Black election board members could be removed in Ware County

An overhaul of Ware County’s election board could replace all its members under legislation the state House approved this past week, including the three African Americans who form its majority.

Under the current system, the South Georgia county’s Republican and Democratic parties select four of the board’s members. They then pick the board’s chair.

Voting rights advocates warn that Black voters could lose representation on the board under the change proposed in House Bill 422, which would hand Ware’s Republican-led County Commission the power to choose the four members who then pick the chair.

“It’s simply going to dilute minority votes by denying representation on the election board,” said board Chair Clarence Billups, one of the panel’s three Black members.

He predicted that voting hours could be cut under a new board, and “early voting will be something of a thing of the past as we know it, particularly hours for Saturday and Sunday voting.”

The proposal is the latest attempt to change political power in county election boards across Georgia following the passage of previous bills that ended bipartisan appointments in several other counties.

State Rep. James Burchett, a Republican from Waycross, said the Ware election board should be reshaped so that it complies with a 2018 decision by the Georgia Supreme Court, which ruled that private organizations, such as political parties, couldn’t appoint public officials to government decision-making bodies.

“Public boards exercise government control. Private entities are not elected by the constituents and are not held to the same standard that public officials are,” Burchett said.

Political parties could still nominate members of the election board, but the County Commission would have final authority over who’s selected, and it would have “no obligation” to choose the parties’ nominees.

Most of the county election board overhauls across Georgia have occurred since the 2020 election, when Democrat Joe Biden defeated Republican Donald Trump, whose supporters questioned the results, including in Ware County. Three vote counts showed Biden won Georgia by about 12,000 votes.

In Morgan and Troup counties,

Black election board members lost their positions after the General Assembly removed political party appointments.

HB 422 is now pending in the Senate.