(The Center Square) – Another decision in a courtroom is pending before sending a Nov. 5 election winner to the bench of the North Carolina Supreme Court.
Friday evening, Judge Jefferson Griffin filed a motion for litigation to return from federal to state court, and requested injunction blocking the State Board of Elections from certifying Judge Allison Riggs as winner of a state Supreme Court seat. Battling into the third month since Election Day, the appellate court judge believes without these moves the state board will finalize the election result this week, possibly on Friday.
The next meeting of the State Board of Elections has yet to be announced.
Griffin, on the bench in the state’s appellate court, is the petitioner in the filing at the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina Western Division. Respondents and intervenors are Riggs, the appointed incumbent Democrat; North Carolina Alliance for Retired Americans; VoteVets Action Fund; Tanya Webster-Durham; Sarah Smith; and Juanita Anderson.
In the filing, Griffin and lawyers say the respondent and intervenors “have failed to carry their burden to show that this Court has subject-matter jurisdiction over this case.”
Griffin on Dec. 23 asked the same court for a preliminary injunction so the state board would not certify a 734-vote win by Riggs.
Six protests by Griffin, three under jurisdiction of the state board and three at the county board level, have been dismissed. He’s litigating a dismissal of a protest involving more than 60,000 ballots.
On Election Night, with 2,658 precincts reporting, Griffin led Riggs by 9,851 votes of 5,540,090 cast. Provisional and absentee ballots that qualified were added to the totals since, swinging the race by 10,585 votes.
It was Dec. 11 when the protests under state board jurisdiction were handled. The remainder handled by counties and given to the state board for approval were also dismissed at a meeting Dec. 20.
