Capitol Recap: Georgia set to wipe 191,000 voter registrations off its rolls

Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced that those voters now must respond to mailed notices from county officials within 30 days of receipt to avoid losing their ability to cast ballots.

The state calls it list maintenance. Critics call it purging.

“Georgia’s voter rolls are the cleanest in the nation, and list maintenance efforts like this ensure the integrity of our elections,” Raffensperger said.

The cancellations occur every two years

The 191,473 registrations set for cancellation next month mark an increase from the 101,000 that were removed in 2021. That was expected because of a jump in the number of voters who were designated as “inactive” after their mail was undeliverable or their addresses changed.

It, however, is nowhere near a high mark for the state, which removed a record-breaking 534,000 voter registrations in 2017.

Voting rights groups say they’re concerned legitimate registered voters could be canceled.

“Voting is a right,” New Georgia Project Action Fund CEO Kendra Cotton said. “If someone chooses not to use it, that doesn’t mean they lose it.”

Another voter rights group, Fair Fight Action, said the cancellations would disproportionately affect voters of color. Voters of color make up 51% of those being canceled while they represent 49% of all registered voters in Georgia.

Georgia voters can verify and update their registration information online at www.mvp.sos.ga.gov.

Defense of fake electors drives up state GOP’s legal expenses

Legal fees have been climbing this year for the Georgia GOP.

The reason: Its defense of the “alternate” Republican electors who submitted documents to state and federal authorities stating that they had been “duly elected” to cast Georgia’s 16 votes in the Electoral College for Donald Trump.

New campaign finance disclosures show that over the first six months of this year the state GOP has paid more than $520,000 in legal expenses. That’s about 75% more than what the party paid in all of 2022 and five times what it spent for all legal expenses in 2021.

More than $340,000 of that went toward defending the fake electors, who are possible targets in Fulton County’s probe to determine whether efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 election were legal.

The party’s legal tab for defending electors in 2022 was about $220,000.

A Fulton County special grand jury focused a great deal of its attention on the GOP electors, who some legal experts say may have violated election fraud and forgery statutes, among other crimes.

The members of a similar slate of electors in Michigan were charged this past week with multiple felonies, and an affidavit in that case reveals similarities in how electors operated there and in Georgia.

Michigan’s fake electors, the affidavit states, were “asked to keep silent” about the plot and take other steps to keep secret the meeting on Dec. 14, 2020, where they attempted to cast their votes for Trump. In Georgia, fake electors who met that same day were told to act with “complete discretion in this process” and to mislead state Capitol security guards and the news media about their own meeting.

In Georgia, at least eight of the 16 “alternate” electors have accepted immunity deals with the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office in exchange for their testimony, according to the lawyer representing the group.

Several electors have said they participated in the ceremony in case pro-Trump legal challenges succeeded and that they are now being victimized by politically motivated prosecutors. One of them, then-state GOP Chair David Shafer, has said the “organs of law enforcement have been weaponized against Republicans.”

Shafer’s attorneys, in a bid to ward off an indictment, have cited the actions of Hawaii Democrats during 1960′s tight presidential election in that state as a historic precedent. They’ve also argued the electors were following legal advice.

Josh McKoon, a former state senator and now the state GOP’s chair, maintained the party’s commitment to defend the fake electors.

“The Georgia Republican Party will not abandon these men and women who love their country and are being persecuted for taking action identical to electors in Hawaii in 1960 and in conformity with electors taking similar action going all the way back to 1876,” McKoon said.

arvin.temkar@ajc.com

arvin.temkar@ajc.com

Financial report shows Walker refunding some donors to failed Senate campaign

Former Republican U.S. Senate candidate Herschel Walker still has nearly $4.5 million left over in his campaign account after his loss in a December runoff.

He’s started giving some of that money back to donors.

Walker’s most recent financial report, filed more than seven months after losing to Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, shows that he refunded a total of $15,600 to six donors.

Even with the refunds, Walker’s disclosure for April, May and June shows more money in the account than when the quarter started, mostly because a media buying firm refunded $164,000 for ads that never aired.

Walker also spent about $30,000 for legal fees between April and June, most of it following an accusation that he directed more than half a million dollars in campaign contributions to one of his businesses.

Emails first obtained by The Daily Beast and confirmed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that Walker asked Montana billionaire Dennis Washington for a $600,000 donation — and Walker told him to wire about $535,000 of the sum to a company he runs called HR Talent.

An aide to Washington said the money was ultimately returned after he asked for a refund when he realized the destination for the cash was to Walker’s personal account and not to his campaign. Walker hasn’t commented on the transaction.

The financial report also shows Walker refunded a $2,900 donation as part of a “disgorgement” to the Justice Department. Officials say it is a voluntary refund of a donation from the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX to repay its victims.

Nathan Posner for The AJC

Nathan Posner for The AJC

Greene collects big money but appears to be losing friends

U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene remains one of the top fundraisers in the House, but her new coziness with Speaker Kevin McCarthy is beginning to cost her friends in other segments of the Republican ranks.

Greene displeased some conservatives by backing McCarthy for the top job in the House. That intensified after she also supported his deal with President Joe Biden on the debt ceiling.

In June, the far-right Freedom Caucus voted to scratch her off its membership list.

