Republican legislators in the state of Georgia are voraciously pushing to tighten voting laws. Members of the GOP are looking to limit mail-in voting, increase voting requirements and reduce voting on Sunday. These are all measures that the ACLU believes will reduce voter turnout for marginalized groups that typically vote for Democrats. In an effort to call out quell these efforts, voting rights activist Stacey Abrams issued a strong statement to the Republican Party within her state.
“Instead of celebrating better access and more participation, their response is to try to eliminate access to voting for primarily communities of color. And there’s a direct correlation between the usage of drop boxes, the usage of in-person early voting, especially on Sundays, and the use of vote by mail and a direct increase in the number of people of color voting," she told Jake Tapper.
Abrams pointed out that these efforts to limit voter access come after a record turnout in November 2020. Not only did President Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump, but Sens. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff also turned the state blue. As the state nears midterm elections next November, she believes that the GOP is aiming to decrease the chance that Democrats will emerge victorious again.
“We know that the only thing that precipitated these changes, it’s not that there was the question of security,” she added.
“And so the only connection that we can find is that more people of color voted, and it changed the outcome of elections in a direction that Republicans do not like."
In November 2022, Warnock will look to keep his seat by fighting off a Republican challenger. There are also rumors that Abrams may run for the governor's seat. However, she has not publicly stated that she is interested in running for the seat.
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