing Black voters from getting into the polls and voting -- they would be clamoring for him to refuse to certify the election. But now they're saying: "Oh no, no. It doesn't matter what happens, you've got to certify the election. You can't do anything about potential fraud or other problems."
STEVE GRUBER (HOST): To me it seems, what I hear when you're talking there Hans, is if there is a batch of illegal aliens that are able to vote in Georgia -- however they got there and they voted -- and the local election official knows that there was a group of people that came in and voted illegally, doesn't matter. The election's 100 votes one way or the other doesn't matter. You have to certify anyway.
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GRUBER: What do you honestly think is the practical impact if this holds through Election Day?
VON SPAKOVSKY: Well, you know, county election officials are going to have to follow the order. But what's going to have to happen is if you are a county election official in Georgia and you see wrongdoing, at the meeting at which you certify the election you need to put as much into the record as possible about the wrongdoing, the mistakes, the potential fraud so that the losing candidate can then file a lawsuit and use all the objections and evidence that you presented at that certification meeting. I mean, it's either that or resign and refuse to take part in certifying the election.