A prominent election attorney for the Democratic Party has joined the legal dispute over a proposed ballot referendum to let voters decide whether to build Atlanta’s controversial Public Safety Training Center, “Cop City.”
Marc Elias of the Elias Law Group is throwing his political weight behind a proposed ordinance that aims to upend Atlanta’s petition review process for ballot referendums and end the use of the questionable verification practice called “signature matching” as activists pressured officials to put Cop City on the ballot for a citywide vote in 2024.
Elias’ entry into the Cop City furor was notable because he is one of the foremost attorneys in the country on voting rights issues and cases that emphasize the importance of fair and accessible elections. His involvement now gives anti-Cop City protesters a heavyweight in their corner as mainstream Democrats wanted to ensure election procedures are not undermined.
As one of the Democratic Party’s most prolific litigators, Elias has overseen a number of high-profile cases involving the White House and the Democratic National Committee, as well as lawsuits stemming from Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.
In 2018, The New York Times called Elias “one of the most influential” Democrats in Washington who didn’t hold an elected position.
Elias coming on board with the Cop City case signified a larger shift in strategy as activists seeking a referendum on the $90 million facility faced continued delay tactics by local politicians who back the plan, including Atlanta mayor Andre Dickens.
Meanwhile, Atlanta City Council member Liliana Bakhtiari was expected to introduce the ordinance to the full council soon, according to news organization Mother Jones, which obtained an exclusive draft of the proposal.
The case puts Elias’ firm on the opposite side of an unexpected legal battle with the majority-Democrat city council, as well as Dickens — a fellow Democrat and adviser to President Joe Biden’s 2024 campaign.
Dickens firmly supports Cop City despite the uproar over its construction, arguing that a modernized training hub for first responders is necessary to replace the city’s outdated facilities.
The mega center includes a firing range, driver’s training course, canine training courses, as well as a “mock city” comprising a model home, nightclub, gas station and hotel “to simulate real-world training,” according to plans released by the Atlanta Police Foundation.
Previously, Dickens said the facility would create a “classroom space that redefines how we approach policing” while implementing de-escalation and racial sensitivity training.
Cop City opponents, however, have consistently expressed disapproval through protests at the construction site, maintaining that the facility would lead to over-policing and racial profiling in surrounding communities.
The referendum issue also has created a major rift between the city and key Democratic figures like Stacey Abrams, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA), King Center CEO Bernice King, and other various Georgia voting rights groups, who have voiced opposition to Dickens’ approach to the petition process.
In a lateral move, the Vote To Stop Cop City Coalition — the organization leading the campaign against the training center — sent a letter to Atlanta on Monday, Dec. 11, insisting that local leaders avoid voter suppression tactics to thwart the potential referendum as support was gaining more steam.
The petition was launched in June to put Cop City on the ballot after the city broke ground on the 85-acre facility last spring in the South River Forest area of unincorporated DeKalb County, sparking fierce protests for several months, including several violent confrontations between demonstrators and law enforcement authorities.
The campaign against Cop City has used various strategies to derail the plan, including active forest defense, legal battles, and lobbying city council officials as protesters continued to lay siege on the site.
One protester was shot and killed by police during a raid to clear woods near the site, while more than 60 demonstrators have been indicted on charges of domestic terrorism and racketeering, which many civil and legal advocates called extreme.
Then there was the parallel saga of the referendum campaign, which needed to gather 58,000 signatures by August to bring the Cop City issue to a vote in November. However, a federal judge ruled in July that only non-Atlanta residents could collect signatures for the petition, including those who live in unincorporated DeKalb County, where Cop City is located, further muddying the issue and pushing the referendum deadline to September.
Many DeKalb residents who live near the planned site say they oppose the facility as they believe it would embed a more militarized police force in the Black community, but these community members are locked out of voting on the referendum because they are not residents of Atlanta, which owns the site.
On the other hand, Atlanta residents who are eligible to vote can sign the petition and vote on the resulting referendum if it happens.
In August, as the referendum campaign got ready to submit more than 100,000 signatures, Atlanta’s city clerk announced a plan to use “signature matching” to vet the petition, prompting dozens of voting rights groups in Georgia to condemn Dickens and other city officials for adopting a practice often associated with Republican efforts to deprive Black voters.
Proponents of signature matching value it as a verification process that prevents fraud by matching a signature on a petition with the one on file in a state database. However, many have criticized the method, saying it’s a way to suppress votes.
As city officials introduced the contentious verification process, they also appealed the July decision that changed the deadline, claiming the entire petition process was invalid.
In September, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals paused the July decision, which plunged the entire referendum campaign into uncertainty, while the federal judge who issued the ruling admonished the city of Atlanta for inconsistencies throughout the legal proceedings.
“The city could have avoided the conundrum that now exists,” Judge Mark Cohen wrote. “But the city instead opted to approve a petition for a referendum it believed and later contended was illegal. A proverb dating back over four centuries ago once again applies here: Honesty is the best policy.”
Later, Sen. Warnock sent a letter to Dickens, criticizing the mayor about the city’s intention to implement signature matching on the ballot petition. In response, Dickens defended the procedure in an 11-page letter, calling it “best in class.”
Atlanta officials are awaiting a ruling by the 11th Circuit on when the city can start the signature validation process.
