March 31 (UPI) — The U.S. Justice Department on Monday was directed to dismiss a Biden administration lawsuit, which challenged a Republican-backed Georgia election law by alleging Black voter suppression.
“Americans can be confident that this Department of Justice will protect their vote and never play politics with election integrity,” U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a release.
Senate Bill 202 signed on March 25, 2021 by Gov. Brian Kemp was far-reaching legislation which made significant changes to the state’s absentee voting, voter ID and election administration methods for Georgia’s 159 counties.
“Georgia is one of the top states in the country for early voting and experienced record voter turnout in multiple elections since the passage of the Elections Integrity Act,” the Republican two-term governor said in a statement.
The Justice Department claimed the prior administration under then-President Joe Biden “fabricated an untrue narrative” about SB 202, saying it was meant to “depress the Black vote.”
The legislation was proposed after record numbers of voters turned out for both the 2020 presidential election and the 2021 runoff elections for two Senate seats with Democrats winning all three races.
Among other things it expanded early voting for primary and general elections, but not runoffs, while shortening the period between elections and runoffs from nine weeks to four weeks.
Critics, civil rights groups and the Biden White House characterized it as “Jim Crow 2.0,” warning it will disproportionately affect minority voters, specifically Black people.
The American Civil Liberties Union, the NAACP, the Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the Southern Poverty Law Center and several law firms joined hands in a legal challenge of the law.
A private lawsuit alleged that SB 202 failed to provide people with disabilities equal opportunity to vote, saying it applied to absentee and in-person voting and likewise failed to make reasonable modifications to avoid discrimination based on disability.
Other provisions would make it a crime for non-election workers to give food or beverage to voters waiting in line to vote and ban out-of-precinct voting until 5 p.m., requiring voters to sign an affidavit saying they can’t get to their assigned precinct in time to vote.
On Monday, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger called on the Justice Department to release its documents relating to the lawsuit under the previous DOJ, lead by then-U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.
“This lawsuit is the first of many steps we are taking to ensure that all eligible voters can cast a vote, that all lawful votes are counted and that every voter has access to accurate information,” Garland said in June 2021 in first announcing the Biden challenge.
Transparency, Raffensperger said, “is paramount in upholding public trust.”
“We call upon the DOJ to release these documents promptly, per court order, so we can better understand why this suit was brought in the first place,” he added.
