The race to replace outgoing U.S. Rep. Tom Graves for a congressional seat representing Northwest Georgia looked headed for a runoff late Tuesday night, as results in the state’s coronavirus-stricken primary indicated none of the Republican candidates would claim enough votes to win outright.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, a construction company owner, held a lead in the primary over John Cowan, a neurosurgeon who owns a toy shop. As vote counts trickled in late Tuesday, it appeared she would not collect enough votes in the primary to avoid a runoff scheduled for Aug. 11.
In all, nine Republican candidates signed up for the bid to replace Graves, a Republican, who announced late last year that he would not seek re-election. He has held the 14th District seat since first winning election in 2010.
The reliably Republican district stretches from Paulding and Haralson counties north through Rome, Calhoun and Dalton to the Tennessee line.
Little daylight has come between the staunchly conservative candidates in terms of policy points. Eight of them participated in last month’s Atlanta Press Club primary debate in which they alternated between praise for President Donald Trump, disdain for congressional Democrats and a handful of jabs at each other.
At last month’s debate, Greene stressed that her staunchly conservative values align with many of the district’s voters and touted endorsements from influential members of Congress like U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio.
“I’m 100% pro-life, 100% pro-gun, and I’m the strongest supporter of President Trump and always have been,” Greene said.
She also faced criticism for deciding to back out of the 6th Congressional District race earlier this year and enter the 14th District contest. John Barge, a former Georgia state school superintendent who ran in the primary, labeled Greene an “opportunist”.
Cowan was criticized by some candidates during the debate for buying products made in China and not in Northwest Georgia for his toy shop. He defended his business practices, saying he has experience negotiating with Chinese manufacturers.
“I’ve been tougher on China than anyone on this panel because I’ve actually engaged them,” Cowan said.
Cowan also said last month he favors moves to reopen local economies emerging from the coronavirus pandemic amid his background in the medical field and that there needs to be a balance between science and economic needs.
The race has also drawn one Democratic candidate, Kevin Van Ausdal, an implementation specialist. He has slightly more than $1,000 on hand to vie for the Republican stronghold seat.
On the Republican side, the race to replace Graves has drawn several deep-pocketed contenders able to prop up their campaigns with personal loans. Of the roughly $3.5 million raised in total by Republican candidates through May 20, nearly half came in the form of loans.
Greene propped up her campaign financing with a $700,000 personal loan that contributed greatly to the more than $1 million she spent through late May. She has roughly $170,000 on hand for the runoff.
Cowan also floated his campaign a $100,000 loan to help boost his roughly $574,000 in spending. His campaign was aided by a late infusion of nearly $118,000 in contributions that have flowed in since May 21.
Tuesday’s primary was marked by long lines and wait times at some polling places in the state, particularly in Atlanta and Savannah. Elections officials attributed slow in-person voting to subpar training in the state’s new voting machines and safety measures put in place amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Statewide, more than three-fourths of the roughly 1.2 million early votes ahead of the primary were cast by mail, marking a historic absentee effort as elections officials pressed for increased participation in vote-by-mail to help curb the spread of the virus.
Also running in the Republican primary were Barge, the former school superintendent; Clayton Fuller, a prosecutor and U.S. Air Force veteran; Bill Hembree, a former state House representative; state Rep. Kevin Cooke, R-Carrollton; Matt Laughridge, a businessman; Ben Bullock, a real estate investor and U.S. Air Force veteran; and Andy Gunther, a retired U.S. Marine and businessman.
Voters wait in a long line at the Central Park polling place in Atlanta on Primary Election Day, June 9, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Hours-long waits in line and technical hiccups with new voting machines greeted Georgians who headed to the polls Tuesday for the state’s primary election amid safety measures prompted by the coronavirus pandemic.
Voters and local officials reported issues with using the new $104 million voting machines and the ability of short-handed volunteer poll workers to troubleshoot problems as voting lines stretched at polling places from Atlanta to Savannah.
State elections officials warned ahead of Tuesday lines and wait times would be longer as polling places space people six feet apart, take time to clean voting areas and use fewer voting machines to limit capacity. But technical issues seen in some areas like Atlanta and Savannah were unexpected, compounding already long lines.
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger traced problems to “a lack of training and planning” by county elections officials, noting most of Georgia’s 159 counties were not experiencing technical issues with voting machines. Counties like Cobb, Richmond and Muscogee were running smoothly, he said.
“By and large, what it comes down to is the competence of the county director,” Raffensperger said in an interview. “It’s not really a machine error. What it’s been is user error, just lack of training for the poll workers.”
