Board of Elections Votes to Move Forward with an Investigation of Raphael Warnock

Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) is facing an inquiry into the handling of voter registration applications in 2019 by the New Georgia Project, an organization for which he served as CEO at the time. The Georgia Board of Elections voted yesterday to refer the investigation to Attorney General Chris Carr, as the AJC explains:

Representatives of the New Georgia Project hand-delivered 1,268 voter registration applications to the Gwinnett County elections office beyond the time allowed, according to an investigator for Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

State election rules require voter registration organizations to submit completed applications within 10 days after they were received from the voter.

The State Election Board submitted the case on a 3-0 vote, with the board’s lone Democrat, David Worley, recusing himself. Raffensperger is the chairman of the board but usually doesn’t vote except to break ties.

The referral doesn’t mean that the Attorney General’s office will do more than continue to investigate the case. Fines and/or a criminal prosecution could be the end result of that investigation, but it’s not a certainty.

Also, the politics of this aren’t something that should be ignored, considering Raffensperger is in cycle and will undoubtedly face a primary challenger. It seems likely that Warnock and Democrats will make that part of their public argument against the inquiry, if they haven’t already.