Conservative voices join the outcry against Jefferson Griffin’s effort to overturn his election loss

A Republican angering Democrats in a fight over voting rights is one thing. But a Republican causing several conservative voices to align with Democrats against them highlights just how unprecedented Griffin’s effort is.

Some might trace the origin of Jefferson Griffin’s attempt to overturn his election loss to Carol Snow, a self-proclaimed, “full-blown, grade A, bona fide election denier.”

Snow is the North Carolina citizen who first tried to get more than 225,000 registered voters thrown off the rolls in 2023 because their registrations lacked some information, as required by law, on state databases. Griffin has made the same accusation in his effort to discard more than 60,000 ballots from his 2024 election contest for North Carolina Supreme Court so that he can win the race instead of incumbent Justice Allison Riggs, who actually won by 734 votes.

Some might draw a line from Griffin to Snow. But now Snow herself.

“The remedy Griffin is requesting is an embarrassment to the Republican Party,” Snow wrote recently on X.

She is far from the only conservative voice joining the outcry against Griffin. His efforts have united folks who have seldom, if ever, agreed on politics, including several GOP groups who deride Griffin as a “sore loser” who would destroy the credibility of the state supreme court and state Republican Party if his case is successful.

A Republican angering Democrats in a fight over voting rights is one thing. But a Republican  causing several conservative voices to align with Democrats against him is something else, and the bipartisan outcry to Griffin’s effort highlights just how unprecedented it is.

“I’ve spent years pushing back against the left’s tendency to go scorched earth in their rhetoric against N.C. Republicans,” Andrew Dunn, a conservative columnist based in Charlotte, wrote last month in a column criticising Griffin’s attempt.

“Most of the time, it’s dishonest nonsense,” he wrote.

“Not this time.”

‘Incredible mischief’

Despite three counts of the vote showing Riggs defeating Griffin by 734 votes, he filed a lawsuit saying that 60,000 votes should not have been counted because those voters’ registration files had incomplete information in a state database, even though there are lots of valid reasons why that may be the case. Legal precedent also says voters can’t be removed close to an election over paperwork-related issues and Griffin’s team has yet to produce a single voter among the 60,000 who is actually ineligible. 

In fact, the vast majority of these contested voters have been voting without issue for years and had to show their voter ID before voting.

Still, the NC Supreme Court, which has a 5-2 conservative majority, voted to hear Griffin’s case and blocked the state board of elections from certifying Riggs’ victory until the case was resolved. (Riggs recused herself from the case, and on Wednesday, the court rejected Griffin’s attempt to fast track the case and sent it back, for now, to a lower court.)

But one Republican justice broke with the court’s majority in its initial decision: In a dissent, Justice Richard Dietz wrote that the court should have not taken up the case at all.

The registration aspect of Griffin’s argument “is almost certainly meritless,” Dietz wrote, and while he criticized elections officials and agreed that there was some merit to Griffin’s challenges to  overseas ballots (more on that below), it was still too late for Griffin to raise them for this election without striking at the heart of election integrity and voter confidence.

“Permitting post-election litigation that seeks to rewrite our state’s election rules – and as a result, remove the right to vote in an election from people who already lawfully voted under the existing rules – invites incredible mischief,” Dietz wrote.

RELATED: ‘We shouldn’t be here’ : Effort to throw out votes in NC Supreme Court race threatens election integrity, Riggs says

Dietz said the court should not have taken up the case, based on a federal election doctrine called the Purcell principle that judges can’t intervene in election law once an election is near. 

“The petition is, in effect, post-election litigation that seeks to remove the legal right to vote from people who lawfully voted under the laws and regulations that existed during the voting process,” Dietz wrote in his dissent. 

“The harm this type of post-election legal challenge could inflict on the integrity of elections is precisely what the Purcell principle is designed to avoid,” Dietz said. 

‘Stealing a Supreme Court seat’

“If the Supreme Court sides with Griffin,” Dunn wrote in his column, “the fallout will be immediate and brutal.” 

Griffin’s case, he said, is dangerous, not just for election integrity, but for the Republican party. 

