Release via email:

Today, a group of Georgia voters filed a federal lawsuit asking the United States District Court in Atlanta to enjoin Secretary of State Brian Kemp from exercising any further powers of the Secretary of State’s Office in presiding over the 2018 general election, in which he himself is a candidate.

The emergency legal papers were filed at 5 PM today on behalf of five Georgia voters: LaTosha Brown, Jennifer N. Ide and Katharine Wilkinson of Fulton County, Candace Fowler of Dekalb County, and Chalis Montgomery of Barrow County. They are represented in the matter by the nonpartisan nonprofit Protect Democracy, former United States Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia Michael J. Moore of Pope McGlamry, and former Department of Justice Voting Rights Section attorney Bryan L. Sells of the Atlanta Law Office of Bryan L. Sells.

The plaintiffs are seeking a temporary restraining order barring Secretary Kemp from being involved in the counting of votes, the certification of results, or any runoff or recount procedures that would normally be exercised by the Secretary of State’s Office or the Board of Elections, on which he also sits.

Counsel for Protect Democracy Larry Schwartztol said, “That no person should be a judge in their own case is about as basic a rule of fairness as you can get. That principle, embodied in the Constitution’s Due Process Clause, applies with special force to Secretary Kemp, who has misused his official position to try to tilt the playing field of the election in his favor. The extreme facts of this case warrant emergency relief to protect the rights of Georgia voters.”

Seems a bit late for this, no?