ATLANTA, Ga. — The Georgia Secretary of State’s Office is making routine and legally required updates to Georgia’s voter file that will reduce the size of the voter roll by 4 percent. These updates are required by federal and state law in order to ensure that the state has the most up-to-date voter information.
“Election security is my top priority,” said Secretary Raffensperger. “Accurate and up-to-date voter rolls are vital to secure elections, but at the same time I want to ensure that anyone potentially affected by this routine process has notice and opportunity to update their information. That is why my office is releasing the full list to ensure that people who are still eligible voters can update their information.”
The Georgia General Assembly passed additional laws in 2019 requiring election officials to mail a personalized notice to the last known address of people prior to removing them from the voter rolls due to a change in address.
Anyone can search the list of registrations that are subject to cancellation. Only information that is public pursuant to state law is included. If your name is on the list and you are still an eligible Georgia voter, you can simply update your registration at https://registertovote.sos.ga.gov or contact your county elections office. You may also respond to the confirmation card that will be included with the notice, but keep in mind that the notice is mailed to your last known address of your voter registration, which may not be accurate if you have moved and not updated your registration. Any registered voter can check their registration information to confirm it is accurate and up-to-date at https://www.mvp.sos.ga.gov.
The list contains 313,243 records, or about 4 percent of Georgia’s total number of registered voters, which is in line with the number of records cancelled by other states according to the 2018 Election Administration and Voting Survey conducted by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. The number is less than the census estimates of people moving out of Georgia during the two-year period since the state last conducted this routine list maintenance process.
Of the inactive registration list, 108,306, or 34.6 percent, filed a change of address request with the U.S. Postal Service showing they have moved to a different county or state. Another 84,376, or 26.9 percent, had election mail returned as undeliverable.
The remaining 120,561, or 38.5 percent, have had no contact with their county election officials since prior to the 2012 presidential election and failed to respond to a confirmation card sent by their county elections office. Contact is usually is in the form of voting – either in person or absentee, but updating their registration, signing a petition, or requesting an absentee ballot also counts. Renewing or updating their driver’s license will also count as a contact with election officials unless the person opts out.
The list of registrations subject to cancellation can be viewed here: https://sos.ga.gov/admin/uploads/2019_NGE_List.xlsx
