Pam Bondi Tells Justice Department To Drop Legal Challenge To Georgia Election Law | EUROtoday

ATLANTA (AP) — U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday instructed the Justice Department to dismiss a lawsuit difficult a sweeping election overhaul that Georgia Republican lawmakers handed within the wake of President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss within the state.

The lawsuit, filed in June 2021 beneath former President Joe Biden, alleged that the Georgia regulation was meant to disclaim Black voters equal entry to the poll. Bondi mentioned the Biden administration was pushing “false claims of suppression.”

“Georgians deserve secure elections, not fabricated claims of false voter suppression meant to divide us,” she mentioned.

The regulation was a part of a pattern of Republican-backed measures that tightened guidelines round voting, handed within the months after Trump misplaced his reelection bid to Biden, claiming with out proof that voter fraud price him victory. The fallout was swift after Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed the regulation in March 2021, with the CEOs of Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines and Coca-Cola voicing criticism and Major League Baseball’s commissioner deciding to maneuver that 12 months’s All-Star Game from Atlanta’s Truist Park.

Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, each Republicans who drew Trump’s ire once they refused to assist overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia, strongly denounced the Justice Department lawsuit when it was filed. Raffensperger on Monday referred to as Bondi’s announcement “a significant win for Georgia voters.”

“Our commitment has always been to ensure fair and secure elections for every Georgian, despite losing an All-Star game and the left’s boycott of Georgia as a result of commonsense election law,” Raffensperger mentioned in an announcement.

Known as SB 202, the regulation added a voter ID requirement for mail ballots, shortened the time interval for requesting a mailed poll and resulted in fewer poll drop packing containers accessible in populous metro Atlanta counties that lean Democratic and have a big Black inhabitants. The regulation additionally banned the distribution of meals and water by numerous teams and organizations to voters standing in line to solid a poll.

In asserting the dismissal of the lawsuit, Bondi mentioned Black voter turnout in Georgia “actually increased” after the regulation was handed. A December evaluation by the Brennan Center for Justice discovered that whereas the variety of ballots solid by Black voters elevated from 2020 to 2024, Black turnout truly declined by 0.6% as a result of the rise within the variety of ballots solid by Black voters didn’t sustain with inhabitants will increase.

“Understanding whether, or to what extent, these declines are due to restrictive voting policies such as Georgia’s S.B. 202, justifiable feelings that the government is not working for them, or myriad other factors will be of signal importance,” the evaluation says.

In addition to the Justice Department lawsuit, a few half-dozen different fits have been filed by civil rights and election integrity teams elevating claims based mostly on the U.S. Constitution and the federal Voting Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination in voting.