Actor Will Smith and director Antoine Fuqua said they are moving the production of their coming film “Emancipation” out of Georgia, citing the state’s controversial voting law.
The exit adds to the economic fallout following Republican-led efforts to pass new state election laws. Georgia’s law, passed last month, makes changes to how people vote absentee and where people can drop off their ballots. It has drawn the ire of voting-advocacy groups and businesses that say the law will restrict voting access with a pronounced effect on Black voters.
Proponents of the law say the legislation was necessary to bolster security and confidence in elections.
“We cannot in good conscience provide economic support to a government that enacts regressive voting laws that are designed to restrict voter access,” Mr. Smith’s company Westbrook Inc. and Mr. Fuqua’s Fuqua Films said in a joint statement. They compared the new bill to restrictions passed during the end of Reconstruction that prevented many Black Americans from voting.
Georgia’s film and TV production division didn’t respond to a request for comment.
