Demonstrators in downtown Raleigh declare Allison Riggs rightfully won the state Supreme Court race against Jefferson Griffin. (Photo: Clayton Henkel/NC Newsline)

It’s now been more than five months since North Carolina voters elected incumbent Justice Allison Riggs over challenger Jefferson Griffin to a state Supreme Court seat, but amazingly, Republican efforts to overturn the election continue.

Last Friday, a pair of GOP state Court of Appeals judges accepted Griffin’s ridiculous theory that sixty-five thousand registered North Carolina voters who complied with all voting rules, including providing a valid photo ID, must still nonetheless come forward and again prove their identity, or have their votes thrown out.

The ruling is a stunning assault on democracy. As Judge Tobias Hampson wrote in a long and scathing dissent, quote “changing the rules by which these lawful voters took part in our electoral process after the election to discard their otherwise valid votes – in an attempt to alter the outcome of only one race among many on the ballot – is directly counter to law, equity, and the Constitution.”

The bottom line: Hampson is right. The voters have spoken in the Riggs-Griffin contest, and this rogue ruling cannot be allowed to stand.

For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.