Overcoming Challenges, Georgians Vote In Record Numbers. Organizers Want To Keep Them Engaged

“If you don’t participate, you let someone else take your power away,” says Helen Butler, executive director of Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda. “And we don’t want people to give up their power.”

On Nov. 3, 4,998,000 Georgians had cast their votes. Georgia set an all-time record for voter turnout, beating the previous record of 3.9 million people in 2008.

[advert]

Georgians had a comparable, but lesser, turnout for the senatorial elections in November. Both Senate races had at least 4,900,000 total votes and resulted in January runoffs. 

For the Jan. 5 runoff elections, nearly 4,485,000 people voted. These are relatively high turnout numbers for a runoff election.

According to FairVote’s Research Report on turnout for runoff elections, typically there’s a 40.2% national average decrease in votes for runoff senatorial elections in comparison to their primary elections. 

“We were just ecstatic that people, no matter what areas, they stood there in lines, they stood in the heat, they stood in the rain, they stood in the cold, they stood there for six hours,” Butler says.

Individual voters as well as organizers all prevailed over a circumstance that threatened to hinder them all: the coronavirus pandemic.

In a typical election year, organizations in the coalition would work face-to-face with voters in communities. This type of work helps them understand the people’s wants and desires for change, which is important for a coalition whose goal is to improve governance through public policy.

We don’t care who they vote for. We care they do exercise their right to vote, and not let a few make decisions for many.

— Helen Butler, executive director of Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda

But in 2020, they were forced to make due with phone banking, socially distant literature drops, sending mass texts and mailers, and QR codes to get voters registered or apply for absentee ballots. Other organizations relied on Zoom calls, postcards, flyers and advertising anywhere from radio to billboards.

“We don’t care who they vote for. We care they do exercise their right to vote, and not let a few make decisions for many,” Butler says.

Due to the pandemic, absentee voting became more important than ever. And combating an onslaught of misinformation and disinformation surrounding it was a battle in itself.

An important part of voter engagement became showing people that it’s a safe and trusted method to vote. Because the process involves an application, identification and signatures, organizers had to work through it all with voters. For example, how to follow up if their ballot doesn’t get accepted and how to make sure it was counted.

“We had to get our community, especially the Black community, to trust the vote-by-mail process because as a race, we didn’t typically use that process,” Butler says.

All Eyes On Georgia

Another factor that affected voter engagement in Georgia was the state being put on a national stage for the January runoffs. The attention was cast on Georgia because the election would go on to determine which party would control the U.S. Senate. 

Gayla Tillman, the civic engagement organizer for Georgia Conservation Voters, says organizers were anticipating a runoff election. In her words, organizers were ready to “lock and load.”

“[It was] another opportunity to show people that Georgia is an incredible state and that people are ready for something much better than what we’ve been given,” she says.

Tillman saw the negative side of the attention, too.

She recalls a lot of “well-meaning” people out of state giving misinformation about absentee voting in Georgia, and they weren’t thinking much about the landscape of Georgia or the impact of their misinformation.

[advert]

“What’s interesting was I was more stressed from the attention than I was about getting out the vote,” she says.

She would also hear talks about people sending help from other regions of the country, which she interpreted as condescending. She feels as though outsiders have an assumption that Southerners don’t turn out for runoffs, don’t pay attention to politics and have a backwards way of thinking. 

“To see that myth debunked and dismissed twice was such an incredible sight to me,” Tillman says. 

Because of the high-profile nature of the Senate races in the runoff, she says the election for public service commissioner went overlooked. 

“If people aren’t having conversations about these local offices that impact these very local issues, then that’s when you start to see more voter apathy,” she says. 

2021 Municipal Elections

Organizations had a moment to breathe, but are now gearing up for this year’s Georgia municipal elections.

There will be at least four elections spread throughout the year, including an Atlanta municipal general election in which a mayor will be elected.

“It feels like a never-ending cycle, but keeping up with democracy … is not just ‘I voted on Nov. 3 and I’m done,’” says Susannah Scott, president of The League of Women Voters of Georgia.

Redistricting will affect this year’s and future elections. She says it’ll likely happen during late summer or fall, and she’s afraid the public won’t have insight into what is happening. 

[advert]

“It’s something people should keep an eye on and make sure that their legislators know that a fair redistricting process and a transparent redistricting process is important to them,” she says.

A new challenge to face will be legislation that changes the process of absentee voting. 

Fraud allegations in the presidential election were the driving force behind a proposal by Georgia Senate Majority Leader Mike Dugan. The proposal increases security around absentee voting, but can also be seen as restricting access to voting. Scott says any legislation making the process more difficult could be problematic.

Potential changes to absentee voting is just one form of fallout from the November election, in addition to investigations into misconduct and a handful of other new bills in the state Legislature. 

Regardless, organizations like The League of Women Voters are focused on keeping voters engaged this year.

“This election has proven that if you show up, you can make a difference,” she says. “And you can’t write off any state as being just dominated by one party.”