(Georgia Recorder) — One of Georgia’s largest mass voter cancellations is wrapping up after 40 days, as election officials seek to purge outdated registrations from the state’s voter rolls.
Roughly 478,000 registered but inactive voters had been slated for removal, according to the secretary of state’s office. An additional 218,000 active voters were notified that they risked becoming inactive unless they reached out to their local elections office.
Officials with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office say that the purge is part of a routine maintenance process that states are required to undergo to ensure that voter rolls are accurate.
“We conduct every phase of the list maintenance process as publicly as possible, and in accordance with State and Federal law, because transparency helps shore up public trust in the accuracy and integrity of the entire election process,” Raffensperger said in a statement.
A resident’s voter registration can be switched to “inactive” status if they do not vote for two consecutive federal elections, and they are eligible to be removed if they do not vote for the next two federal election cycles after that.
According to Gabriel Sterling, who until recently was the secretary of state’s chief operating officer, the majority of those flagged during the most recent round of voter roll maintenance are believed to be people who have moved out of the state.
“Four thousand have let us know they’re here, another 700 went ahead and pre-canceled themselves,” Sterling said. “So it’s exactly what we think. These people have been gone for 10 to eight years, and they’re going to be off of our voter rolls, which helps us keep the cleanest voter rolls in America.”
Of the active voters who risked being moved to inactive status, Sterling said, “so far, we’ve had about 300 people cancel themselves completely, and another 4,000 who have said, ‘Yes, we’re still here.’”
In recent years, conservative activists have fixated on Georgia’s voter rolls, reiterating unproven claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. Many activists have also taken it upon themselves to challenge voter registrations they find suspicious, sometimes filing tens of thousands of voter registration challenges at a time.
Efforts to preemptively remove inactive voters may quell fears from right-wing activists. However, Raffensperger’s efforts have been opposed by groups like Fair Fight, which say that voter roll purges disproportionately impact Black voters.
“After excluding voters who cast ballots in other states and likely moved, this purge list disproportionately targets Black Georgians who likely still live here,” Fair Fight CEO Lauren Groh-Wargo said in a statement. “Once again, politicians are rushing to remove voters based on unreliable data – and young Black voters are bearing the brunt.”
Sterling also said he was considering launching a campaign for secretary of state in 2026. If he decides to run, he will join a field of candidates that includes state Rep. Tim Fleming, a Covington Republican, and Kelvin King, the husband of State Election Board member Janelle King.
