Judge: North Carolina Must Strengthen Absentee Witness Rule

A federal judge has ordered North Carolina elections officials to update absentee voting rules to ensure that voters prove they have had someone witness their ballot. Judge William Osteen issued a preliminary injunction Wednesday ordering state officials to rewrite a directive issued in late September that allowed voters to fix a lack of a witness signature by returning an affidavit. However, he said he wouldn’t block that kind of fix for small errors such as an incomplete witness address. Ballots with incomplete witness info and other deficiencies have been in limbo since at least Oct. 3.