A group that was previously led by Democrat Senate candidate Raphael Warnock is under investigation by the state of Georgia for its voter registration activities, Georgia’s secretary of state announced on Monday.
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said that he had launched an investigation into “third party groups working to register people in other states to vote here in Georgia.”
“We have opened an investigation into a group called America Votes who is sending absentee ballot applications to people at addresses where they have not lived since 1994; Vote Forward, who attempted to register a dead Alabama voter, a woman, to vote here in Georgia; The New Georgia Project, who sent voter registration applications to New York City, at Operation New Voter Registration Georgia, who is telling college students in Georgia that they can change their residency to Georgia and then change it back after the election,” he said. “Let me be very clear again, voting in Georgia when you are not resident of Georgia is a felony.”
The Washington Free Beacon reported that Warnock served as the CEO of The New Georgia Project until February of this year.
“The announcement comes as Democrats have praised Raffensperger, a Republican, for pushing back against President Donald Trump’s allegations of election fraud in Georgia during the presidential election,” the report said. “Warnock was listed as CEO of the New Georgia Project from 2017 until Feb. 21, 2020, according to the group’s corporate filings. He has been identified as the New Georgia Project’s chairman and spokesman in media reports and has said he organized voter mobilization drives for the group, including a push to register 80,000 new minority voters in 2014. His campaign did not respond to a request for comment about the ongoing investigation.”
The report noted that The New Georgia Project was previously the subject of a voter fraud investigation in 2014 when contractors working for the group were accused of forging voter registration applications.
“Let me emphasize this again, casting an illegal vote in Georgia is a felony, casting more than one vote in Georgia is a felony,” Raffensperger added at the press conference. “Upholding the law matters, truth matters, and your vote matters. Anyone telling you to boycott an election is not on your side. Your right to vote is sacred. Don’t let someone con you out of it.”
The announcement into the group formerly run by Warnock comes as Warnock is engaged in one of two U.S. Senate runoff races in the state that are set to take place during the first week in January. The outcome of the two races will determine which party controls the U.S. Senate ahead of the incoming Biden administration.