Mail-in gone missing
That assessment did not calm frustrations shown by voters at polling places in Atlanta such as at Central Park, where voters queued up for more than two hours Tuesday morning. Many in line said poll workers were struggling to operate the new machines, forcing them to hand out paper provisional ballots while waiting for technical support to arrive.
“We’re hot, we’re tired, we’re bothered,” said one voter.
Lori Krugman, a voter at Central Park, called it a “disaster of a line” that she had wanted to avoid by voting absentee but never received a mail-in ballot after twice requesting one since April. Daniel Murdoch also had to brave the line after not receiving a requested mail-in ballot.
“Not good,” he said.
Concerns over the primary’s integrity were inflamed Tuesday even as more than 1.2 million Georgians cast ballots by mail and during the early voting period ahead of Election Day, a record early turnout that included roughly 950,000 absentee ballots in a push to curb in-person voting amid the virus.
The surge in vote-by-mail and early voting came as state and local elections officials faced a daunting challenge to keep polling places sanitized and safe for voters and poll workers, particularly with polling places in areas like Fulton County closed or consolidated due to COVID-19.
Hours in line
But from the get-go Tuesday, voters in Atlanta like Shannon Christian were angered by what appeared to be a severe lack of preparation on the part of local elections officials.
“Outraged,” is how Christian put it as she approached the three-hour mark of her wait in line at the Central Park precinct.
“It’s frustrating,” said her companion, Gabriel Baawo, both of whom were in a group of people tired from the wait but still fired up to vote after joining protests last week over police brutality and racial injustice.
“I got tear-gassed last Monday,” Christian said. “We’re out here.”
Extended waits and technical problems were not confined to Atlanta. In Savannah, Mayor Van Johnson said Tuesday morning he had “been inundated with calls and messages” from upset voters at polling places in the coastal city.
“This appears to be a widespread issue as individuals have told me that they’ve had to go to work or, in some cases, they were asked to come back at a later time,” Johnson said at a news conference.
Johnson added state and county elections officials should have been better prepared for the issues seen Tuesday, noting the presidential preference primary was delayed twice from its original March 24 date.
“Certainly, we’ve had enough time and enough delays at this point where it should be right,” Johnson said.
Placing blame
State officials were quick to criticize the performance of county officials. Gabriel Sterling, the secretary of state’s chief operating officer, said some counties saw “logistical deployment issues” including poll workers who tried to use voter check-in cards “upside down,” but that officials had not seen any glitches with the new machines.
Sterling also noted state officials fielded reports that poll workers were “not understanding setup or how to operate voting equipment,” a shortcoming he and Raffensperger pinned on local elections directors.
Since purchasing the new voting machines last year, Raffensperger’s office has largely left it to county officials how to provide training for poll workers. He said Tuesday his office provided several rounds of training for county and regional leaders and set up an online training portal for local precincts to use.
“We think that we’ve done a great job on the training aspect,” Raffensperger said. “Other counties are getting it right today.”
But many lawmakers and voting rights advocates were dismayed by Raffensperger’s response, arguing the buck should stop with him as the state’s elections chief.
“Talk about throwing under the bus,” said Johnson, Savannah’s mayor.
Investigation called
State Democratic leaders called for Raffensperger to take more direct action to patch any problems with training or equipment prior to elections set for later this year including the Nov. 3 general election.
“The Secretary of State’s job is to provide adequate support and training for counties as he implemented Georgia’s new voting system, and he has failed,” said Maggie Chambers, spokeswoman for the Democratic Party of Georgia.
And Georgia House Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, ordered a lawmaker-led investigation into the “unacceptable deficiencies” of the primary that aims to look at more than poll workers, who he said “do not deserve to be blamed for systemic problems beyond their control.”
“The legislative branch of government has an obligation to go beyond the mutual finger-pointing and get to the truth,” Ralston said.
Meanwhile, facing long wait times, many voters hunkered down Tuesday to cast ballots in what they view as the start of an important election cycle that includes contests for president, U.S. Senate, Congress and General Assembly seats.
At St. Philip’s Cathedral in Atlanta, Aroona Toor finally cast her ballot just after 9 a.m. after standing in line since polls opened at 7 a.m. Her feet were tired, her back hurt, but Toor said she felt proud to vote.
“You’ve got to do what you’ve got to do,” she said.
Voters wait in line at a precinct in Cobb County on May 18, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Voters headed to the polls Tuesday for Georgia’s primary elections should expect long lines and wait times at local precincts due to safety measures prompted by the coronavirus pandemic, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Monday.
The warning comes after voters at several polling places in the Atlanta area stood in line for hours late into the night on the final day of early voting last Friday, sparking concern from elections officials and voting rights advocates that wait times on Election Day could be worse.
