A federal judge has approved a request by the Georgia secretary of state to move the federal election primary to May 20 next year.

The move was designed to avoid having advance voting fall during the Memorial Day weekend. It follows an earlier federal ruling requiring Georgia to build in more time between an election and a runoff in order to allow adequate time for absentee and overseas ballots to be issued and counted.

The federal election ballot next year will include races for U.S. Senate, the seat being left by retiring Saxby Chambliss, and all U.S. House seats.

With the move, the state’s election calendar for 2014 now looks like this:

March 3-7: Qualifying period for candidates seeking federal office

April 5: Deadline to transmit Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting ballots (for federal primary)

May 20: Federal primary

June 7: Deadline to transmit UOCAVA ballots (for the federal primary runoff)

July 22: Federal primary runoff

Sept. 20: Deadline to transmit UOCAVA ballots (for general election)

Nov. 4: General election

Nov. 22: Deadline to transmit UOCAVA ballots (for general runoff)

Jan. 6: Federal general runoff

From staff reports