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Sonny Perdue signs bill to require proof of citizenship for new voter registration

6:20 pm May 5, 2009, by jgalloway

Gov. Sonny Perdue on Tuesday signed into law Senate Bill 86, which requires new voters to produce proof of U.S. citizenship when they register.

Look for the measure to quickly become part of the resumes of several Republican candidates — most prominently Secretary of State Karen Handel, who’s now running for governor.

Handel, who backed the bill, called it “common-sense legislation that will further strengthen the integrity and confidence in our elections by ensuring that only U.S. citizens are able to register and vote.”

The new Georgia law, under the terms of the Voting Rights Act, will have to be approved by the U.S. Justice Department. It was modeled after an Arizona law that has received such approval. The law applies to new voters who register after Jan. 1, 2010.

The measure was sponsored by James Mills (R-Gainesville) in the House and Cecil Staton (R-Macon) in the Senate.

“This bill clearly addresses a real problem with the voter registration system, as currently an applicant is only required to pledge that they are a U.S. citizen and not asked for proof,” Staton said.

How large a problem? Matt Carrothers, a spokesman for Handel, said 599 of 3.9 million votes cast last Nov. 4 were flagged because of local officials’ suspicions of foreign citizenship. Ultimately, 369 of those flagged votes were accepted. Which means 230, or .006 percent of total votes cast, went “unconfirmed” and thus uncounted.

Carrothers said the secretary of state’s office sent out 4,771 “citizen status advisory” letters last year to registered voters whose citizenship was uncertain. The new legislation, he said, would streamline the process so that citizenship questions are raised and settled at the outset, rather than at polling places on election day.

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9 comments Add your comment

Will Jones - Atlanta

May 5th, 2009
6:33 pm

Handel has the gall to address the “integrity” of the vote when she decided it was impossible to come up with a paper trail with more than a year to go before last Fall’s election. That’s a woman lacking any sense of American “can-do” ingenuity and no good for Georgia…why else would G-d see her line cut-off?

Will is an IDIOT

May 5th, 2009
7:19 pm

Paper trail are useless. Any machine that can be manipulated(and that means all machines) can all
have the paper work manipulated.
Hell we can even get paper ballots right and that is a heck of a paper trail.
I guess we should put you in charge. When are you running for office?

retiredds

May 5th, 2009
9:45 pm

Thank you, thank you, thank you Sonny and various Republican legislators. Now I can sleep at night knowing that this large and important problem is solved. Now, Gov. is it possible that you can get on to dealing with the smaller and less important transportation issues in GA.

American worker

May 5th, 2009
11:42 pm

WOW, how outrageous to require proof of citizenship to register to vote! Soon, we may approach the level of security in voting that they enjoy in Mexico where proof of citizenship WITH A BIRTH CERTIFICATE is required to get a federally issued photo voter ID card that must be presented at poll to vote.

What next? Secure borders? Enforced immigration laws? Damned radical extremeist Republicans in the state house! ACORN is who we need to run our voter registration here!

Keith

May 6th, 2009
12:22 am

Even if only one illegal casts a vote here, that one cancelled out YOUR vote! Thanks GOP for putting this into law.

Will Jones - Atlanta

May 6th, 2009
7:16 am

Illegals aren’t voting…they’re taking whatever jobs are left over from the ones shipped to slave labor camps in the Third World and China…thanks to a published design, “The National Pastoral Plan for Hispanic Ministry,” supported by the one-third Roman Catholic bloc which controls Congress, from both parties, and the five vote majority of papists on the Supreme Court.

The People, the eighty percent Middle Class, the Yeoman Artisanry must be destroyed for total hegemony of fascist plutocracy, the restoration of The Old Sectarian Order of king and pope.

Sonny Perdue dodged Vietnam by crawling into veterinary school. How long did he practice as a vet? The same lack of integrity saw him have a crony feed him an eleventh-hour tax dodge in the Legislature to benefit only him. No integrity.

So when this bill is signed into law, might it be from a morally grounded position or as eyewash.

As the twig is bent so grows the tree.

Perdue and Handel are hand in glove with Bush’s and Cheney’s committing 9/11. Wise UP.

Simon

May 6th, 2009
7:34 am

Will, that was amazing.

Will is an IDIOT

May 6th, 2009
9:10 am

Not much scares me, but to know that Will is loose on any street of
America – THAT scares me. Maybe it is time to put more money into
the mental health system of America.

Native Californian

May 6th, 2009
2:34 pm

Trust the ever xenophobic Georgians, who live nowhere close to the border, to overreact and enact a stupid law like this one.