As we’re fielding concerns about the potentially troubling precedent of the GA Presidential Primary delay, some thoughts on what’s happening in GA and why @fairfightaction is supportive of the delay in this instance, but generally not supportive of delaying elections. 1/15
Our support is due to the incredibly unfortunate timing of the escalation of the pandemic plus the state’s spring election calendar. Next week is the final week of in-person early vote in the state, and many large counties were scheduled to open additional early voting sites.2/15
Next week is also the start of most large school districts in the state being closed, events are finally being canceled in the state, and tomorrow morning the Governor is convening an emergency legislative session to declare a state of emergency. 3/15
All of the chaos and uncertainty of the last few days has been intense here; Gov Kemp did not mandate school closures or mandate the canceling of large events like other governors, which meant every locality and business has been on their own in their decision-making. 4/15
Here’s what he said Thursday March 12th about school closures, for example: 5/15 
With the primary election day coming up one week from Tuesday, it is too close to push for an immediate expansion of vote by mail, yet too far away to just power through, with election workers no longer reporting to work as county officials scramble to figure out what to do. 6/15
In GA’s specific case, elections officials were faced with an impossible task of conducting 6 more in-person voting days- that were increasingly understaffed as public health concerns escalated. 7/15
Meanwhile, voters no longer had time to request an absentee ballot to avoid impossibly long lines, caused by a lack of election workers and the use of new voting systems in all 159 counties. In one county alone, 38 election workers had already quit by this weekend. 8/15
The states of AZ, FL, IL & OH had already announced their plan to complete their elections on Tuesday, but GA was not in a position to realistically continue to conduct 6 additional days of in-person voting, especially given the day-to-day uncertainty of coronavirus updates. 9/15
Then the calendar: GA has a May 19 state primary; right after the March 24 PPP, the state shifts into voting in the May primary, making it impracticable to push for a very late expansion of mail voting in the PPP during all of this shutdown chaos. bit.ly/38RYyqP 10/15
Now with the PPP delayed until May, it is on state and local elections officials to pivot to preparing for a May primary election where all votes will be counted while workers and the public stay safe. 11/15
As we move forward in GA and around the country, @fairfightaction will be advocating strongly for federal and state action to dramatically expand voting by mail. 12/15
Doing so will require not only governmental action, but legal strategies and adjusted efforts to fight voter suppression and protect the vote—stopping the junk science signature matching practices that disenfranchise (where @marceelias is leading the legal fight), 13/15
expanding acceptance windows so ballots postmarked on Election Day and received shortly after the election are counted, preparing for GOP suppression tactics to confuse and intimidate voters of color and students around voting by mail, and much more. 14/15
.@fairfightaction will #keepfighting and though we like all are working remotely, the work of #FairFight2020 continues to grow and adapt in these challenging times in our quest to #counteveryvote. 15/15
