08/25/2026
Georgia’s Election Problems Are Documented Failures, Not Theories
Rebuttal to an Op-Ed Praising Secretary of State Raffensperger and the new Election Integrity Task Force
By Field Searcy
August 24, 2026
The recent op-ed praising Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and the new Election Integrity Task Force claims that concerns about Georgia’s elections are little more than “conspiracy theories” that have unfairly damaged public confidence. This framing is not only inaccurate — it is contradicted by multiple documented cases, court findings, and official records that reveal serious, recurring problems with Georgia’s voting system. If Georgia’s elections are truly the most secure, fair, and accurate in the nation, why did the Secretary of State feel the need to create an Election Integrity Task Force? Let’s examine the record.
These issues are not abstract theories. They involve missing ballot images, double-counted ballots, unverifiable QR codes, compromised security credentials, and repeated failures to follow basic chain-of-custody requirements. These problems have been raised in federal court, adjudicated by the State Election Board, and confirmed through open records requests.
In the 2022 DeKalb County Commission primary, candidate Michelle Long Spears initially appeared to finish third. After precinct-level analysis showed zero votes for her in the precinct where she votes, she requested a hand recount. The Secretary of State’s office opposed the request. When DeKalb County conducted the hand count anyway, Spears moved from third place to first. This single race demonstrated that the electronic results could not be trusted without a human-verified paper trail.
In the Rossi/Moncla case (SEB2023-025), the State Election Board confirmed that Fulton County produced 17,852 ballots with no corresponding ballot images, 20,713 votes that could not be traced to any source tabulator, and 3,125 double-counted ballots in the 2020 General Election. The case also documented more than 140 election code violations by Fulton County. These findings were not made by activists — they were accepted by the Governor’s office and adjudicated by the State Election Board itself.
In the federal case Curling v. Raffensperger, cybersecurity expert Dr. Alex Halderman demonstrated in open court before Judge Amy Totenberg that he could hack a Georgia ballot-marking device using only a ballpoint pen and change votes. Judge Totenberg had already ruled that the QR codes generated by these machines violate Georgia law (O.C.G.A. § 21-2-300) because voters cannot verify that the QR code accurately reflects their choices. The system also conflicts with the federal Help America Vote Act’s requirement that ballots be humanly verifiable. Other expert testimony in this case revealed that risk-limiting audits based on ballot-marking devices are meaningless, as the voter’s intent can never be known — what was shown to the voter on the touchscreen is not verifiable.
In the DeKalb GOP v. Raffensperger case, open records requests revealed that Dominion’s X.509 encryption certificates were stored in plain text on the Election Management System servers. Using these certificates, the system administrator password was decrypted and has since appeared on publicly available merchandise. Both of these issues violate basic cybersecurity protocols for securing election computer equipment and role-based access controls.
After the 2024 election, analysis of Dominion tabulator tapes from multiple counties found that poll workers were certifying results under the “Local Election Authority Act” — a Canadian statute that does not exist in Georgia. This error had gone unnoticed since the Dominion system was installed in 2020. When it was brought to the attention of the Secretary of State’s office in January 2025, a chief of staff reportedly responded that “it doesn’t matter.” The language was only corrected for the next election cycle after legislative pressure.
An analysis of scanner log (SLOG) files from seven Georgia counties after the 2024 General Election found tabulator errors and misfeeds that far exceeded federal standards under the Help America Vote Act. In addition, these seven counties recorded over 22,000 instances of the “QR Code Signature Mismatch” error, which has been classified as a Security Error by the Election Assistance Commission. These errors represent violations of both US federal law 52 USC § 21081(5) and Georgia state law 21-2-374.
In December 2025, the State Election Board heard complaint SEB 2022-015. The complaint alleged that Fulton County failed to obtain required signatures on tabulator tapes for approximately 315,000 early votes. The Fulton County attorney admitted to the State Election Board that these tabulator tapes were unsigned. These tapes are essential documents for verifying vote totals and maintaining chain of custody.
The new Election Integrity Task Force formation does not erase the documented problems above. Real election integrity requires more than forums and statements. It requires replacing unverifiable QR-code ballots with hand-marked paper ballots, conducting meaningful risk-limiting audits based on voter intent rather than machine summaries, securing proper chain-of-custody documentation, and maintaining independent oversight of election administration.
It is also worth noting that Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has failed to appear in the above-mentioned court cases and declined requests from the Georgia Senate Ethics Committee to answer questions about these issues and concerns. Is his Election Integrity Task Force an attempt to cover his own record?
After six years of operating an expensive, insecure, and unnecessarily complex voting system financed for two decades, the Georgia legislature has delayed its own mandate to remove QR-code ballots and instead created a Joint Committee to evaluate the next system — one that will likely cost taxpayers even more. In an era of advancing artificial intelligence and quantum computing, Georgia must maintain human control over its elections rather than outsourcing them to ever-more-complex technology and corporations beyond public oversight. Now is the time to simplify the system and return to hand-marked, hand-counted paper ballots, supported by video documentation and rigorous chain-of-custody protocols.
Until these fundamental issues are addressed, claims that Georgia has “the most secure elections in America” will continue to ring hollow to voters who have seen the evidence. Election integrity concerns in Georgia are not theories. They are documented failures that demand substantive reform, not public relations.
Field Searcy is a technologist and co-founder of GeorgiansForTruth.org, a grassroots volunteer effort to bring election integrity to Georgia. Visit for more information and supporting documentation.
