If hundreds of thousands of ballots in Georgia’s pivotal 2020 election lacked legally required certification, then calling it “secure” was never a matter of opinion; it was demonstrably false.

As President Donald J. Trump asserted during and after the 2020 election, the integrity of that contest was not merely a political talking point but a foundational requirement for democracy itself. Now, five years later, an official admission from Fulton County, Ga.’s most populous jurisdiction with nearly 1.1 million residents, confirms what millions of Americans suspected: Election procedures were not followed, and the consequences were profound.

Fulton County recently acknowledged that approximately 315,000 early-voting ballots in the 2020 presidential race were never properly certified with required poll-worker signatures on tabulation tapes, yet were nonetheless included in the county’s totals that were transmitted to the state and certified as part of the official result.

To comprehend the scale of this issue, consider this contrast: President Joe Biden’s certified margin of victory in Georgia was just 11,779 votes. Yet the number of uncertified ballots in question — 315,000 — was nearly 27 times larger than that margin. Under Georgia law, every ballot scanner must produce signed tapes at the close of voting to verify that vote counts started at zero, ran unaltered, and ended with an accurate total. In Fulton County in 2020, 36 out of 37 advanced voting precincts failed to produce these signatures, stripping the entire process of verifiable legitimacy.

These are not abstract procedural quibbles. They are violations of statutory election law. Certification tapes are not superfluous; they serve as the foundational checks and balances that prevent errors, tampering, or machine malfunction from being hidden in the final results.

Trump was right to call this out. In an early January 2021 phone call with Raffensperger, Trump repeatedly referenced concerns about irregularities and urged investigation into large quantities of questionable ballots, estimates at the time ranged between “250,000 to 300,000” ballots. Critics seized on that recorded call, framing Trump as seeking to “find votes” unlawfully. But in reality, his concern was the lawful validation of votes already cast.

The broader context reinforces that this is not a fringe claim. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has recently sued Fulton County officials to obtain 2020 voter records, citing “unexplained anomalies in vote tabulation” and noncompliance with federal election laws. The DOJ’s involvement underscores that significant legal questions about the process remain unresolved. If local election boards willfully disregard statutory safeguards, the entire electoral framework risks becoming voluntary rather than compulsory.

Republicans and independents alike should find this deeply troubling. What happens in Georgia does not stay in Georgia; it sets precedent. If election law violations go unchecked, they will spread, normalizing legal disregard and encouraging jurisdictions to treat procedural requirements as optional.

Detractors will argue that post-election litigation, audits, and recounts upheld the certified outcome. But those reviews do not erase the reality that essential statutory safeguards were breached in a race decided by a razor-thin margin. Process matters as much as outcome. If election laws can be ignored without consequence, then certification becomes a formality rather than a safeguard, and the rule of law itself is weakened.

Should Fulton County enforce stricter election certification requirements after 2020 irregularities?

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Concerns about election integrity are not limited to Georgia. The Department of Justice is pursuing compliance issues in jurisdictions across the country under federal statutes such as the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act. These actions reflect systemic questions about adherence to election law, not isolated partisan grievances.

Acknowledging procedural failures is not an attack on voters. No one disputes the good faith of citizens who cast ballots. The issue is whether election officials followed the law in counting and certifying those ballots. Transparency and verification are democratic necessities, not partisan demands.

President Trump’s challenges to the 2020 election were framed by critics as an effort to overturn the will of the people. In light of Fulton County’s admission, they appear instead as a demand that election law be enforced as written. That distinction matters. A democracy cannot endure if legal compliance is optional when outcomes are politically inconvenient.

Safeguarding future elections requires straightforward reforms: Enforce certification requirements, conduct full forensic audits where violations are acknowledged, impose penalties for officials who disregard statutory duties, and establish independent oversight to restore public confidence. Without accountability, election laws become suggestions rather than binding rules.

Georgia’s admission should serve as both a warning and an opportunity. Restoring trust in American elections begins with enforcing the law consistently and transparently. Anything less invites continued doubt, deeper division, and a system vulnerable to abuse. The integrity of our elections depends not on rhetoric, but on adherence to the rules that govern them.

Jorge Martinez is senior advisor and National Director for Hispanic Outreach for America First Works. He previously served as press secretary for the U.S. Department of Justice.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

(Featured Image Media Credit: Screen Capture/PBS NewsHour)

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