Georgia Senate second round: over 940,000 requests for postal votes reported

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This includes 604,255 people who are eligible to automatically receive mail-in ballots, according to Sterling. By comparison, 1,322,529 mail-in ballots were cast in the November general election, according to a statement from the Georgia Secretary of State’s office.

Sterling said 1,040 ballots have been returned so far, a “little trickle that we expect to expand soon.”

Georgian voters are required to re-apply for postal votes for the second round, even if they voted by correspondence in November, with the exception of those over 65, servicemen or persons with physical disabilities who have requested postal ballots for the entire electoral cycle.

Republicans are struggling to encourage voters to back incumbent Republican Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue as President Donald Trump continues to cast doubt on the presidential election results.

If either of the outgoing Republicans retain their seats, the party will retain majority control in the chamber. If Democratic challengers Jon Ossoff and Reverend Raphael Warnock win, Democrats would take control of the Senate thanks to the decisive vote of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.

Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel on Saturday tried to persuade Republicans to vote in the election, even as some voters expressed ambivalence over increasing resources in a contest they believe has already been decided. Trump is expected to travel to Peach State on Saturday to campaign for Loeffler and Perdue.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger – both Republicans – on Monday rejected Trump’s calls to overturn the state’s election results more than a week after certifying Joe Biden as the winner.

For weeks, Trump has made a series of unsubstantiated allegations of fraud in the state, for which there is no evidence. Biden won the state by more than 12,000 votes, and Kemp and Raffensperger pledged to uphold the law.

“Well, I said (to Sens. Loeffler and Perdue) today, I think you are dealing with a very fraudulent system. I am very worried about this,” the president said at a conference press release Thursday, calling the two Republican senators “great people.”

Loeffler and Perdue called on Raffensperger to step down, alleging wrongdoing, but without providing any specific evidence to back up their claims.

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic also continues to weigh on the logistics of the next second round of the elections. Georgia has faced 471,563 cases of the coronavirus – the sixth largest case of any state – as well as 9,452 deaths from the virus, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
The election process has been underway since the start of the month, with November 18 being the first date for a registrar to send out a postal ballot. December 7 marks the voter registration deadline to vote in the second round of federal elections, and early in-person or early voting begins for the second round of the federal office general election on December 14.

CNN’s Chandelis Duster, Paul LeBlanc, Betsy Klein, Donald Judd and Ryan Nobles contributed to this report.

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