NC Democratic Party sues over GOP efforts to toss 60,000 votes. Race for Supreme Court seat hangs in balance

The North Carolina Democratic Party is suing in an attempt to stop the state Republican Party's efforts to throw out the ballots of more than 60,000 people who voted in this year's elections.

A recount that finished this week reaffirmed initial election results that showed the Democratic incumbent, Justice Allison Riggs, got the most votes. But the challenges claiming that elections officials improperly counted tens of thousands of ballots are a key part of the GOP's strategy to win the key race for a seat on the seven-member North Carolina Supreme Court.

Riggs led by 734 votes, according to the recount, out of more than 5.5 million ballots cast in that race. Her Republican opponent, state Court of Appeals Judge Jefferson Griffin, has called for a second recount that's underway now. State officials expect it will likely finish next week.

But recounts don't have a history in North Carolina of changing many votes, and Griffin's main strategy has been his attempt to toss out those tens of thousands of ballots. But that's a multi-step process at the state level, where county election boards must first look into the claims and decide if they have merit. Then the State Board of Elections will likely be asked to review those county-level decisions. And the state board's decision could then be appealed to state court, where a legal battle could drag on for weeks or months.

Democratic Party officials want to avoid much of that and get Riggs, who has already declared victory, sworn back in on the Supreme Court. The party sued the State Board of Elections on Wednesday, seeking to have a federal judge order the elections board not to throw out many, or potentially any, of the ballots Griffin is challenging.

Many of the ballots being challenged are based on a legal theory that has already been rejected by the State Board of Elections — in a unanimous, bipartisan vote earlier this year — as well as by a federal judge, appointed by Donald Trump, who ruled that the GOP's requests went counter to "a democratic form of government" after the party sought to block nearly a quarter of a million people from being allowed to vote this year.

His ruling was later upheld by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, which additionally ruled that the matter was a question for federal courts, not state courts, to decide.

The Democratic Party's lawsuits seeks to use those rulings to essentially force state elections officials to deny Griffin's challenges, based on that recent precedent.

Griffin and other Republicans are alleging that ballots for the following reasons:

Ballots were cast by overseas citizens who have not resided in North Carolina but whose parents or legal guardians were eligible in-state voters before leaving the United States.

Ballots were cast by military or overseas citizens that were not accompanied by a photocopy of a qualifying photo ID or ID Exception Form.

Ballots were cast by registered voters whose voter-registration database records contain neither a driver’s license number nor the last-four digits of a social security number.

Democrats argue that the protests shouldn’t be considered because they are systematic complaints, rather than complaints about individual voters. The lawsuit also notes that two of the three types of challenges rest on legal theories that have not been successful in court.

“Put simply, the Protests demand that the NCSBE violate federal laws safeguarding North Carolinians’ fundamental right to have their votes counted,” the Democrats’ lawsuit says, adding that the state elections board should issue a declaratory judgment that federal law prohibits throwing out votes in an election on the basis of the mass, systemic challenges lodged by the Protests.”

An elections board spokesman didn't immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit. A Republican Party spokesman said the party was still reviewing the lawsuit.

Also on Friday, however, the NCGOP began asking the State Board of Elections to speed up its decision on the protests — and to act by Tuesday. It's unclear if a federal judge will have ruled on the Democratic Party's lawsuit by then.

“Judge Griffin has led efforts to seek clarity and accountability while the State Board has been dragging its feet," NCGOP chairman Jason Simmons said in a news release. "The people of North Carolina deserve clarity and confidence in the electoral process."