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DEKALB COUNTY, GA- DeKalb County District Attorney Sherry Boston filed a lawsuit on today, June 3, in Fulton County Superior Court against the State of Georgia challenging the constitutionality of House Bill 369, which Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law last month.The new law changes the elections of several county-level offices, including District Attorney, from partisan to non-partisan races beginning Jan. 1, 2028. The statute, however, only applies to five big metro-Atlanta counties—Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett.
DA Boston is represented by renowned Atlanta litigation firm Caplan Cobb. She said she believes the new law is a calculated move by the Republican-controlled General Assembly to hide candidates’ party affiliations from voters in an attempt to win power in counties where most of the elected positions are held by members of the Democratic Party.“I am going to be fighting for the voters, and we’ll do that by filing a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of House Bill 369. I feel very comfortable in the legal arguments that we have to make in court,” Boston had said in preparation for the lawsuit.
The lawsuit challenges the validity of the law in three ways:
- Violation of Georgia’s Uniformity Clause – The Georgia Constitution requires that laws must work the same way throughout the state and prohibits lawmakers from enacting local or special laws that change the rules for one area of Georgia. The Georgia Supreme Court has repeatedly held that laws that target just one or a handful of counties are unconstitutional.
- Violation of the Georgia and U.S. Equal Protection Clauses – Both the Georgia and United States Constitutions mandate that laws must protect all people equally. State lawmakers did not give any legitimate reason for treating the 5 metro counties, their elected officials, and their voters differently from the state’s other 154 counties. They set them apart on the basis that they have medical examiners instead of coroners, which has no connection to the need for nonpartisan elections. In addition, the five counties targeted have large Black voter populations and Black female District Attorneys.
- Violation of Georgia’s Rejected Bills Clause – Before lawmakers passed the nonpartisan county elections bill as HB 369, the same proposal failed a full vote of the Senate as SB 573. Before the Legislature can take up a measure it previously rejected, the Georgia Constitution requires a two-thirds vote by the rejecting chamber. That did not happen with HB 369.
Now that the legal challenge has been filed, the state has 30 days to file a response.