Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced a victory in the matter of VoteAmerica v. Raffensperger after VoteAmerica, one of the plaintiffs who was challenging Georgia’s Election Integrity Act (SB 202), voluntarily dismissed their claims.

“Despite the overheated rhetoric to the contrary by President Biden, Stacey Abrams, and their progressive allies, Georgia’s Election Integrity Act contains common-sense reforms like photo-ID for all forms of voting,” said Raffensperger. “We’re seeing a trend that the poll-tested rhetoric from opponents of the bill is not supported by the facts.”

VoteAmerica sued Georgia over the provisions of SB202 that requires third-party groups that send out absentee ballot applications to include a disclaimer identifying themselves, disallows pre-filling of absentee ballot applications, and disallows sending duplicate applications to voters who have already requested absentee ballots. When they filed their lawsuit, they called the law “egregious,” “suppressive,” and “discriminatory.” However, since they filed their lawsuit Georgia has had a primary election with record midterm turnout that did not see any major issues implementing the new provisions of SB 202. Georgia election officials are currently preparing for record turnout in the midterm election. In implementing SB 202, the State Election Board promulgated a rule that clearly explained that online tools that helped a voter fill out their absentee application are permitted, as long as the group offering the tool kept a voter’s personal information safe.

“I commend VoteAmerica for recognizing that their initial claims weren’t supported by the facts, and that it would be a waste of taxpayer resources to continue them,” added Secretary Raffensperger.