On Wednesday, Republican Brian Kemp officially declared himself the winner in Georgia’s gubernatorial race—despite the fact that there are tens of thousands of provisional and absentee ballots all across the state which have yet to be counted. Kemp is so confident of his victory that he resigned his position as secretary of state, which means that he will not certify the election results, provide any guidance to counties in the state which are still counting their ballots nor oversee the recount process should there be one. In other words, Kemp is supremely confident in the results of his nearly decade-long effort to steal this election and is already preparing to take his place in the governor’s mansion.
How convenient.
But, Kemp should be worried. The campaign team of his opponent, Democrat Stacey Abrams, believes they have numbers to force a runoff and they are now taking legal action. Georgia requires a runoff if a candidate does earn enough votes—in this case being 50 percent plus one. Currently, Kemp has 50.3 percent to Abrams’s 48.7. And, in addition to Kemp’s blatant suppression efforts prior to the election, Tuesday was marked by widespread reports of long lines at polling locations, broken voting machines, not enough voting machines, and not enough provisional ballots. In fact, one report claims that 700 brand-new, still wrapped voting machines were found in a warehouse in Fulton County.
In other words, Brian Kemp cheated. And the Abrams team remains steadfast that she will not concede until every vote is counted.
If you are a Georgia voter and voted absentee, please make sure your vote was counted. You can do so by checking the secretary of state’s website at: www.mvp.sos.ga.gov. You can also call the Voter Protection Hotline at 1-888-730-5816.
The Georgia Democratic Party is also weighing in. Calling Kemp’s move a “political stunt,” they released a series of questions that remain about this race, including why Kemp has not made the county breakdown of provisional ballots available to the media.
This whole election process was rotten from beginning to end. Aside from the many years he spent trying make sure black and brown Georgians couldn’t vote, Brian Kemp should have never been allowed to oversee an election in which he was a candidate. In his role as secretary of state, his used the office to give his campaign all kinds of information that should have been public while withholding it from the Abrams team. He provided no guidance to counties on the process whatsoever and is now declaring himself as the state’s governor-elect. This is shameful. If this election were to have occurred in another country, there’s no way we’d consider this fair or democratic.
Though it feels daunting, we can’t stop until every vote is counted!