(FeaturedNews.com) – In Georgia, a federal judge has ruled that they would not be striking down the election law that would restrict mail-in voting for runoff elections, and would shorten the early voting period.
The Election Integrity Act, which was at the heart of the case, was an election law that the state GOP had championed. The Republicans were trying to shorten the time frame that the runoff elections in Georgia would take, bringing the number of weeks down to four from nine. They would also limit the mail-in ballots window.
In cases where the majority is not won by any candidate in the Georgia election, the state moves forward with a runoff election. As a result of this system, elections in the state can be dragged out for weeks, and could not be finished for long after the results in the rest of the country have been announced.
The U.S. Justice Department and Democratic opponents have argued that the stricter voting period introduced would be discriminatory against Black voters. The law requires that voter registration closes 29 days prior to the elections, and it would prevent individuals from registering to vote in any hypothetical runoff election if they had not registered prior to the first election.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge J.P. Boulee determined that the plaintiffs had failed to show that Black voters would be disproportionately impacted by the law. Boule wrote that while the plaintiff had shown that Black voters are more likely to vote early, they did not show how the new early voting period would block them from exercising their right to vote.
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