ATLANTA – Certification of election results in Georgia is a mandatory duty of local elections officials – not a discretionary decision – the state Court of Appeals has ruled.

The decision dismissed a lawsuit filed by Julie Adams, a Republican member of the Fulton County Board of Elections and Registration who refused to certify the results of last year’s presidential primary and maintained she had the legal authority to do so. The appellate court ruling upheld a lower-court decision Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney issued last October.

“A [local election] superintendent is empowered to request and review election documents … and to share concerns about fraud or errors with the appropriate authorities,” appellate Judges Elizabeth Gobeil and Brian Rickman wrote in an 11-page ruling dated July 2. “However, these concerns are not a basis for a superintendent to partially or entirely refuse to certify election results.”

Monday’s appellate court decision came nearly a month after the Georgia Supreme Court invalidated four of seven controversial rules changes the Republican-controlled State Election Board (SEB) passed shortly before last November’s elections. The justices ruled unanimously that board members exceeded their rulemaking authority under the Georgia Constitution.

In that case, lawyers for the plaintiffs – including a Georgia-based advocacy group headed by Republican former state Rep. Scot Turner – argued such rules changes came under the jurisdiction of the General Assembly rather than the SEB.

Lawyers for the state, the Republican National Committee and the Georgia Republican Party countered that the board was within its legal rights to approve the new election rules.

Civil rights and voting rights groups and their Democratic allies had fought the rules changes, charging Republicans with trying to sow chaos and confusion in the electoral process to aid the candidacy of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who ended up carrying Georgia’s 16 electoral votes on his way to recapturing the White House.

Members of the SEB who supported the rules changes said they were trying to restore public confidence in Georgia elections, which was shaken by uncertainties over the 2020 election results in Georgia.