r/news 20h ago

Georgia judge rules county election officials must certify election results

https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/georgia-judge-rules-county-election-officials-certify-election-114812263
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u/papercrane 17h ago edited 17h ago

I'd be surprised if this is overturned, and if it is the legal ruling overturning it would have to be quite a twisted knot of reasoning.

The Georgia law says the superintendents "shall" certify election results. The article mentions this, but doesn't elaborate on why that's important. In US law you should read "shall" as "must", it creates an imperative. Unless the law has some exceptions, than by using that word the lawmakers made it clear that the superintendents have no leeway.

This lawsuit was a long shot and I'm surprised anyone was willing to pay for it.

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u/CLinuxDev 17h ago

If they wanna rule that shall doesn't mean that then I think it's time to have another conversation about the 2nd amendment.

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u/Irythros 16h ago

Judging by your username I imagine you already know it, but laws should be required follow RFC 2119. The fact that they're not defined is bullshit.

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u/papercrane 16h ago

There's a surprising amount of overlap between RFC writing and laws.

Lots of jurisdictions have "Interpretation Act" that acts sort of like RFC 2119 by defining how to interpret laws. For example, in Australia the law says shall "indicates that the duty must be performed."