Free and Fair Elections? Meet the Restrictive Reality of Georgia’s New Election Law.

Georgia’s Senate Bill 202, or a “Jim Crow on steroids” law as President Biden had coined it, is a step back from the progress made towards voter equality and a step towards democratic erosion. The Republican-controlled GOP created this bill to defend against voter fraud, believing the Democratic Party had committed fraud in the 2020 presidential election. Due to this belief, Georgia’s Senate Bill 202 attempts to decrease election manipulation by focusing on in-person voting and restricting absentee and drop-box voting. 

Is there election fraud?

Maintaining power through election manipulation may be the real motive, as there is little evidence of voter fraud in previous United States elections. Instead, there is national agreement that election-day fraud has massively decreased in modern-day elections. Election monitoring causes voter fraud, such as ballot-box fraud or count falsification, to be extremely rare. By disguising it with the objectives of safeguarding the election, the Republican Party is able to exploit election processes through this bill. Strategic election manipulation is a form of backsliding from democratic ideals. In this case, the law can be pinpointed as hampering voter registration and altering the electoral rules to favor incumbents or a certain party’s members. The Republican Party covers their intentions of gaining power for their party by seeming as if they are attempting to fix past election mistakes. In fact, electoral barriers are a way for political parties to practice authoritarian ideals secretly. Georgia’s Senate Bill 202, provisions match the explanation of electoral barriers Varol puts forth in his article, Stealth Authoritarianism, of setting restrictions on political parties’ ability to compete in elections and thereby maintain the political party’s position of power. 

Senate Bill 202 tampers with election administration

This bill furthers backsliding by giving the Republican party greater power over election administration. Because Georgia’s general assembly is Republican-controlled, Republicans have the power to handpick the people in charge of disqualifying ballots in Democratic-leaning areas. This is especially dangerous for free and fair elections as it is similar to a president shifting power from one branch of government to another to gain more centralized power in autocratic governments. This method is used by the Republican party to gain power over election administration through the control they have over the legislative body. The bill also removes judicial oversight from the city takeover process, a method utilized to consolidate power for the Republican Party. It allows the Republican-controlled GOP State Election Board to replace election officials with no surveillance. This may lead to a disadvantage for the Democratic Party in elections, furthering democratic erosion through unfair elections.  

Senate Bill 202 presents a list of voting restrictions

Numerous restrictions of Georgia’s Senate Bill 202 create concern for voters, and it specifically targets minorities and Democrat voters. For one, voter identification has become a controversial restriction, with many arguing it has not decreased the number of voters eligible and able to vote. Nevertheless, Georgia’s Senate Bill 202 requires voter identification, while about 200,000 citizens lack them. Moreover, the bill will exclude certain members of society who favor a certain political party. Specifically, Democrat voters will find it harder to vote and may have their votes analyzed on fraudulency by Republicans. This is shown as most provisional ballots, which were roughly 70% democratic in the 2020 general and runoff elections, were eliminated through the bill’s provisions. With these ballots, almost 20,000 voters—a disproportionate number of whom were Black—cast votes in the general elections of 2020 and 2021. Due to this restriction, the influx of minorities unable to vote may serve Republican interests. Further, the bill establishes a fraud hotline that accepts anonymous tips, which the Attorney General can then inquire into and charge people for in less than 3 days. This potential intimidation arctic may create fear in voters and persuade them against voting. Lastly, the bill decreases the 8 to 12 hours available for early voting, when more than 80% of early voter locations in the United States offer over 8 hours. Integrating the bill with restrictions such as these erodes democracy in the United States and begins to erase the voter equality achieved for citizens. 

How does the media play a role?

Alongside voter restrictions, this bill causes democratic erosion through the media coverage resulting from it.Exaggerations or blatant lies can be devised by a political party to further political motives and is seen here from both parties. While the Republican party may have created a false narrative of voter fraud to support their creation of Georgia’s Senate Bill 202, it had beneficial provisions in it. These were exaggerated to be entirely negative by the Democratic party. When President Biden named the bill a “Jim Crow law on steroids”, knowing it was excessive, it misinformed the American public of the bill’s influence. Through voter restrictions, election manipulation, and false media, Georgia’s Senate Bill 202 erodes voter equality and in turn, erodes the United States democracy.