Does your vote count if you die before Election Day? Here’s what Georgia law says

ATLANTA — Claims of a rigged election and voter fraud in Georgia are raising questions about dead people voting beyond the grave.

Channel 2′s Darryn Moore investigated if Georgia law allows an absentee vote to count if a person dies before Election Day.

Cleveland Dollison’s father was a military man and never passed up the right to vote.

[SPECIAL SECTION: Election 2020]

“Voting was very important with him being a war veteran. He fought for this country, and the least thing he could do is vote,” Dollison said.

The longtime DeKalb County resident voted by absentee ballot in the Georgia primaries.

“That ballot came out in March. They sent it to everybody, so he was able to get that vote filled out and sent in prior to his death,” Dollison said.

He died a month later at the age of 75 and his vote still counted.

Gabe Sterling, from Georgia’s secretary of state’s office, said secrecy rules doesn’t allow rejecting a ballot when a voter dies before Election Day.

“You can’t go back and get that ballot back out. It’s just physically impossible, given the privacy rules in our state,” Sterling said.

GEORGIA VOTER GUIDE:

It’s different in other places.

Seventeen states will not count votes if a person dies before Election Day.

However, months after his father died, another ballot came in the mail for the November general election.

“When his election ballot came in, I was trying to figure what to do with it, so I dropped it off in the actual drop box and wrote deceased on it,” Dollison said.

He did it to prevent voter fraud.

Sterling said if a voter dies, removing their name from voter rolls is done at the county level.

“They get vital records come on in and deal with it depending on the process they have in place,” Sterling said.

Dollison said he’s working to remove his father’s name from voter rolls and proud that his father exercised his right to vote.

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