A federal judge rejects a call to reopen voter registration in Georgia after Hurricane Helene

ATLANTA (AP) — A federal judge said Thursday that she won't order the presidential battleground state of Georgia to reopen voter registration for November’s elections despite recent disruptions to registration caused by Hurricane Helene.

U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross rejected arguments that the state should reopen registration through next Monday. The registration deadline was last Monday and she said in her ruling from the bench Thursday afternoon that there would be no extension.

Ross said in her verbal ruling Thursday that three groups that sued didn't sufficiently prove their members were harmed and said there are no state laws allowing Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, the Republican defendants in the case, to order an extension of the voter registration deadline. Although the groups presented testimony Thursday that they know of at least two people unable to register, Ross said the testimony wasn't detailed enough to link that failure to the burdens of Helene.

“I don't think we had even one voter who had been harmed or would likely be harmed by failure to register to vote,” Ross said.

The state and the Republican Party argued that election processes could be disrupted since absentee ballots have already been mailed and early in-person voting was scheduled to begin Tuesday. Ross seemed to agree with that argument in her ruling.

“The harm to the state's interests outweighs the plaintiffs' interests,” Ross said.

The lawsuit filed by the Georgia conference of the NAACP, the Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda and the New Georgia Project had argued that damage and disruptions from Helene unfairly deprived people of the opportunity to register.

All three groups said they had to cancel voter registration activities last week after the hurricane tore through the Southeast. Historically, there’s a spike in Georgia voter registrations just before the deadline, the plaintiffs said.

“Here we’re talking about, in many circumstances, complete disenfranchisement for prospective voters," Amir Badat, a lawyer for the groups, told Ross. He argued Kemp could extend the deadline using his emergency powers.

But Senior Assistant Attorney General Elizabeth Young Young said there’s a difference between an individual registering to vote and a registration drive by a nonprofit.

“It’s not the right to have a voter registration drive,” she argued. “It’s the right to vote.”

Leaders of the NAACP and the Coalition for the People's Agenda, who were present in the courtroom for the case, voiced their disagreement with the verdict.

“We're still going to fight to make sure every voter's rights are protected," said Helen Butler, the coalition's executive director. “We believe voters were harmed, but this doesn't deter us.”

Lawyers for the plaintiffs declined to say whether they would appeal.

Georgia has 8.2 million registered voters, according to online records from Raffensperger’s office. But with Georgia’s presidential race having been decided by only 12,000 votes in 2020, a few thousand votes could make a difference in whether Republican Donald Trump or Democrat Kamala Harris wins the state’s 16 electoral votes.

The lawsuit said the hurricane kept people with driver’s licenses from registering online because of widespread power and internet outages in the eastern half of the state and kept people from registering in person because at least 37 county election offices were closed for parts of last week. The lawsuit also notes that mail pickup and delivery was suspended in 27 counties, including the cities of Augusta, Savannah, Statesboro, Dublin and Vidalia.

A federal judge in Florida denied a request to reopen voter registration in that state after hearing arguments Wednesday. The plaintiffs are considering whether to appeal. The lawsuit brought by the Florida chapters of the League of Women Voters and NAACP contends that thousands of people may have missed the registration deadline because they were recovering from Helene or preparing to evacuate from Milton, which churned across Florida this week.

A court in South Carolina extended that state’s registration deadline after Helene and courts in Georgia and Florida extended registration deadlines after 2016’s Hurricane Matthew. In North Carolina, which was more heavily impacted by Hurricane Helene, the registration deadline isn’t until Friday. Voters there can also register and cast a ballot simultaneously during the state’s early in-person voting period, which runs from Oct. 17 through Nov. 2.

At least 40 advocacy groups asked Republican Gov. Brian Kemp and Raffensperger to extend the registration deadline in affected counties before the Georgia lawsuit was filed.