Georgia Republicans passed restrictive new changes to the state election process on Thursday, after weeks of debate about how to tighten voting laws in the state. The new law will limit early voting and add additional voter ID requirements to mail voting.
Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed the law immediately, calling it “common sense” legislation while aligning himself with former President Donald Trump in remarks touting the bill.
Trump baselessly claimed the Georgia election was stolen from him, pressured Republican election officials to investigate, and dismissed their claims that the election was secure and that the results were accurate.
Republican lawmakers in the General Assembly seized on Trump’s false claims and pushed dozens of restrictive voting bills this year.
The 95-page bill adds new restrictions across the election process.
It will dramatically limit early voting required for runoff elections, like the two in January that elected Democratic Senators Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff and secured the party’s majority in the Senate. Instead of a required three weeks of early voting hours, runoff elections could see as little as one week of early voting.
It will also require mail voters to include their driver’s license numbers or other documentation to verify their identify, instead of signature verification. Drop boxes can only be located inside election offices and early voting locations, curbing their usefulness.
Republicans pushed a final version of the bill through the General Assembly quickly, despite Democrats protests and advocate’s arguments that the bills will make it harder for voters of color to cast ballots.
Georgia is one of the first to pass major voting restrictions in the wake of the last year’s election, but Republican lawmakers around the country are advancing similar measures. Republicans have introduced at least 253 restrictive voting bills in 43 states, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law.
People will be prohibited from bringing food and water to voters waiting in line, something that has become common in past Georgia elections, where voters have waited extremely long hours to cast a ballot in the past.
The bill also standardizes most early voting to the hours of 9-5p.m., something Biden appeared to refer to earlier today when asked about proposed voting restrictions in his press conference.
“It’s sick,” Biden said. “Deciding in some states that you cannot bring water to people standing in line waiting to vote; deciding that you’re going to end voting at 5:00 when working people are just getting off work.”
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
