On Friday, 4 days after Georgia Democrats started warning that unhealthy actors might abuse the state’s new on-line portal for canceling voter registrations, the Secretary of State’s Workplace acknowledged to ProPublica that it had recognized a number of such makes an attempt — together with unsuccessful efforts to cancel the registrations of two outstanding Republicans, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
The affirmation of the makes an attempt to misuse the portal follows separate discoveries by The Related Press and The Present that the portal suffered not less than two safety glitches that briefly uncovered voters’ dates of delivery, the final 4 digits of their Social Safety numbers and their full driver’s license numbers — the precise info wanted to cancel others’ voter registrations.
Mike Hassinger, a spokesperson for Georgia’s Secretary of State’s Workplace, mentioned the state had been monitoring cancellation requests for abuse and that’s the way it noticed those concentrating on Greene’s and Raffensperger’s registrations.
He mentioned that extra protections for much less high-profile voters embody warnings on the portal that abusing it could possibly be a felony, options constructed into the web site to forestall a single consumer from submitting a number of cancellations, opinions of requests by county election staff and a postcard that alerts voters whose registration is canceled. He mentioned these safeguards make it extraordinarily troublesome to efficiently cancel another person’s voter registration. “Can this web site be used to cancel a professional voter’s registration?” Hassinger mentioned. “Sure, in the identical sense that it’s doable to win a lottery with out shopping for a ticket. The wind might blow the successful ticket into your pocket. Not going, however theoretically doable.”
Hassinger mentioned that Raffensperger was unavailable for remark. Greene’s congressional workplace didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
“As an alternative of apologizing and dealing to repair the issue, Brad Raffensperger is denying it exists,” mentioned Max Flugrath, director of communications for Truthful Struggle Motion, a voting rights advocacy group. “If the secretary of state gained’t do what it takes to guard Georgians and their voting entry, advocates will do every part we will to make sure voters have the data wanted to register, forged a poll and have their vote rely.”
The official X account for Georgia Senate Democrats posted that the voter registration cancellation portal “empowers conspiracy theorists and different unhealthy actors to disclaim Georgians the appropriate to vote.” In response, one commenter replied with the birthdays of Republican officers, together with Greene and Raffensperger, noting: “Numerous individuals have their birthday within the public area.” One consumer posted, “Overwhelm them with cancelled well-known Republican’s registrations!”
To start out the cancellation course of on the portal, all customers want is a voter’s title, date of delivery and county of residence. To finalize the cancellation request, additionally they should present the final 4 digits of the voter’s Social Safety quantity or their full driver’s license quantity. There’s additionally an choice to fill out a type with that info and print and ship it to the voter’s county election workplace or the Georgia Secretary of State’s Workplace. Hassinger mentioned that election staff wouldn’t approve any paper request that lacked a Social Safety quantity or driver’s license quantity.
The portal warns customers that impersonating somebody to cancel a voter registration is a felony punishable by as much as 10 years in jail and a $100,000 tremendous. Hassinger mentioned the Secretary of State’s Workplace was consulting with in-house authorized consultants about whether or not to hunt costs for the people who had tried to cancel Raffensperger’s and Greene’s registrations.
In response to Hassinger, info submitted to the portal is forwarded to the county election workplace the place the voter is registered; staff there make the decision about whether or not to approve the cancellation request. In the event that they do, a postcard is distributed to the voter’s tackle warning them that they are going to be eliminated except the voter responds. A voter who missed the postcard after which tried to vote might nonetheless forged a provisional poll, he mentioned, which might nonetheless be counted as soon as the voter attested that they’d not meant for his or her registration to be canceled.
The July 29 launch of the portal got here on the heels of laws in 2021 and 2024 that has made it simpler for Georgia residents to problem voter registrations. Proper-wing activists have challenged tens of 1000’s of voters within the state, although that course of is completely different.
Hassinger mentioned the cancellation web site has built-in options that ought to forestall one consumer from submitting quite a few cancellation requests. He additionally mentioned the Secretary of State’s Workplace launched the positioning on the suggestion of its IT division, to make it simpler and safer for voters to cancel their registration once they transfer out of the state. He mentioned the trouble was impartial of any of the provisions within the current laws or stress from right-wing voter registration challengers.
The federally mandated course of for election officers to take away inactive registrations takes years, with elections officers required to try to contact voters to confirm that they’ve moved.
Hassinger mentioned that the safety measures of the positioning have confirmed efficient, and due to that there haven’t been discussions about altering them. Nonetheless, he mentioned that there have been talks about enhancing software program rollouts sooner or later, together with doubtlessly doing extra testing, bringing extra coding in-house and rising the price range for such work.
Hassinger additionally mentioned the portal is safer than the earlier methods of canceling a voter’s registration, which required delicate private info to be despatched by way of unencrypted emails or the mail, which might make tempting targets for id thieves.
“We need to defend voters’ personally identifiable info,” Hassinger mentioned. “That’s a part of working safe elections, and that’s the job that we take very significantly.”
