Georgia Election Board Asks Justice Department to Stop QR-Code Tabulation Before Midterms

Georgia’s State Election Board has asked the Justice Department to bar the state’s QR-code vote counting, force a software patch on machines used statewide, and investigate Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office over election records and data shared with outside groups.

Executive Director James Mills sent the request on Sept. 30 to Attorney General Todd Blanche. Copies went to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin. The letter is a formal request for review and, where appropriate, investigation and intervention before the Nov. 3 election.

Early in-person voting in Georgia begins Oct. 13.

The letter targets the Dominion Democracy Suite 5.5-A system used statewide. The company now operates as Liberty Vote. Georgia voters mark choices on touchscreens. The machines print a ballot with a human-readable summary and a QR code. Scanners count the QR code, not the text the voter can read.

Mills wrote that QR-code tabulation is inconsistent with the voter-verification rules in the Help America Vote Act and undermines ballot secrecy. He asked the department to prohibit “unreadable, unverifiable QR-code-based vote tabulation” and any electronic method that does not let the voter verify the vote that is actually counted. He cited 52 U.S.C. § 21081 and a Georgia statute, O.C.G.A. § 21-2-379.23(d), that took effect July 1, 2026.

He also asked for a binding six-month deadline to move to a system with voter-verifiable, hand-auditable paper records and no machine-coded tabulation. Georgia installed the current system statewide in about that span in 2020.

A second request is immediate. Mills asked the department to require a forensic backup of election-management servers and Dominion ICC scanners, then installation of Election Assistance Commission-certified Democracy Suite version 5.17, 5.20, or later software on ballot-marking devices, scanners, and election-management systems before November. He wants independent verification that vulnerabilities documented by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and a privacy flaw known as DVSorder, have been fixed.

The letter lists nine claims. Among them: the state is running software with known security flaws and has not installed certified patches; the operating environment is obsolete and unsupported; the system can be compromised in seconds with an ordinary ballpoint pen, as demonstrated in federal court; a privacy flaw can link voters to ballots; and shared statewide passwords and administrator codes weaken accountability.

Mills also asked the department to investigate alleged alteration, destruction, or withholding of ballot images, cast-vote records, and voter rolls, and to preserve those records under federal supervision. He asked that Raffensperger and any responsible officials be held accountable under federal election-records and obstruction statutes if the allegations hold.

A separate item covers data sharing. On Sept. 2, Mullin asked Blanche to examine whether Georgia and other states violated the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act and the National Voter Registration Act by sharing motor-vehicle and voter-registration data with private groups, including the Electronic Registration Information Center and the Center for Election Innovation and Research. Mills asked the department to take up that review.

The letter encloses a resolution the board adopted Sept. 28 on a 3–2 vote. Board member Carolyn Roddy presented it. The resolution says the state has not updated Dominion software to address security patches and DVSorder, that a patch is available and certified, and that Dominion has agreed to install it at no charge. It urges Raffensperger to begin the update, keep forensic images of servers and scanner drives before any change, and provide those images to the board, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Justice Department. It directs Mills to seek federal help, including on the QR-code question Mullin raised under HAVA.

Roddy told the board she did not see interest at the state level in acting, and that federal partners might. Board member Janelle King said the request was meant to get the Justice Department to support the board in pressing the secretary of state’s office to update the software.

Raffensperger’s office rejected the letter. Spokesman Robert Sinners called it unserious and said people who are serious about election security do not inject chaos at the eleventh hour, the Georgia Recorder reported. Spokeswoman Michon Lindstrom said that in roughly 30 days, Georgia’s 159 election directors will conduct a free, fair, and fast election for eligible voters.

During the 2025 legislative session, Raffensperger asked lawmakers to set aside $15 million for the personnel costs of a machine update. The money was not approved. State officials have said a full software replacement cannot be finished before voting starts because the work takes months. Planning for a new system is aimed at the 2028 presidential election. The current equipment remains in place for November.

The Justice Department had not announced a response to the Sept. 30 letter as of Friday.