Republican officials in Georgia are reportedly using President Donald Trump’s false allegations of election fraud to enact new voter suppression techniques.
The New York Times pointed out the strategy in a report on Wednesday.
“Aside from trying to assuage Mr. Trump, Republicans in Georgia also appear to be laying the groundwork for new limits on voting, and particularly on absentee voting,” the Times explained.
According to the report, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) has echoed Trump’s concern about absentee voting and “has called for a sample audit of signatures on absentee ballot envelopes from the recent election.”
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, has also opened investigations into get-out-the-vote organizations like the New Georgia Project, which was founded by former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.
The Times noted:
To the left, this smacks of voter suppression — a charge Ms. Abrams often brought against Mr. Kemp when he was secretary of state and presided over his own gubernatorial contest with Ms. Abrams in 2018.
This week, Nse Ufot, chief executive of the New Georgia Project, said that Mr. Raffensperger was “resorting to desperate attempts to smear law-abiding organizations and scare eligible Georgians from registering to vote in critical upcoming elections.” Mr. Raffensperger’s office said on Wednesday that Ms. Ufot’s group had sent an absentee ballot registration form to his dead son.
The concerns about voter suppression come ahead of a Georgia runoff election on Jan. 5 that will decide control of the U.S. Senate.
