On January 20, the Catoosa County (Georgia) Republican Party filed an amended Complaint in its lawsuit that tries to give the party the right to exclude candidates from its primary ballot. The new Complaint argues that certain Georgia election laws are unconstitutional. The case depends on a 1992 Eleventh Circuit opinion that said the Georgia Republican Party had a right to exclude David Duke, a Ku Klux Klan leader, from its presidential primary.

The amended Complaint includes the Secretary of State as a defendant. The U.S. District Court had ordered that the Secretary of State be brought into the case.

The Complaint refers to the Republican candidates for county office in the 2024 election as “independent candidates” and says they should have tried to appear on the ballot as independents. The party argues that they are not in sympathy with the ideas of the Republican Party, even though some of them are incumbent county commissioners. Georgia law lets independent candidates who are incumbents get on the ballot with no petition.