More than 1.2 million Georgians have cast ballots so far by mail and during the early voting period, a record turnout for a primary election that should help curb the amount of in-person voting on Tuesday, Raffensperger said.
But he still expects upwards of 250,000 to 400,000 voters may turn out across the state, spurring long lines as polling places space people six feet apart, take time to clean voting areas and use fewer voting machines to limit capacity.
“Things would be better if we weren’t in this pandemic,” Raffensperger said at a news conference Monday. “But it is what it is.”
Raffensperger also noted voters may take a little longer to cast ballots Tuesday while adapting to the state’s new voting machines, which involve touchscreens and scanners that record a paper print-out of a voter’s completed ballot. The primary marks the first statewide Election Day use of the new machines.
Polls open at 7 a.m. across the state Tuesday.
Health and elections experts are urging voters to make sure they stay separated from others while in line to vote, wear a face mask that covers both the mouth and nose areas, use hand sanitizer and avoid touching surfaces unnecessarily while at a voting site.
Dr. Marybeth Sexton, an assistant professor of medicine at Emory University’s Division of Infectious Diseases, said voters who follow those distancing and sanitizing practices should be able to vote in person Tuesday without the risk of being exposed to the virus. But if some voters at polling places are not spaced out in line or are not wearing masks, it would be wise to get tested for COVID-19 four to five days after voting, Sexton said.
“People can get out and vote safely,” Sexton said Monday. “It’s just important that the message gets out about how to best do that.”
Long waits are anticipated even as mail-in voting has surged in Georgia amid the coronavirus pandemic. As of Monday, roughly 950,000 voters had cast absentee ballots, though many still had not received ballots weeks after requesting them.
The surge in vote-by-mail comes as state and local elections officials face a daunting challenge to keep polling places sanitized and safe for voters and poll workers, particularly with polling places in some counties like Fulton closed or consolidated amid the virus.
Voters should check ahead of time whether their usual voting location will be open Tuesday and, if not, where they will be able to cast their ballot instead, said Andra Gillespie, an associate professor of political science at Emory. Sexton likewise urged voters to choose odd-hour times if possible when heading to the polls.
“You do want to try to pick a time when it’s a little less crowded so that it is possible to keep that distance both in any line outside and then certainly once you’re inside the building,” Sexton said.
Raffensperger urged voters who have requested absentee ballots but not yet received one to show up in person to vote Tuesday. He laid blame for delays on Fulton County elections officials, who now face a state probe into their handling of mail-in ballots.
“We’re not pleased with the performance of Fulton County,” Raffensperger said Monday. “In so many areas, they just made poor decisions.”
He also advised people who have received absentee ballots but not put them in the mail yet to either place them in a drop-off box that counties have set up to collect mail-in ballots or to just vote in person Tuesday.
Additionally, Raffensperger cautioned Georgians not to expect a quick turnaround in results due to the large number of absentee ballots and short-handed staff at some polling places. He said no election results will be announced “until every precinct is closed,” which could mean a few days pass before results for some contests are announced.
Meanwhile, Georgia Democratic leaders have chastised the performance by Raffensperger and some county elections offices over the long lines and unreturned absentee ballots.
“The secretary of state and counties have had months to prepare for this election, but they have squandered valuable time that could have been used to prevent the democratic crisis we are seeing today,” said Sen. Nikema Williams, D-Atlanta, who chairs the Democratic Party of Georgia.
Voters wait in line at a precinct in Cobb County on May 18, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
More than 1 million Georgia voters have already cast ballots in the upcoming June 9 primary election via mail-in and early in-person voting, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office said Thursday.
The overwhelming majority of votes cast so far have come via absentee ballots amid a surge in mail-in voting spurred by the coronavirus pandemic.
Of the more than 1 million votes cast as of Thursday, roughly 80% were absentee ballots sent in the mail or placed in temporary drop-off boxes that county elections officials have installed in recent weeks, Raffensperger’s office said.
That amounts to 810,000 absentee ballots cast so far, already dwarfing the roughly 223,000 mail-in votes collected in the high-turnout 2018 gubernatorial election.
The surge in vote-by-mail comes as state and local elections officials face a daunting challenge to keep polling places sanitized and safe for voters and poll workers with many more voters poised to cast ballots in-person on Election Day than have done so to date.
“Though we encourage anyone who has requested an absentee ballot to return it by mail or submit it in a drop box, we look forward to providing safe in-person voting on Election Day as well,” Raffensperger said.
