Fulton County, Georgia, recently made an admission that should have commanded national attention. During a hearing before the Georgia State Election Board, county officials acknowledged that approximately 315,000 early ballots cast in the 2020 presidential election were unlawfully certified yet were nonetheless included in Georgia’s final, official results, in a race Joe Biden was officially declared to have won by just 11,779 votes.
The admission arose from a challenge filed by David Cross, an election integrity activist, who alleged that Fulton County violated Georgia election law in its handling of early voting. Under state statute, each ballot scanner is required to produce tabulation tapes at the close of voting, and poll workers must sign those tapes to certify the reported totals. These signed tapes are not merely an administrative safeguard. They are central to determining whether the vote count itself is legitimate. //
But even as the man accused of attacking democracy for questioning the process has now been vindicated on a central factual point, the people and institutions that failed to follow the law have faced no consequences.
The fact that President Trump ultimately won reelection does not undo what was done in Georgia. Accountability is not contingent on electoral reversal. It is contingent on whether the law still binds those who administer elections, and whether violations of that law still matter once the political moment has passed.
If nothing comes of Fulton County’s admission, the implication will be that election laws can be treated as optional rather than binding. Lawful certification will remain a matter of convenience instead of necessity. Future officials will understand that essential checks on the integrity of the vote can be ignored so long as the results are politically convenient.
Even more troubling, inaction would validate a deeper inversion of responsibility. The individual who raised concerns was punished, while the institutions that failed to follow the law remain protected.
Cross, whose persistence brought these revelations to light, has asked the State Election Board to decertify Fulton County’s 2020 advanced voting results for the historical record. His request is not aimed at changing past outcomes. We cannot undo the fact that for four years Joe Biden was president. But an official acknowledgment that Fulton County’s vote certification, and by extension the Georgia outcome, was invalid would place a permanent mark on the deliberate misconduct of those responsible and the institutional failure that enabled it, while reinforcing the principle that election law is not optional.
