GLYNN COUNTY, Ga. — The Georgia Republican party has passed a resolution to censure Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger.
The party is meeting for their annual convention on Jekyll Island this weekend, where the divide over former president Donald Trump’s role in the future of the GOP was evident.
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Trump notoriously disputed the results of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia, falsely claiming that he lost because of voter fraud.
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In the months after the election, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Raffensperger repeatedly defended the state’s election process and said there was no evidence of voter fraud in the state. Several audits were performed that did not change the election results in Georgia. The secretary of state has stood by his office and said they followed the state’s election laws. Investigators found there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud, machine or election management problems.
Trump has long made clear his intentions to target Raffensperger and Gov. Brian Kemp, also a Republican, for their parts in ratifying Biden’s victory.
Kemp faced the consequences of not backing the former president’s claims on Saturday when he was booed and taunted as he gave a speech.
Later Saturday afternoon, the party passed a resolution to censure Raffensperger, saying he failed to perform his duties in “accordance with the laws of the Constitution of the State of Georgia.”
The resolution says Raffensperger undermined the security of elections by allowing mass mailings of absentee ballot applications, which “created opportunities for fraud and overwhelmed election offices.”
Channel 2 received a statement from the Secretary of States office that says,
“The Secretary of States Office, county election directors and the tens of thousands of poll workers across the state worked to ensure that democracy was upheld. It is the job of counties to run elections and the secretary of states office’s job to report those election results-- it is the job of the political parties to deliver wins for their candidates. Let’s not confuse the two.”
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The resolution goes on to say that absentee ballots made signature matches impossible and ballot drop boxes were allowed without proper chain of custody.
The resolution calls on Kemp to “repair the damage that has been done” and secure Georgia’s elections.
Trump taped a video message for the convention in which he praised Georgia Republicans generally, yet never mentioned Kemp.
Both Kemp and Raffensperger are running for reelection.
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