A federal judge on Tuesday found that a populous Georgia county violated the Civil Rights Act in its handling of absentee ballots during the midterm elections last week.

US District Judge Leigh Martin May ordered election officials in Gwinnett County not to reject those ballots solely on the basis of an omitted or incorrect birth year, The Hill reported.

May noted that although the decision arrives amid “many hotly contested and highly publicized elections issues across the State,” the relief granted finds that the “narrow set of ballots” the case pertains to must be counted.

Her decision comes as votes continue to be counted in the state’s gubernatorial contest between Democrat Stacey Abrams and Republican Brian Kemp.

The judge’s order also comes the same day a federal judge ordered state election officials in Georgia to preserve and count provisional ballots filed for the gubernatorial race.

Kemp leads Abrams in unofficial vote tallies, but the Democrat’s campaign remains confident that there are enough uncounted votes in her favor to force Kemp into a Dec. 4 runoff election.

May’s order stems from requests filed by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and by Democratic congressional candidate Carolyn Bourdeaux.

The race between Bourdeaux and Republican incumbent US Rep. Rob Woodall for Georgia’s 7th Congressional District remained too close to call.

With Post wires