Georgia woman hadn't even voted when she was informed her vote was being challenged

I keep seeing record voting numbers at the polls. Georgia has had the largest early vote turnout in their history so far. Lot of suppression going on I guess.

 

The goal of all voter suppression is to tip the scales. As this isn’t Soviet Russia, people aren’t (yet) voting at gunpoint.

They should have to report “challenged ballots” for clarity. It seems insane that a person’s ballot could be challenged without being given a reason. Assuming this person returns to vote I wonder what will happen, is her ballot permanently flagged without reason, or is it literally up to the whims of how aggressive some GOP activist is at “challenging” ballots right there on the spot. Either way, it may be an anecdote but it’s not how a healthy democracy is supposed to function. There needs to be a price paid for partisan shenanigans. One of the concerns is that several GOP states gave more power to partisan actors at the polls, Georgia was one of those states as I recall.

 

You and the Senator from Oklahoma who brought in a snowball to disprove climate change have a lot in common.

 

How about just let people vote how they want and fine/arrest the jackasses who think they need to do this

 

A Black woman in Fulton County coincidental?

 

like losing a challenge in football.

 

That’s actually not true:

 

A fine idea, provided the fine increases exponentially or at least with an added zero for each “false” challenge, with the final penalty being death for simply being an actual nuisance to democracy.

 

Well, they could both be true, given the story in the OP. There could be record high turnout, yet lower than record votes cast if enough people are being disenfranchised.

 

Well so far we do have one case of documented voter suppression....that is that is assuming the woman who reported it was truthful which I assume she was.

What I found a little bit interesting the woman said she knew she could contact "Fair Fight" and get help. I googled Fair Fight to see who they were and guess what the first result was? An add for Stacey Abrams. It just struck me funny.

 

That's disgusting.

 

Fair Fight is the organization Stacey Abrams started to expand voter registration and education efforts in Georgia.

 

Trying to stop black voters. Masked and armed "volunteers" outside drop boxes.

Vote out the party that believes that voting restriction and intimidation is the key to their electoral success.

 

Meanwhile in Arizona

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/10/20/arizona-ballot-drop-boxes/

Armed and masked 'ballot watchers' sat by a ballot drop box in Arizona, prompting police investigation

 

Not a clue here as to what happened but it wouldn't surprise me that a lot of college students get challenged simply to know if they are also registered in the state they are from. I know this sounds terrible to some as voter suppression and not sure if any of you actually changed your official address and voter id while attending college, so to me, it is quite plausible that you could be registered in 2 states. Not saying that is case here and not saying if someone did that it is necessarily for nefarious reasons but could happen very easily.
Is it wrong to want to make sure every citizen gets to vote, but only once and they actually are a citizen?

 

The issue of voter suppression in GA is more nuanced than just counting the number of people who voted and comparing that to prior years.

For example, the new law reduced the number of ballot boxes in the dense counties around Atlanta (mostly D) while actually adding some to rural counties outside of the Atlanta metro (mostly R). In 2020 there were 94 ballot drops in the 4-county Atlanta metro, this year there are 23.

The NYT did a good annotation on this law a couple years ago, and while ID laws and handing out water got most of the national media attention (because they are mostly idiots who follow low hanging fruit for clicks) it was a number of the other changes that were far more suppressive.

What Georgia’s Voting Law Really Does (Published 2021)

The early voting location closest to me in Sandy Springs (a high density first ring suburb) was closed, and the wait times at the 2d closest one have been almost doubled in the past week as to what they were previously, and early voting hours have been curtailed somewhat.

The worst of the law, however, was the removal of the SOS from the State Election Board (because Raffensberger didn't kowtow to Trump's illegal demands) and the usurpation of powers given to the legislature to take over the election from County officials-which I would have a problem with regardless of my politics (despite a reasonably high bar) After watching Trump lobby for votes here and elsewhere in 2020, and seeing right wing state legislatures capitulate to his abject nonsense by providing slates of phony electors, I would have a problem with this new provision in our voting laws regardless of my politics.

 

Being registered in 2 states is not illegal. Voting in 2 states is. In 2016 there were a number of high profile trump administration figures who were registered in 2 states including Steve Bannon, Tiffany trump, Steve Mnuchin, Sean Spicer, and Jared Kushner. Be willing to bet none were challenged while trying to vote.



Who Is Registered to Vote in Two States? Some in Trump’s Inner Circle (Published 2017)

On Wednesday, Mr. Trump had announced in a pair of tweets that he would be asking for a “major investigation” into voter fraud, “including those registered to vote in two states.”