Georgia's State Election Board Seeks Legal Power to Investigate Secretary of State

Senate Bill 358 Advances Amid Constitutional Debate Over Oversight of Executive Branch

Georgia's State Election Board is attempting to gain legal power to investigate Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger's handling of elections, sparking a constitutional debate.
The Senate Ethics Committee has advanced Senate Bill 358, which would remove Raffensperger from his nonvoting post on the board, allow the board to hire election investigators, and give the board power to investigate the secretary of state.
Raffensperger's lawyer argues that there is no precedent for an unelected board of political appointees to have oversight over members of the executive branch.
Activists have been pushing the State Election Board to investigate whether Raffensperger mishandled his audit of Fulton County's 2020 results, motivated by unproven claims of fraud.
Lawmakers are also pushing for Raffensperger to remove computer codes used to count most Georgia ballots, to move more quickly to patch voting machine software vulnerabilities, and include more ballot security features.