“This isn’t just bad optics; it’s potentially a credibility-shattering disaster for the court, the party, and conservatism in North Carolina. Overnight, this becomes a national story about Republicans ‘stealing’ a Supreme Court seat,” he wrote. 

RELATED: NC Supreme Court stalls Jefferson Griffin’s effort to overturn his election loss, but hints at a long road ahead

“The allegation would be impossible to defend against.”

Dunn said he took no joy in calling Griffin out.

“I hate writing this. I really do,” Dunn wrote.

“I have no desire to poison relationships with people at the state Republican Party, whom I like and respect. But this isn’t just some minor procedural squabble — it’s a huge risk that could threaten the future of conservatism in North Carolina.”

‘Nonsense’

The difference between Carol Snow and Jefferson Griffin is a matter of How, not necessarily What. 

Snow still agrees that those registrations should not have been accepted and has suggested that the state board of election should be investigated for its handling of things. If it were up to Snow, she wrote on X, a new special election would be called after those voters have either been removed or given a chance to correct the issues and vote again. 

But that is not what Griffin has done.

Griffin is seeking to throw out the ballots of 60,000 voters who followed the rules as they were presented to them, and throw them out AFTER the election and then count again. And as this particular request continued to face widespread criticism, he tweaked it in new filings to the court, suggesting that if justices are uncomfortable throwing out all 60,000 votes up front, they can throw out a smaller subset of votes, enough for him to win, and then they can stop.

Among the votes challenged in this narrower focus, are military service members from Democratic counties who voted while stationed overseas, but did not provide a voter ID, a process election officials Republican-controlled General Assembly signed off on.

This is the burning bridge too far, Snow wrote on Twitter. 

“If the R-held Supreme Court goes along with Griffin’s “hey, just toss the overseas ballots with no photo ID and if I win THAT WAY, then let’s forget about those other categories of ballots because magically I know my lead would increase” nonsense, I think changing my party affiliation to UNA [unaffiliated voters] is looking pretty darned good.”

‘Attack on our elections’

RightCount, a GOP-run election integrity group, also joined the outcry this week, releasing a campaign-style ad featuring a Republican voter from Moore County who is among the 60,000 voters being challenged.

“I’m a Republican,” the voter, James Danz, says into the camera. “I voted for Trump and Jefferson Griffin. I’ve voted Republican my whole life.”

“Now politicians are trying to cancel my vote here in North Carolina. They say I’m on a list of 60,000 voters facing canceled ballots due to a technicality.”

Danz and RightCount pull their punches a little, blaming vague “politicians” and never saying outright that Griffin is the one behind it all. But their message is clear, just the same. 

“Regardless of how you vote, all of us need to stand together to stop this attack on our elections.”

Griffin, like the rest of the Republicans on the court he is trying to join, has said he is an originalist, the judicial philosophy that says rulings must adhere to the original intent of the founding fathers who drafted the constitution.

RightCount lays out the same principles in their mission statement.

‘In order to honor the principles of America’s Founding, restore the promise of limited government and protect freedom, RightCount will remain steadfast in our commitment to defend those sworn to uphold the rule of law by ensuring that the constitutional standards, laws and procedures for vote counting and certification are upheld in the states.”

‘It needs to end now’

Many people who know Griffin suggest that Griffin’s actions don’t match what they know of him.

Jacob Brooks, a lawyer who was among the dozens of voting rights advocates who gathered in the cold last week to try and read each of the names of the 60,000 voters challenged, said that Griffin’s actions were surprising.

“I’m fortunate to know Judge Griffin on somewhat of a personal level,” Brooks said. “And I will say he’s a good man, a good father, everything I know about him, this seems pretty out of character.”

Brooks, like many others, wondered whose call this really was.

“This just seems like some folks pulling the strings,” Brooks said. He also suggested this sort of challenge might have occurred in any super close race.

“If it had been the lieutenant governor’s race that [was that] close, if it would have been secretary of state that close, we would probably have seen these challenges made,” Brooks said.

Dunn made a similar point in his piece.

“I’m not sure who’s leading the push here,” Dunn wrote, “but it needs to end now.”