Now, one of Georgia’s top Republican officials has made a break.

“I’m through with her,” said Brian K. Pritchard, the newly elected first vice-chair of the Georgia GOP. “I’m through.”

Pritchard said Greene has “turned her back on MAGA and turned her back on the people of the 14th District.” He suggested that she is trying to moderate her image in advance of a U.S. Senate campaign in 2026.

He said she lost touch with her constituents.

“I know people in her district that she should be communicating with, the grassroots coordinators of her district that she should be in tune with, that she now tells to ‘please speak with my staff,’ ” he said.

Pritchard also took fault with Greene’s recent comments criticizing Freedom Caucus members, including his congressman, U.S. Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Athens, over their criticism of the debt-ceiling deal. Unlike them, Greene said, she does not live in “conservative fantasyland,” so she backed the deal to avoid defaulting on the government’s financial obligations and potentially devastating the economy.

“If your member of Congress voted against the debt ceiling,” Pritchard said, “everything coming out of this woman’s mouth is a direct shot at your member of Congress.”

“I’ve had it. I tried, But this is it,” he said. “Every single (expletive) thing that comes out of your mouth is an attack on my congressman. Who do you think you are?”

Whatever divide that exists between Greene and conservative officials has yet to take a toll on her fundraising.

New campaign finance reports show she took in more than $1.1 million in donations for the period covering April, May and June. (For a sense of scale, Axios reported that Republicans in districts deemed winnable by either party raised an average of $686,075 this quarter, while the Democrats collected about $404,687.)

Greene, however, spent about $30,000 more than she collected for the quarter, so she finished with $931,990 in cash on hand.

Nathan Posner for the AJC

Nathan Posner for the AJC

Clyde’s profile on the rise, but it hasn’t helped his fundraising

More people are getting to know the name of U.S. Rep. Andrew Clyde, but not as many of them are writing it on checks.

Clyde has watched his profile rise in a year that began when he joined other conservative Republicans in opposing Kevin McCarthy’s election as House speaker, a battle that went 15 rounds and lasted nearly a week.

The Athens Republican was in the spotlight in June when conservatives shut down the House floor for days after Clyde said GOP leadership threatened to punish him over his opposition to McCarthy’s debt deal with President Joe Biden. Clyde didn’t actively participate in the rebellion, but he served as a symbol of the hard-liners’ opposition to leadership.

But, while Clyde’s star appears to be on the rise, his campaign fund has gone in the opposite direction.

His campaign finance report for April, May and June shows Clyde spent more money ($95,219) than he took in ($74,415). A big chunk of what he raised, $12,100, came via donations from the House Freedom Fund, a political committee associated with the conservative Freedom Caucus.

Clyde finished the quarter with $16,137 in cash on hand, the lowest total of any member of Georgia’s congressional delegation.

Federal judge to decide whether to block new state law on transgender care

U.S. District Judge Sarah Geraghty set Aug. 10 for a hearing to determine whether to place a temporary hold on a new state law that limits treatment for transgender children.

Geraghty held a brief scheduling hearing earlier this month after several families of transgender minors filed a lawsuit challenging Georgia’s new law, saying it takes away the rights of parents to make health care decisions for their children.

The law, Senate Bill 140, bans health care professionals from giving hormones such as estrogen and testosterone to transgender minors. Doctors also are not allowed to perform surgeries on children seeking to align with their gender identity,

It took effect July 1.

Supporters of the measure say it protects children from taking steps toward gender transition that are permanent. Opponents say the bill goes against published “standards of care” and could hurt transgender children, who have a higher rate of suicide than their nontransgender peers.

Federal judges have stopped similar laws from taking effect in other states, including Alabama and Florida, while the cases make their way through the court process.

Georgia ups maximum weight for trucks, but more bridges can’t handle new limit

Georgia boosted the maximum load for trucks this year on most of its highways, but they’ll have to shed some pounds to cross hundreds of the Peach State’s bridges.

The maximum weight for trucks has been a bit of a moving target. Until this year, it had been set at 80,000 pounds, although vehicles carrying certain agricultural and forestry products could go up to 84,000 pounds.

During the coronavirus pandemic, Gov. Brian Kemp upped the limit to 95,000 pounds, but that authorization expired in March.

State legislators this year approved House Bill 189, which temporarily bumps up the maximum weight to 88,000 pounds for some vehicles and expands the number of products that are eligible for the higher weight.

Now the Georgia Department of Transportation — which had already classified 1,363 of the state’s nearly 15,000 bridges as unable to safely accommodate the former maximum weight — has identified 733 others that cannot handle the new limit.

Deputy Chief Engineer Andrew Heath told the State Transportation Board this past week that GDOT and local governments will post signs with weight restrictions for the new bridges no later than Sept. 2.

During debates this year over the legislation, supporters said higher maximums would allow businesses to ship their goods more efficiently and save money. Truck safety advocates, GDOT and local governments said heavier trucks would lead to more traffic fatalities and increase the cost to taxpayers for road maintenance.

Ultimately, lawmakers approved a compromise that raised the maximum to 88,000 pounds — except in 13 metro Atlanta counties — but only for two years while lawmakers work on a permanent answer.

Political expedience