Roofing company in Atlantic Beach, SC

The November election for mayor in the small town of Atlantic Beach is still yet to be certified more than three months later, but there may be an end in sight.

Votes were cast in November and counted shortly after, but 18 ballots were set aside after they were challenged by former mayor Irene Armstrong and mayoral candidate Josephine Isom who disputed whether some who cast ballots lived in the town.

An appeal hearing was held where those whose ballots were challenged submitted documentation including drivers licenses and utility bills. The Municipal Election Commission decided to accept all the challenged ballots but before the election was certified, an emergency town council meeting was held where the commission was disbanded.

Since then, the election commission was reformed, the chairman was dismissed and a new chairman, Derrick Stevens, was appointed.

On Tuesday, the commission met for the first time since the November election and its three members, Kenneth McIver, Carolyn Gore and Stevens voted to appoint McIver as the acting chair.

New election board member selected as election still undecided in Atlantic Beach

The commission also voted to redo the ballot appeal on March 20 at 10 a.m. and to issue subpoenas to 15 people who cast ballots in November to appear before the commission virtually or in person at the appeal meeting. McIver voted against holding the appeal for a second time.

“I feel as if we have already voted on these ballots and I don’t see a need to go and decide on them again,” McIver said.

Councilman and mayoral candidate John David, who ran against Isom for mayor, has dealt with residency challenges himself. He won a special election for council last January against Josephine Isom’s son, Michael Isom, but was unable to sit on council until January after court challenges regarding his residency were resolved in a supreme court case.

The new makeup of the commission has raised question marks from some in the town. Jacqui Gore, who was running for re-election in November, has personal connections to two of the three members. Stevens is said to be in a romantic relationship with Gore and Carolyn Gore is Jacqui Gore’s mother.

David said he predicts that the newly shaped commission will work to discard the votes to ensure that Isom becomes mayor. Nearly all of the ballots that were challenged were for David.

“I don’t know why these voters are being targeted in their right to vote in America when they haven’t voted anywhere else and this is their municipality where they vote,” David said. “Why does my opponent keep challenging people’s votes?”

Armstrong claimed at the appeal hearing in November that those who cast ballots did not live in Atlantic Beach. She gave one example of multiple votes being cast from an address that has a house still under construction.

Carla Taylor earned enough votes in the November election to become a council member but has not been able to sit on council yet because the votes are yet to be certified. She said the election commission should pay attention to how the Supreme Court ruled in the case challenging David’s residency eligibility to run for council.

“One of the things that most of the justices concurred with was that if you have presented your documentation to get a voter registration card and you have established that this is your primary residence, then you have the right to vote there,” Taylor said. “All of these other questions are moot because they issued a registration card from the state of South Carolina, so they met that standard. What other standards do they have to meet? To me, you’re talking about infringing on people’s right to vote.”

HORRY COUNTY, S.C. (WPDE) — Governor Henry McMaster's office will not intervene in the ongoing Atlantic Beach election certification controversy.

Last week, the Town of Atlantic Beach sent a request to McMaster's office to "take over the administration of the November 7, 2023 Town of Atlantic Beach Municipal Election proceedings".

The election was left with a one-vote margin of victory between John David and incumbent councilwoman Josephine Isom. The town council dissolved the municipal election commission as they completed a review of challenges to votes and were readying to certify David's victory.

Town attorneys summarize that action and the protests as "irregularities". They involved allegations of voter fraud, alleged illegal and improper conduct by a municipal election official, and various legal actions that are now pending before the Supreme Court of South Carolina.

READ MORE: SC Supreme Court to decide on challenge to Atlantic Beach January special election results

In his response, the Chief Legal Counsel for McMaster's office informs the town attorney that, "the Office cannot accommodate your request for Governor McMaster to end this embarrassing episode."

Thomas Limehouse Jr. said that the decision was made based on the fact that nothing in state law or in the state constitution allows the Governor to direct the State Election Commission to intervene.

"...your recent letter does not suggest otherwise or cite any legal authority to justify the stated request for gubernatorial action," Limehouse wrote.

Before issuing this decision, the chief legal counsel spotlighted the town's historical blunders with local elections.

The Town’s repeated inability to conduct such elections in compliance with South Carolina law is equal parts embarrassing and inexcusable. Notwithstanding the foregoing, for the distinct reasons detailed below, the Governor cannot direct the SEC to “take over the administration” of this election or otherwise intervene in the ongoing election dispute at this time.

The matter is in the court system now with David requesting the SC Supreme Court step in to resolve the certification process.

The Court has not made a decision.

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In the past, the county board of election and registration has had to intervene to certify races in the Town of Atlantic Beach.

Limehouse ended his letter to the town suggesting they move to make that a permanent arrangement mirroring the Town of Loris and Surfside Beach.

Regardless, going forward, absent the General Assembly addressing this issue on a statewide level, the Town should transfer the authority for conducting municipal elections to the Horry County Board of Voter Registration and Elections pursuant to section 5-5-145 of the South Carolina Code of Laws. The residents of Atlantic Beach should have confidence in the Town’s ability to conduct municipal elections, and unfortunately, the Town has not been able to provide it," Limehouse wrote.