It remains to be seen how much absentee and early voting will account for the total vote share in the June 9 primary. Slightly more than 2 million voters cast ballots in the 2016 presidential primary, though that contest did not include the full roster of local, state and federal elections on next week’s primary ballots.
Voters who turn out on Election Day should expect longer lines than usual as volunteers at local polling places keep people spaced six feet apart in line and take more time to sanitize voting areas, Raffensperger told lawmakers on the Senate Appropriations Fiscal Management Subcommittee Tuesday.
“By and large, most voters have been very patient,” he said. “They understand how important it is to vote, whether by absentee or in person.”
Meanwhile, many voters in the state are still waiting to receive absentee ballots after requesting them weeks ago. Elections officials acknowledged Tuesday thousands of voters were still awaiting absentee ballots, particularly in Fulton County.
For instance, Kaleb McMichen, the press secretary for Georgia House Speaker David Ralston, said Thursday on Twitter he had not yet received his absentee ballot after requesting one on April 8.
Gabriel Sterling, the secretary of state’s chief operating officer, told lawmakers Tuesday 95% of voters who requested absentee ballots had received them and that an Arizona-based vendor the state is using to distribute the ballots had sent 38,000 of them in the mail earlier this week.
Raffensperger said Tuesday ballot turnaround was “in excellent shape” in every county except Fulton, which he called a “straggler county.” He pressed voters intent on mailing in their ballots to do so quickly.
Absentee votes must arrive at county elections offices by 7 p.m. on June 9.
Haste has also been the message from Democratic lawmakers in the state House in recent weeks. On Thursday, Rep. David Dreyer, D-Atlanta, urged voters who have not yet mailed in their absentee ballots to put them in a drop-off box that counties have set up to collect those ballots.
“I can guarantee your vote will be counted,” Dreyer said.
Voters wait in line at a precinct in Cobb County on May 18, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Georgia’s new voting machines will face their first major test in a June 9 primary election that has created far different logistical challenges for state officials than were anticipated before the coronavirus pandemic struck.
The new machines, purchased last summer for $104 million, were already under intense scrutiny as Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office pushed to have the 30,000 new devices rolled out by the March 24 presidential preference primary, all while legal challenges sought to have them blocked.
Then coronavirus hit, upending the game plan for the March 24 contest in which the voting machines were poised for their first statewide use. Since then, primary elections have been postponed twice to June 9, precincts in high-volume voting areas like Atlanta have shuttered over safety concerns and Raffensperger has pushed for Georgians to hand in absentee ballots rather than head to the polls.
“What voters have to understand is that it’s going to look a little bit different when they show up this time,” Raffensperger said at a recent news conference.
“The fewer people voting on the actual election day,” he added, “the safer it will be for the voters, poll workers and all Georgians.”
Purchased last July from Dominion Voting Systems, the new machines – called ballot-marking devices – involve touchscreens and scanners that record a paper print-out of a voter’s completed ballot. State officials hail the new machines as more secure than the old all-electronic machines, which have been scrapped over cybersecurity concerns after 18 years of use.
Critics of the new machines have continued pushing for Georgia to adopt an all-paper voting system, arguing the new devices still record votes electronically and do not provide enough of an audit trail. Lawsuits filed in federal court against Raffensperger’s office aim to halt the new machines in Georgia, though judges overseeing those cases so far have not issued any injunction orders to do so.
To date, Raffensperger said the new machines have not experienced any major technical issues since being installed in time for the March 24 presidential primary. They have been used by hundreds of thousands of Georgians in early voting this year and during a six-county test run last fall, in which county officials reported some minor glitches.
“They’ve worked amazing,” Raffensperger said, while acknowledging that “we haven’t gotten the full use of those [machines] that we would like because of COVID-19.”
Coronavirus, which had sickened more than 45,000 people and killed 1,974 in Georgia as of Friday afternoon, has prompted elections officials to shift attention from having the new machines go off without a hitch to making sure polling places are kept clean and both voters and poll workers have protective supplies to stay safe.
To curb risks of spreading the virus, voters are being spaced out six feet apart from each other in line at local precincts and poll workers will all wear masks and gloves, Raffensperger said. His office is also supplying counties with roughly 60,000 stylus pens for voters to use on the touchscreens rather than their fingers. Without the styluses, polling places would have to completely shut down the touchscreens to disinfect them after each use.
On top of distancing and sanitizing measures, officials expect voting to take longer than normal due to fewer precincts being open in areas like Atlanta, as some local churches and schools that usually serve as precincts back out over coronavirus concerns.
