ATLANTA — Weeks after a controversial elections bill died on Crossover Day, it came back to life in the Georgia Senate on Friday.
The old version of this bill was much more controversial. It stopped county-wide early voting and created early voting districts.
That’s gone. But Democrats are still concerned that the State Elections Board, not the Secretary of State, would control recounts.
“We are very excited to see us pass a bill that would move Georgia to a hand-marked paper ballot system,” Republican State Sen. Greg Dolezal said.
Dolezal was all smiles after the bill passed along party lines. His earlier bill failed to make it past crossover day.
But this resurrected version would mean Georgia would vote with hand-marked paper ballots, which he said is the most important part of it.
“Most of America does, about two-thirds of the citizens in America, vote on a hand-marked paper ballot, and we would move in that direction.
But the bill would also require these changes by the November elections, too fast for counties to handle, critics say.
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It would also mean the State Elections Board, not the Secretary of State, would control recounts -- something Democrats don’t like.
“Because you deal with the State Elections Board, which actually dealt with a lot of conspiracy theories and things of that nature. So that is also something that is very problematic,” state Sen. Harold Jones said.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger worried that the bill would require a lot of changes without a lot of funding.
“A lot of these ideas that people have, I guess, introduced and sometimes passed, there’s no funding for it. And if there’s no funding for it, then you’re going to hit a brick wall,” Raffensperger said.
The election bill will now head to the House. There are only two legislative days left before Sine Die.
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