Georgia Republicans Aim To Restrict Voting by Mail – By Eric Boehm (Reason) / Mar 9 2021
The state Senate approved some cynical changes to Georgia’s absentee ballot laws under the guise of securing future elections from fraud that no one seems to be able to find.
It’s been more than four months since the 2020 election and Georgia’s Republican-run state government has still not found any evidence of widespread voter fraud that could have unfairly tipped the state to President Joe Biden.
But that apparently isn’t going to stop Republicans in the state legislature from making some cynical changes to Georgia’s absentee ballot laws under the guise of securing future elections—securing them from the supposed fraud that they still can’t find any evidence of.
The state Senate on Monday approved a bill limiting when Georgians can use no-excuse absentee voting—that is, voting by mail without having to first provide the state with a reason why you can’t show up at the polls. That’s the method of voting that more than 1.3 million of the state’s residents used in last year’s election, and which has been widely credited by state officials for helping boost Georgia’s turnout to record high levels.
Under the terms of S.B. 241, residents will be allowed to vote by mail only if they are physically absent from their districts on Election Day, are physically disabled, are members of the military, or are celebrating a religious holiday. Only one group of people is still allowed to vote by mail for any reason: residents over age 65.
