A federal judge presiding over a major election lawsuit in Georgia on Nov. 29 issued and then reversed an order directing the state to cease and desist wiping or resetting election machines.
“Defendants are ordered to maintain the status quo & are temporarily enjoined from wiping or resetting any voting machines in the State of Georgia until further order of the court,” U.S. District Judge Timothy Batten Sr. wrote in an emergency order issued Nov. 29.
The judge reversed the order not long after, explaining that the defendants aren’t in possession of the machines.
“Plaintiffs’ request fails because the voting equipment that they seek to impound is in the possession of county election officials. Any injunction the Court issues would extend only to Defendants and those within their control, and Plaintiffs have not demonstrated that county election officials are within Defendants’ control. Defendants cannot serve as a proxy for local election officials against whom the relief should be sought,” the judge wrote.
The change of course by the judge drew a flabbergasted response from Lin Wood, an attorney associated with the Trump campaign.
“What??? Judge reversed order based on Defendants’ claim that GA Counties control voting machines,” Wood wrote on Twitter, adding that the machines are owned by the state and that the Georgia secretary of state administers elections.
“Why are GA officials determined to wipe these machines clean [by] resetting them?”
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit on Nov. 29 filed an emergency motion that included an affidavit featuring a Nov. 25 message from an election official stating that the ballot-counting machines would be reset to zero on Nov. 30 before performing a recount.
“The process will begin with an L & A – resetting the machine to ‘zero’ to begin the recount,” the text of the message stated before describing the specifics of the recount process.
The affidavit was written by a Republican poll worker who says he or she addressed concerns about wiping the machines to the election manager.
“Because the plan on Monday is to wipe the voting machines clean, and start from 0 so that we can recount using those machines, I’m concerned by what I am reading online,” the poll worker wrote, according to the affidavit.
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