Georgia’s highest court has ruled that more than 3,000 absentee ballots may not be counted if they are received after Election Day, despite an error by local election officials.

All the voting will take place in Cobb County, a northern Atlanta suburb that voted for Joe Biden in 2020 and could be a decisive factor in a state where Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are tied in the polls.

Biden won the state with 49.5% of the vote in 2020, compared to 49.2% for Trump.

Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger after the 2020 election asking him to “find 11,780 votes” Trump needed to defeat Biden in Georgia.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a lawsuit to protect the rights of Cobb County voters in the 2024 presidential election after officials accidentally delayed sending out some absentee ballots.

Newsweek asked the RNC, the ACLU and the Cobb County Election Board for email comments on Tuesday.

Among the plaintiffs bringing the case to the ACLU are Naomi Ayota, a 19-year-old attending college in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Harrison “Grant” Simmel, a 20-year-old attending college in Boulder, Colorado, and Gabriel Dickson, a Cobb County resident who requested an absentee ballot because he is legally blind.

“It is incredibly burdensome for him to vote in person,” the ACLU lawsuit says.

The Georgia Supreme Court has ruled that all absentee ballots in Cobb County must be received before the polls close Tuesday at 7 p.m.

Any ballots received after that time will be held until the matter can be fully adjudicated.

The Georgia Supreme Court has overruled a Cobb County judge who extended the deadline until 5 p.m. Friday to compensate for the delay in mailing out ballots.

The Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Georgia Republican Party had appealed the decision to the Georgia Supreme Court, arguing that the Cobb County judge’s deviation from election rules is “unwarranted.”

“Plaintiffs claim an encumbrance on their right to vote, but the Georgia Constitution does not guarantee the right to vote by mail. Voters still have many options to vote, including voting in person or dropping off their ballots in person,” their appeal stated.

In its first lawsuit, the ACLU complained that “Plaintiffs and more than 3,000 other legally registered voters in Cobb County are on the brink of disenfranchisement in the November 5 election because the Cobb County Board of Elections and Registration failed to were able to cast their absentee ballots on time. Defendants admit the violation of the law.”

“It is unlikely that all affected voters will even receive their ballots before November 2, especially as hundreds of affected voters temporarily live out of state or abroad,” the report said.