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Fulton County elections board to hold vote on director Richard Barron

A specially called meeting will be held on Tuesday.

FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — Fulton County's elections board will hold a vote on Tuesday over Election Director Richard Barron.

An agenda for the specially-called Registration and Elections Board meeting lists only one item under new business : "Board of Registration and Election vote on the Registration and Elections Director."

A county spokeswoman confirmed that at last week's regular meeting, on Thursday, a "vote was taken" regarding the matter during an executive session.

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While elections board meetings are to be public in Georgia, boards may go into executive session to discuss sensitive matters in private. However, under Georgia law, votes such as the one described from last week must be held publicly.

"It was immediately determined that such a vote was invalid unless it occurred in open session," the county spokeswoman said. "At that time, the Board closed Executive Session and reconvened during open session. The Chair made a motion to table two items – the vote from Executive Session and Item #6 on the agenda. A motion was made and seconded. As a result, no vote occurred on these matters."

As the Fulton County elections director, Barron became one of the most visible faces throughout Georgia's post-election saga in November and December. It faced criticism over issues regarding election security, staffing and resources and ballot chain of custody.

The now-infamous election night events at State Farm Arena became a centerpiece of former President Donald Trump's false claims that the election had been stolen. It was thoroughly accounted for by state officials, but became a huge strain on the county's election apparatus, with some workers facing harassment and death threats.

A server crashing during the recount also became a flash point as the state said the county "literally ignored the basic instructions and the directions of the vendor."

While the county said it had followed procedures set out by the Secretary of State and Dominion Voting Systems, Gabriel Sterling in the Secretary of State's Office said at the time the county "cut a corner" by using a server that had been meant for testing. Sterling said a Dominion employee told them they couldn't do that because it would crash the server, but they went ahead anyway. The county wound up having to re-scan ballots, and the Fulton board narrowly recertified results in a 3-2 vote.

Even before the November election, Fulton was under the microscope for a problematic June primary process that saw massive lines at polling sites.

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