After three weeks of early voting ahead of Tuesday’s primary, record-breaking turnout is undercutting predictions that the Georgia Election Integrity Act of 2021 would lead to a falloff in voting.
The Election Integrity Act, also known as, unleashed a furious backlash when it passed. Biden called it “Jim Crow 2.0.” Abrams accused its authors of “reviving Georgia’s dark past of racist voting laws.” The clothing retailer Patagonia condemned the bill, and Major League Baseball moved its All-Star Game out of Atlanta.
“Contrary to the hyperpartisan rhetoric you may have heard inside and outside this gold dome, the facts are that this new law will expand voting access in the Peach State,” Gov. Brian Kemp said in March last year as he signed the bill, noting that every county in Georgia would have expanded early voting on the weekends for the first time in history.
“They made it hard,” said Preston Wallace, a retiree from Chamblee who voted by mail in 2020 but chose to do so in person this year. “I’m not certain about the drop-offs, or if the mail is going to get picked up on time. I just don’t trust it. I didn’t want to take any chances.” at the end of each day when teams of election workers emptied it. This year, a log taped to the side of the drop box listed the numbers of ballots collected in the first two days of activity. On May 3, the number was eight. The next day, it was three.
Cliff Albright of Black Voters Matter, a Georgia-based voting rights group, said that issue will probably be more pronounced in November, when turnout will be higher than on Tuesday. But the group is using Tuesday as a dry run, and is sending out text messages and radio ads urging voters to bring their own water, chairs and phone chargers.
In Griffin, Republicans gained a majority on the Spalding County Board of Elections last year and decided this spring to eliminate Sunday voting, as allowed under the new state law. Since then, local Democrats have mobilizedThe party teamed up with Black Voters Matter this month to host a Mother’s Day-themed voter registration festival at a Griffin laundromat.
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