(Georgia Recorder) — In a special meeting held Thursday, Georgia’s State Election Board voted to hire Hope Coan, the wife of the board’s former executive director Mike Coan, as a temporary paralegal.
Coan’s hiring came at the request of James Mills, the new executive director who joined the board in May. He personally requested Coan for the role, citing staff shortages and a high volume of cases before the board. The previous director, Mike Coan, resigned from his role in January according to the AJC.
The three Trump-aligned members of the board — Janelle King, Janice Johnston and Rick Jeffares — voted to approve Hope Coan over the objections of Chairman John Fervier, who raised questions about her fitness for the role. The final vote was 3-0.
“I do not believe this particular individual meets the necessary qualifications for this job and the hiring process itself was improper,” Fervier told the board ahead of Thursday’s vote.
“That is out of order,” Mills replied.
Democratic appointee Sara Tindall Ghazal abstained from casting a vote, saying she had not been provided “any information whatsoever about any of the candidates” for the role.
The former CEO of Coan Construction, Hope Coan’s LinkedIn page lists her as the current VP of commercial development at a real estate investment firm. Her profile does not list any paralegal experience, and she has not replied to a request for comment.
Hope Coan will replace former paralegal Alexandra Hardin, who has started a new role with the secretary of state’s office.
The board has weathered a number of controversies since the 2020 election, when President Donald Trump falsely stated that the election was stolen from him in Georgia and several other swing states. Since then, the State Election Board has been deluged by conservative activists urging them to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results, as well as implement sweeping changes they say will boost confidence in the outcome of the elections, including mandatory ballot hand-counts and the elimination of the state’s voting machines.
At a campaign rally last August, Trump highlighted King, Jeffares and Johnston’s efforts, calling them “pitbulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.” The board later attempted to implement a number of last-minute election rule changes heralded by Trump’s supporters that would have, among other things, mandated hand-counts of ballots, expanded poll-watching areas and given election officials greater leeway to delay election certification. However, those changes were invalidated ahead of the 2024 election by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thomas A. Cox Jr., who said members of the board were illegally usurping legislative authority.
The board’s next meeting is scheduled for July 29.
