Reverses certification of voting results, which violated state law

NEW HANOVER COUNTY -- In a whirlwind day, the New Hanover County Board of Elections Thursday certified local election results -- then a few hours later rescinded its decision because it would have violated state law.

Thursday morning, and against the advice of elections staff and a county attorney and in apparent violation of state elections law, the board decided 2-1 to immediately certify results of the 2016 election for county races after dismissing election protests filed by John Christian Anderson.

Five hours later, after a conference call with attorneys from the N.C. State Board of Elections, the board held an emergency meeting to nullify its own decision in another 2-1 vote -- with Chairman Jonathan Washburn dissenting.

"The board still believes that we did what was right under the circumstances, but there is nothing we can do until the statute is changed," said board member Jamie Getty, whose vote from certifying to nullifying swung the decision.

The quick turnaround from the N.C. elections board happened even as the agency is dealing with statewide recount requests in the close gubernatorial contest between incumbent Republican Gov. Pat McCrory and Democratic Attorney General Roy Cooper, who leads McCrory. But spokesman Pat Gannon said the state agency is still available to assist counties.

"The State Board’s attorneys routinely field legal questions from counties," Gannon said. "There was nothing unusual or surprising about (the timing) from our end."

Earlier Thursday, Washburn and Getty -- both Republicans -- said they certified the results because they didn't want to hold up the results of the election any longer. The board's initial decision came shortly after it dismissed Anderson's protests as being frivolous and without merit. Anderson presented no evidence for his various assertions and one of his protests relied on a constitutional residency requirement that had been nullified by a 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision.

The state law reads, "The certificate shall be issued five days after the protest is dismissed or denied by the county board of elections, unless that decision has been appealed to the State Board of Elections." The law then reads that the board could issue a certificate 10 days after a "final decision" by the state Board of Elections if the local decision is appealed.

"The point of him filing this petition was to disrupt our election and all board members found this to be filed in bad faith," Getty said shortly after the earlier meeting. "If we were to follow the law, then this will set a bad precedent going forward. Under the circumstances, we decided that it was more equitable, and in the best interest of our county as a whole, to not allow frivolous petitions to be filed in the future so as to disrupt our county government."

Getty said she was disappointed in the final result.

"We are powerless to do anything to prevent Mr. Anderson from doing what he did," she said. "The election can be stalled by one bad actor and it is going to continue to waste time and money for all the taxpayers."

Reporter Tim Buckland can be reached at 910-343-2217 or Tim.Buckland@StarNewsOnline.com.