Peach Tree Times

Sen. Raphael Warnock’s (D-Ga.) conversion from once condemning voter ID to now supporting it is more like “a surrender than a switch,” says Ken Cuccinelli, national chairman of the conservative-leaning Election Transparency Initiative.

“He and other Democrats can’t keep claiming voter ID is racist when one of their own, Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), comes out with a voter ID proposal,” Cuccinelli, the former GOP attorney general of Virginia, told the Peach Tree Times. “And they have also seen that claiming that voter ID is racist hasn’t moved the needle on how voters feel about it.”

Warnock, who was elected to the Senate in a January runoff,  has called voter ID laws "unnecessary and discriminatory" in the past, the Washington Times reported. Back in June, however, Warnock argued he was “never opposed to voter ID, and in fact, I don’t know anybody who is — who believes people shouldn’t have to prove that they are who they say they are.”

Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia. | Raphael Warnock

In January, Warnock won 37% of independent voters in his special runoff election win over Republican Kelly Loeffler – 10 points higher than independent votes for Loeffler and the highest in the election. A recent poll shows that 57% of Georgia independents support a provision in the recently enacted Georgia election law that includes an absentee voter ID requirement. Overall, the poll shows 67% of those likely to vote do support the absentee voter ID provision.  Warnock is up for re-election in 2022.

Warnock’s view are now at odds with Democratic President Joe Biden, who recently said that voter ID laws were an attempt to suppress and subvert the right to vote,” comparable to “Jim Crow.” He also went on to say, “We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the Civil War. That’s not hyperbole since the Civil War.”

Warnock's views also are at odds with the sweeping election legislation (House Resolution 1 and Senate Bill 1) being pushed by congressional Democrats, along with their other election bill, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (House Resolution 4). H.R. 1 and S.1. would federalize the elections and nullify voter ID laws in the states. The conservative Heritage Foundation reports that H.R. 4 will allow the Department of Justice to override every state’s ability to change polling locations, require voter ID and relocate voting district lines.