In Savannah, the Chatham County Board of Elections is pushing to open alternative polling places after 12 of the county’s 92 voting sites “were uncertain.” And Fulton County, the state’s most populous, has lost more than 30 voting sites in recent weeks from its nearly 200-site total and is “struggling with Election Day locations,” said the county’s election director, Rick Barron.
“This has been an unprecedented situation for not only Fulton County but also other counties around the state,” Barron said at a recent news conference.
To ease the pressure of in-person voting, state and county elections officials have spent weeks urging Georgians to cast ballots by mail after Raffensperger’s office sent absentee ballot applications to all of the state’s nearly 7 million registered voters starting in March. So far, roughly 600,000 people have sent in absentee ballots of the more than 1.5 million who requested them, according to Raffensperger.
Handling the avalanche of absentee ballot requests has been challenging for many county elections officials, including Barron. Like other counties, his Fulton County staff have been swamped with processing absentee ballot applications and returned ballots, with many voters still complaining they have not received mail-in ballots weeks after requesting them.
Officials have asked voters to be patient as they sift through absentee ballot requests submitted by mail and online in recent weeks.
“It’s almost as though we’ve added a different type of an election on top of the one that we’re already running,” Barron said. “It has split our resources.”
Meanwhile, time is running out for mail-in voting. Ballots must be cast or received by county offices no later than 7 p.m. on June 9 or they will not count, Raffensperger said. If voters wait until the final few days, their absentee ballots may not circulate quickly enough through the mail to make it.
“It does put you at the mercy of the United States Postal Service,” Raffensperger said.
That time crunch prompted one member of the Georgia House Democratic Caucus, Rep. Donna McCleod, to conclude voters should ditch the mail-in method if they have not received an absentee ballot by Friday, May 29. If that’s the case, voters can still fall back on the new machines to cast their ballot.
“Please, please, please stay safe,” said McCleod, D-Lawrenceville. “This is not worth your life, but it is important for us to participate in our democracy.”
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger discusses absentee voting in Georgia amid the coronavirus pandemic on May 28, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger renewed calls Thursday for voters who have requested absentee ballots to send them in the mail or put them in a local drop-off box ahead of the June 9 primary election.
More than 600,000 Georgia voters have returned absentee ballots so far, marking roughly 40% of the 1.5 million voters who requested them since March when the coronavirus pandemic escalated in the state, Raffensperger said.
At a news conference Thursday, Raffensperger urged voters whose mail-in ballots are “sitting on your kitchen table” to make sure they are returned by 7 p.m. on June 9, after which ballots will not be counted.
Raffensperger called for as many people as possible to vote by mail rather than in person to lower the risk for spreading the virus among voters and poll workers, many of whom are older individuals more vulnerable to the virus’ health impacts. State election officials are also allowing counties to install drop-off boxes where voters can place their absentee ballots instead of mailing them.
“We need as many of you as possible to use this safe and easy voting tool,” Raffensperger. “The [coronavirus] threat is still a potential threat to orderly elections and in-person voting.”
As of Wednesday, Raffensperger said more than 100,000 Georgians have voted in person during the early-voting period, which began May 18. Many precincts have already seen long lines with people forced to keep their distance from each other while queued up to vote and spend time canceling absentee ballots they requested since they are voting in person.
A handful of elections officials and a voter contracted the virus recently in McDuffie and Appling counties, highlighting the high risk brought by ramped-up voting numbers on June 9. The virus has also complicated efforts by county elections officials to process an influx of absentee ballot applications and ballots that have arrived in recent weeks.
Fulton County’s elections director, Rick Barron, noted Wednesday his office was slow to turn around ballots after a staff member died from coronavirus in early April. Barron said his office has since caught up with the application backlog amid complaints from many voters who still had not received a ballot weeks after requesting one.
“It has not gone as quickly as we had hoped,” Barron said in a virtual news conference Wednesday. “But we finally did get caught up, and we can look forward to the future and having this process go smoother.”
Speaking Thursday, Raffensperger attributed the slow processing time in Fulton to “missteps” and asked voters who have not yet received their absentee ballots to “just be patient.”
“You’ll get your ballot shortly,” he said.
To speed up ballot processing, Raffensperger said his office has sent high-speed scanners to counties to help them reduce their absentee ballot turnaround times. The scanners are part of the state’s new $104 million voting machines that will see their first large-scale statewide test on the June 9 primary.
Amid the push for mail-in voting, Raffensperger also touted Georgia’s push to keep polling places open during the early-voting period. On Thursday, he claimed the state has “maintained more in-person voting options during this pandemic than any other state in the country combined.”
“We have cut through the political rhetoric, ignored the talking heads and put you the voter first,” Raffensperger said. “We have maintained your right to choose in this election.”
