Just a few days prior to the election, the third-largest county in Georgia is experiencing a delay in the mailing of over 3,000 absentee ballots to electors.

The ballots were sent with prepaid express return enclosures, and election officials in Cobb County, located north of Atlanta, were utilizing UPS overnight delivery and U.S. Postal Service express mail to ensure their timely delivery, as Newsweek reported.

“We want to maintain voter trust by being transparent about the situation,” county Board of Elections Chairwoman Tori Silas said in a statement Thursday. “We are taking every possible step to get these ballots to the voters who requested them.”

Silas attributed the delay to a late surge in absentee ballot requests and defective equipment during the week preceding the Oct. 25 deadline.

Court's Response

According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, a judge ruled on Friday that Cobb County electors who received their absentee ballots late can return them by Nov. 8, three days after Election Day, provided that they are postmarked by Tuesday.

After the American Civil Liberties Union and the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a lawsuit to request an extension of the deadline, leading to the ruling that was issued.

The early turnout records of Georgia electors have been shattered since advance voting commenced on October 15.

Ballots In Process

It was reported by the office of Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger that as of Friday afternoon, more than 3.8 million ballots had been cast, which is equivalent to more than half of the state's active voters. The total consists of more than 238,000 people who were voting absentee.

The officials in charge of elections in Cobb County stated that voters who were waiting for absentee ballots but were late could still cast their ballots in person on the final day of early voting, which was either Friday or Tuesday.

The headquarters of the county's election commission intended to remain open throughout the weekend and on Monday in order to collect absentee ballots that were hand-delivered.

The Board of Elections, on the other hand, said that more than one thousand of the absentee ballots that were being mailed late were being addressed to individuals who were located outside of Georgia.

From the County

Ross Cavitt, a spokeswoman for the county, declined to comment on Friday regarding the number of late votes that still remained to be shipped, citing the ongoing litigation as the reason for giving his refusal.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of three voters in Cobb County who stated that as of Friday, they had not yet received absentee ballots that were mailed to them. The case was brought by civil rights organizations.

According to the lawsuit, county election officials "have taken some steps to help alleviate the problem, those actions are not nearly enough to safeguard their right to vote."