About 1,000 people in Georgia are facing felony charges for voting in the state's June primary. The problem is they voted twice, reports the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The issue revolves around mail voting, says Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Roughly 150,000 people who requested a mail ballot also turned up in person to vote at polling sites on Election Day. For the vast majority, this was fine, either because they never received their mail ballot or opted to vote in person instead. But 1,000 voters sent in their mail ballots and were allowed to vote in person as well. In theory, poll workers should be able to flag such duplicate voters in real time and stop the second vote, per the AP, but the backup system somehow failed for 1,000. The double-voting didn't change the outcome of any race.
Raffensperger says an investigation is underway, reports the Augusta Chronicle, but he seemed to reject the notion of innocent mistakes on the part of the voters. "They knew what they were doing," he said, adding that cases will be forwarded to local authorities for prosecution when the investigation is complete. The felony is punishable by a fine of up to $100,000 and 10 years in prison. State Democratic leaders accused Raffensperger, a Republican, of trying to undermine confidence in mail voting. “It is clear that rather than do his job of promoting the safety and security of our voting process, the secretary of state is instead pushing the GOP’s voting conspiracy theories and disinformation," says a state Democratic party official. (Earlier this month, President Trump made headlines when he suggested that voters who request mail ballots also turn up in person to vote.)
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