ATLANTA (AP) ‐ A federal judge is holding a hearing Monday on Georgia’s planned mass purge of its voting rolls, following an emergency request from a voting rights group founded by Democrat Stacey Abrams.Went Judge-shopping for an Obama Appointee
U.S. District Judge Steve Jones had ruled earlier in the day that the purge should be placed on hold until a Thursday hearing, but he later decided to hold the hearing Monday afternoon.
The motion was filed by Fair Fight Action in U.S. District Court, just hours before the secretary of state’s office planned to begin the purge of inactive voter registrations.
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in October released a list of over 313,000 voters whose registrations were at risk of being canceled, about 4% of the state’s total registered voters. Notices were mailed in November giving those voters 30 days to respond in order to keep their registration intact. A spokesman for the secretary of state’s office said last week that the purge was set to begin Monday evening.
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That decision came after a lawyer for the state assured him that if the judge finds later that some people should not have been removed, they can be easily and quickly reinstated.