ATLANTA – The Georgia Secretary of State is launching an investigation into noncitizen voting.
Brad Raffensperger found that more than 1,634 people attempted to register to vote despite not being citizens.
“Attempting to register to vote while knowing you do not possess the qualifications to vote is a felony in Georgia, a serious one,” Raffensperger said at a news conference Monday. “Outside groups that attempt to help noncitizens register to vote will face consequences as well.”
Raffensperger said those cases will be turned over to the State of Election Board, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and local district attorneys to find out how people were able to fill out voter registration applications.
One of the first qualifications on a Georgia voter registration form is being a citizen of the United States. “We will be sending these cases to the state election board, the GBI, local district attorneys around the state, to find out how these individuals ended up filling up voting registration applications, despite not being citizens,” Raffensperger said.
When someone registers to vote, elections officials check their information against databases like the Department of Driver Services and the Social Security Administration. If the information doesn’t match, the potential voter is placed in “pending citizenship” status. The Secretary of State’s office then runs that information though a federal citizenship database.
Raffensperger claims his audit is proof that Georgia’s citizenship check procedures are working.
Paul Glaze, a spokesperson from the non-partisan voter engagement group the New Georgia Project said he sees this as a non-issue. “There’s clearly no harm here. None of these people ever registered to vote, none of them had voted, it is not an issue,” Glaze said. “It’s not even a significant enough number to have impacted any of the counties in which they are claiming the this might be an issue.”
Raffensperger’s remarks on noncitizen voting came on the same day a Stacey Abrams-backed election lawsuit went to trial.
“Stacey Abrams and her allies are trying to get rid of Georgia’s citizenship check for voter registration, and I will fight her efforts to undermine the integrity of our elections all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court if I have to,” Raffensperger said.
Abrams is a Democratic candidate for governor.