Errors Found on April Voter Lists, Says Gasaway

Candidate for State House District 28 Representative Dan Gasaway says he has already found errors in the Elector Lists for the April special primary election.

In his written ruling ordering a new election, Senior Superior Court Judge David Sweat also ordered the Boards of Election in Banks, Stephens and Habersham counties provide lists of the registered voters who will be eligible to cast a ballot on April 9 to Gasaway and challenger Chris Erwin.

Judge Sweat said the lists must include those voters who were or should have been eligible to vote in the May 22 House District 28 General Primary, who did not request a Democratic ballot last May, and who did not become ineligible to vote in the November 2018 election.

On Monday, Gasaway said he and his attorneys started reviewing the lists as soon as they were received.

“We have now received all of the voters rolls from the County,” he said. “Some of the rolls were presented to us after the deadline but we have them all now. Some of the problems we’ve seen so far are in Banks and Habersham counties. We did not see any problems with the Stephens County rolls.”

But Gasaway added his team is already finding problems.

“The issues we found in Habersham and Banks counties were illegal voters who continue to remain on the rolls and some legal voters who should be on the list but are not.  For example, we found a situation in which one spouse was on the rolls but the other spouse was not on the rolls. It may be that one of the spouses doesn’t vote often, but if they live in the same house and they have moved to a different house, then they both need to be corrected,” Gasaway said.

Gasaway said Monday that while Stephens and Banks counties sent their lists by the Judge’s 5p deadline Friday, he did not receive Habersham County’s Elector list until Saturday morning.

Habersham County attorney Donnie Hunt said however, they had transmission issues sending Gasaway the list in the larger pdf format and had to fax it, but they were only able to fax the South Habersham list around 5:30p Friday evening. Hunt said they faxed the list for the North Habersham precincts Saturday morning.

Hunt also noted Habersham County is in a special situation versus Stephens and Banks.

“District 28 encompasses ALL of Stephens County and Banks County. It only encompasses a portion of Habersham County. All Stephens and Banks had to do was submit what the Secretary of State sent them. On the other hand, Habersham had to spend hours checking the SOS division of voters so as not to be back in the same situation as in the first law suit. In other words, the circumstances are different,” he explained.

WNEG News reached out to Erwin’s attorney Bryan Tyson to see when they received the lists and if they had found any issues or discrepancies.

“Chris received all of the elector lists on Friday. We are reviewing the lists, but have confidence in our local election officials and do not expect to find any issues,” Tyson said Monday.

The Judge required those lists be completed by all three Boards of Elections and submitted to both Dan Gasaway and Chris Erwin by close of business on March 1st.

Gasaway said he appreciates the public’s forebearance during this process, which he says has been hard on his family.

“I appreciate everyone’s patience. I know this has been a difficult thing for everybody. It’s been a very difficult thing for me and my family. I know I’ve been painted as a lot of things, but this is not something I would ever wish on anybody. This has been an extremely painful and expensive process that we’ve gone through here,” he said.

The Judge ordered both candidates to submit their objections to any voters on those lists to the Court by 5p Wednesday.