Peach Tree Times

Republican state senators have introduced legislation to end voting by mail, automatic voter registration and ballot drop boxes.

“We’ve got to restore confidence in the ballot box. When people lose confidence in the ballot box they ultimately lose confidence in their government,” Senate President Pro Tem Butch Miller (R-Gainesville) said of the bills, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Epoch Times also reported. “Our goal is to be sure every vote is accounted for, accurate and legal.”

The senators have come up with an eight-bill package proposing measures that require voters to provide some form of identification when applying for an absentee ballot. Another bill bans the use of ballot drop boxes for collecting and delivering absentee votes.  Residents who voted in a different state during the general election will not be allowed to vote in the Georgia runoff election, a separate bill states.

Democrats have however argued that all the proposed bills are tactics of voter suppression.

“It’s voter suppression. If you restrict access, then people get discouraged and they don’t vote. They don’t come back,” Senate Minority Leader Gloria Butler (D-Stone Mountain) told the Journal and Epoch Times also reported. “We have to make the argument that it’s a good process. People were able to vote, and they voted in record numbers.”

Questions have been raised over the credibility of the 2020 general election. Republicans filed numerous lawsuits claiming election irregularities and voter fraud.