ATLANTA – Aklima Khondoker, All Voting is Local Georgia state director, issued the following statement in response to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s ploy to move thousands of registered voters to inactive status less than three months before Election Day:
“Secretary Raffensperger’s plot to move thousands of duly qualified voters to inactive status is beyond abhorrent because it adds an unnecessary layer of voter confusion less than 80 days before the general election. Rather than fix the multitude of issues that disenfranchised countless Georgians in the primary election, he’d rather see them gone.
“We applauded Secretary Raffensperger’s initial decision to send absentee requests to registered voters in the primary, but now his office is using undeliverable absentee ballot requests as the starting point to the purge process.
“In addition to sowing the seeds of confusion for our voters, Secretary Raffensperger is adding an extra burden on our already strained poll workers. If inactive voters show up to cast their ballot, poll workers will have to spend additional time checking the voters’ status, which will result in even longer lines.”
Background:
Thousands of Georgia voters were recently notified that the Secretary of State is placing them on ‘inactive’ status because absentee applications sent to them in the spring were undeliverable. Inactive status is the first step to purging voters from the rolls and canceling their registration. Secretary of State Raffensperger’s threat to move registered voters to inactive marks the second time since 2017 that this office has attempted to disenfranchise Georgians. His office’s actions wrongly purged more than 87,000 lawfully registered voters in 2017.
Voters can take themselves off of inactive status through any contact with their county election office, including voting. Voters should check their registration and update their information online at https://www.mvp.sos.ga.gov/MVP/mvp.do.