Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger addresses election security during stop in Albany

ALBANY — Election integrity and the 2024 Georgia legislative session were among the topics of conversation for a Thursday panel hosted by the Albany Area Chamber of Commerce.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger joined state Sen. Freddie Powell Sims, D-Dawson, and state Reps. Gerald Greene, R-Cuthbert, and Bill Yearta, R-Sylveste at the chamber’s Government Affairs Rise N’ Shine Breakfast at the Doublegate Country Club.

Small business owners, local health care representatives and other community leaders gathered to hear Raffensperger speak, followed by a legislative panel moderated by Chamber President and CEO Bárbara Rivera Holmes.

Raffensperger talked about a number of legislative priorities, including business license reform, which has bipartisan support.

Since he took office, Raffensperger said there has been an explosion of professional growth. For example, the state saw 65,000 more licensed professionals in just nursing in the last five years.

The goal is to remove obstacles for obtaining a business license for up-and-coming business owners or people who move to the state, especially those who are following spouses that got a job.

This is especially crucial in the Albany region as it is a strong military community, Holmes said, as spouses of active military members need to be able to receive business licenses.

State leadership tackling this reform wants to make sure Georgia remains a good place to build a career, he said.

A new software program for registering corporations is in the works as well, he said. All of this is a demonstration of the state’s commitment to business owners.

“The backbone of our communities and the backbone of America are small business owners,” Raffensperger said.

Raffensperger discussed election integrity as well, a topic that’s top of mind as Georgia voters prepare to go to the polls in the next week.

Election security is the state’s highest priority, the secretary said.

“The system is secure,” he said. “The system is accurate.”

The secretary of state notoriously received a phone call from former President Donald Trump in 2021, regarding his loss in Georgia during the 2020 Presidential election.

President Joe Biden won Georgia by 11,779 votes in the 2020 election, which flipped the state blue in a presidential contest for the first time since 1992. Trump called Raffensperger and asked him to find 11,780 votes, claiming he won the state.

Raffensperger stood firm in his election results. The ballots were counted three times and rescanned, and the results were that Trump came up short, he said.

During the Thursday appearance he pointed out that Republican voter turnout was low for the presidential race in 2020 compared to other races. Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate collectively got 33,000 more votes than Trump.

About 28,000 people skipped the Presidential race and yet they cast ballots in other races on their ballots, Raffensperger said.

He also compared the 2020 voter fraud allegations to former Rep. Stacey Abrams’ refusal to concede to Gov. Brian Kemp in 2018. At the time, Abrams said this decision was due to persistent voter suppression allegations.

She did acknowledge that Kemp had won the governor title.

Neither of these instances were supported by facts and tore apart our social fabric, Raffensperger said.

“We’re going to push back on people saying things that just aren’t supported by the facts,” he said.

On Tuesday, Raffensperger said he wanted to drive home a few points regarding Georgia’s elections.

No matter how you vote in Georgia, photo identification is required, he said, and this true even with absentee voting.

The secretary of state emphasized voting at the correct precinct. Voting at the wrong precinct jams up lines and wreaks havoc on election workers.

Next year, when constituents show up to vote, they’ll be met with electronic poll pads at all polls to further speed up the voting process, Raffensperger said. These pads have allowed counties to get check-in times down to under a minute.

As far as election preparedness in southwest Georgia, the secretary of state said counties in the region are very well equipped for this year’s election. There are consistent security and software checks to ensure results are recorded accurately.

The region is also filled with top election directors, he said, mentioning Decatur, Lee and Lowndes counties specifically.

As far as voter accessibility and turnout, Raffensperger said Georgia remains on track. There are numerous ways to vote, including absentee voting and 17 days of in-person early voting.

“We’ve struck the perfect balance of accessibility and security,” he said, noting that the state was ranked number one in election integrity by the Heritage Foundation.

An examination of voter turnout models indicates that all demographic groups are voting at the same percentages, he said.

“We have a large, strong, vibrant voter roll,” Raffensperger said. “Those people are out there engaging in the process.”

Staff Photo: Lucille Lannigan[email protected]