GOP candidate drops closely-watched challenge in North Carolina Supreme Court election

A Republican North Carolina judge who launched an unprecedented effort to overturn his unofficial loss in a state Supreme Court race is dropping his challenge to the results.

A Republican North Carolina judge who launched an unprecedented effort to overturn his unofficial loss in a state Supreme Court race is dropping his challenge to the results. Judge Jefferson Griffin will not appeal a federal court’s ruling ordering that the election be certified in his Democratic opponent’s favor, he announced in a statement obtained by CNN. The case had been closely watched for how it laid out a playbook for a losing candidate to try to reverse a defeat with arguments focused on apparent clerical errors and other technicalities, rather than voting fraud. In the statement, Griffin said that he had been focused on “upholding the rule of law and making sure that every legal vote in an election is counted.” “While I do not fully agree with the District Court’s analysis, I respect the court’s holding—just as I have respected every judicial tribunal that has heard this case,” he said. “I will not appeal the court’s decision.” After two recounts showed Supreme Court Justice Allison Riggs had held on to her seat by 734 votes, Griffin sought to throw out tens of thousands of votes, with election protests mostly focused on Democratic-leaning counties. His lawyers never put forward evidence of voter fraud in the election, instead arguing that the rules set out by North Carolina election officials were not lawful. Election experts and voting rights advocates warned that if Griffin was successful using such tactics would become the norm and that voters would increasingly face the possibility of being disenfranchised at no fault of their own. This story is breaking and will be updated.