An appeals court in North Carolina confirmed on Tuesday that a federal trial judge acted appropriately last month by refraining from making a decision on the eligibility of thousands of voters in last fall’s controversial state Supreme Court election, therefore returning the issue to state jurisdiction.
The panel from the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also granted Associate Justice Allison Riggs the opportunity to revisit federal court if state court appeals result in challenger Jefferson Griffin overcoming her after the exclusion of certain ballots. This judicial panel’s ruling essentially gives Riggs a potential chance to argue violations of federal election and voting rights legislation.
The latest ruling suggests that, for now, federal courts will not be involved in determining the outcome of the November race between Democrat Riggs and Republican Griffin, who has argued for the matters to remain in state courts. In a contest where over 5.5 million ballots were cast and after two recounts, Riggs currently holds a narrow lead over Griffin by just 734 votes.
Griffin is disputing the validity of approximately 66,000 ballots which he believes should not have been counted. Most of these ballots belong to voters whose registration information lacked either a driver’s license number or the last four digits of a Social Security number. The challenge also includes votes from military and overseas Americans who did not submit accompanying photo identification, as well as some voters who have never lived in the U.S.
In December, the State Board of Elections turned down Griffin’s formal protests. Griffin, a state appeals judge, aims to verify the removal of these votes based on state law stipulations or provisions in the North Carolina Constitution.
The North Carolina Republican Party has expressed its satisfaction with the decision from the 4th Circuit that emphasizes state courts should handle state election matters, according to party spokesperson Matt Mercer via text.
Supporters of Riggs, including prominent Democratic figures, have urged Griffin to concede. They argue that Griffin’s actions, supported by the state GOP, aim to overturn the election result through disenfranchisement without adequate evidence of voter ineligibility.
The election remains one of the few races from November 5 that has yet to be resolved nationally. New Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin noted that Riggs is clearly the winner and emphasized that the voters of North Carolina deserve confirmation that their votes matter. However, he criticized the recent ruling for prolonging the process and wasting taxpayer resources.
Since the actions of the elections board, the legal matters surrounding the election have continued to unfold within both state and federal court jurisdictions. Initially, Griffin’s legal team sought intervention from the state Supreme Court to exclude the contested ballots. However, the elections board moved the case to federal court, citing the federal implications of Griffin’s appeals. Four weeks prior, U.S. District Judge Richard Myers opted to direct the cases back to state courts, citing “unsettled questions of state law” as part of his rationale.
Following Judge Myers’ transfer of the case, the state Supreme Court justices rejected Griffin’s initial petition to exclude ballots and determined that his protests should be heard in a local trial court, with a hearing scheduled for Friday in Wake County.
On Tuesday, the panel of U.S. Circuit Judges ruled that some appeals by Riggs and others were no longer relevant due to the actions by the state Supreme Court. Although they referenced different legal reasoning from Judge Myers, the panel’s opinion still supported his choice to abstain from ruling based on unresolved state law issues, indicating that conflicting interpretations of North Carolina statutes were at play. The panel suggested that clarifying state law could help eliminate the need for federal constitutional considerations tied to the case. Should further state appeals arise, they may resurface in the state Supreme Court, where the majority of justices are registered Republicans.
However, the opinion also instructed Judge Myers to adjust his recent directive to explicitly maintain jurisdiction over the federal matters cited by the elections board, should any issues persist after state court resolutions. This would provide Riggs, as a legal party in the proceedings, with the option to seek federal court action to restore any ballots that may be excluded from the total.
The election in question is for an eight-year term that was expected to begin in early January, but Riggs will remain on the court for the time being while the legal proceedings continue.