Read the full letter below.

Previous ABC15 Coverage:

As Atlantic Beach officials were working to certify election results Friday, the election commission chairman Joe Montgomery was fired and the commission was disbanded.

The situation unfolded just hours before the results of the mayoral election were set to be certified.

The commission met to certify the election in the morning but chose to adjourn after current mayor Jake Evans raised concerns about there being no court reporter or stenographer present at the meeting. The commission was set to reconvene at 2 p.m., but an emergency town council meeting was held beforehand. On short notice and without informing the media, council met and voted to disband the commission.

“I was relieved, and I’m sad for the town,” Montgomery said. “They didn’t want to appoint me to the election commission to begin with. They wrote a letter saying there was a conflict of interest. I returned and responded to that letter and told them to show me the conflict of interest. They didn’t respond. There was no conflict of interest. That was before the election was held.”

Montgomery said there were accusations that he attended a campaign rally, but he said that was not true. The dismissal of Montgomery and the commission is the latest twist in the complicated tale of Atlantic Beach’s 2023 mayoral and town council election.

There were two clear factions in the runup to the election — mayoral candidate John David and council candidates Carla Taylor and Jerry Finney on one end; and mayoral candidate Josephine Isom and council candidates Jacqui Gore and Shaun Swinson on the other. Mayor Jake Evans supported Isom’s bid for mayor.

One candidate from each faction was elected to town council and certified on Thursday. Gore earned the most votes, 71, and Taylor earned the second most, 69.

The mayoral election was tight and is yet to be certified. Eighteen votes were originally not counted Tuesday because of challenges made by former mayor Irene Armstrong and Gore who claimed those casting ballots did not live in the town.

On Thursday, each of those ballots were reviewed and those who cast their ballots presented documentation including drivers licenses and utility bills. After review, all the ballots were accepted and counted. The tally for mayor was 65 votes for David, 64 for Isom and two write-ins.

The write-ins meant that David did not earn a majority and that the election would likely head to a runoff. Then the election commission was dissolved.

After the emergency meeting Friday, the community center where vote certification was supposed to take place that afternoon was locked and closed.

Now, residents don’t know who their mayor will be, and some showed up to the community center at 2 p.m. frustrated.

John Sketers has lived in Atlantic Beach since 1968 and said the dismissal of the election commission was uncalled for and politically motivated.

“At the end of the day, we need to put our differences aside for the betterment of Atlantic Beach,” Sketers said. “Atlantic Beach is the one that’s going to receive the black eye, and we should keep that from happening.”

Sketers also said he thinks that some landowners in the town have used their position as landlords to influence their tenants to vote one way over another in the election.

“Honestly, without taking the side of anybody, certain groups of people have had a choke on Atlantic Beach for a number of years. Some of the advantages have been they have some of the largest parcels of rental property and they have taken advantage by telling people who to vote for,” Sketers said. “I won’t get into a lot of the things but I’ve heard of some of the residents that live in this place that they were more or less asked to vote for certain candidates for their best interest.

“Say, for instance, if you were my landlord and you’re running for office and you say ‘If I don’t win the election, you may not have a place to live.’”

On Tuesday during election day, 18 ballots were challenged, mostly by former mayor Irene Armstrong. Gore also challenged some ballots.

“We had votes that was challenged and the reason why they was challenged is because we all who live in this four-block town know that these folks do not live here,” Gore said. “We live in a four-block town, so we know who lives here and who don’t live here.”

Gore called the election “a mass takeover,” claiming that outsiders all registered to vote right before the election to swing the election for mayoral candidate John David and council candidates Jerry Finney and Carla Taylor.

4 in running for Atlantic Beach council seats

Isom wrote a letter to the election commission dated Nov. 9 protesting the certification of the election, stating that the ballots that were challenged were invalid.

“Each of these ballots represents a voter who I believe is not a resident of the Town of Atlantic Beach, including four individuals (Carlisle Cooper, Noble P. Cooper Jr., Noble P. Cooper III, and Traci Y. Cooper) who list the same address as their residence, which is a building under construction for which a certificate of occupancy has not been issued,” Isom wrote in the letter.

Isom said she had no comment following the dissolution of the election commission.

Taylor said after the election that she “is still waiting for a clean election in the town of Atlantic Beach” and that she felt eligible voters were being disenfranchised.

The future mayor of Atlantic Beach is still to be determined, and it was not immediately clear what the next steps would be.

David said he thinks the state election commission needs to step in and certify the election.

Of the 18 ballots that were challenged, 16 of the votes for mayor were for David. Because of this, unofficial election results (which did not count the challenged ballots) showed Isom as the winner. David doesn’t think it was a coincidence that the ballots that were challenged were overwhelmingly for him and those he endorsed for council.

The South Carolina Election Commission and the Municipal Association of South Carolina did not immediately respond to emails inquiring about what the procedure would be if an election commission is disbanded before votes are certified.