Georgia
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A federal appeals court on Oct. 2nd reinstated Georgia’s Election Day deadline for the receipt of mail-in ballots, staying a lower court ruling that had extended that deadline by three days for the general election. To request an absentee ballot, voters had complete an absentee ballot application and return the absentee ballot application to their county registration office. Some counties offer ballot delivery for registered voters who are hospitalized, and there are exceptions for overseas military personnel.
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Except in the case of a physically disabled voter residing in the county or municipality, no absentee ballot shall be mailed to an address other than the permanent mailing address of the elector as recorded on the elector’s voter registration record. Matt Braynard of the Voter Integrity Project found over 1,000 instances of people listing commercial properties like UPS in a single sample.
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A ballot must be received by the county registrar no later than the close of polls on Election Day. Ballots received after the polls close cannot be counted.
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It is the responsibility of the registrar to compare your absentee ballot oath envelope to your voter registration card to verify your signature, as well as compare your signature on the ballot envelope with your signature on the absentee application. We have no evidence that Fulton County and Cobb County upheld this requirement due to the disproportionately low rate of disqualifications.
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This is the biggest shock for me. Georgia allows private organizations and people to create their own ballot applications. "Any individual, organization or group may design their own form according to the requirements specified by Georgia Election Code." Furthermore, certain people are allowed to receive multiple ballots.
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A result of a primary or election may be contested on one or more of the following grounds: Misconduct, fraud, or irregularity by any primary or election official or officials sufficient to change or place in doubt the result; (...) When illegal votes have been received or legal votes rejected at the polls sufficient to change or place in doubt the result; (...) For any error in counting the votes or declaring the result of the primary or election, if such error would change the result;"
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For an audit to be considered legitimate, signature verification is a minimum requirement according to MIT and CalTech. "Auditors need to establish whether paper trail is trustworthy, through ballot accounting, checking against pollbooks and voter registration databases, reviewing chain of custody logs, video security surveillance, checking eligibility determinations, checking signature verification, etc." The initial recount only "audited" some of the machines and recounted ballots. The Secretary was not adhering the basic requirements of a risk-limiting audit.
Sources
G2: https://twitter.com/MattBraynard/status/1330578868357509120
G3-G5: https://sos.ga.gov/admin/uploads/Absentee_Voting_Guide_20142.pdf
For a true audit, it is not the responsibility of any party to prove that a candidate would have won. You merely need to prove enough ballots are in dispute that would affect the election.