Brian Kemp on Government Reform

Removed 107,000 voters via "use-it-or-lose-it" law

Georgia secretary of state Brian Kemp strongly favored the "use it or lose it" power in Georgia, where he removed over 1.4 million voters in a state with 6 million registered users. In July 2017, he removed more than half a million voters in a single day, reducing the number of registered voters in Georgia by 8%. An estimated 107,000 of these voters were removed through "use it or lose it".

2010: Overturned local election by arresting black winners

Years passed before their criminal trials commenced, and in the end, no voter fraud had occurred.

1.5 million voters removed from the voting rolls

STACY ABRAMS: Maintaining clean voter rolls is absolutely appropriate, but the vigor with which he did so--a perfect example is the 92-year-old civil rights activist who's lived in the West End of Atlanta for more than 40 years, has voted in every single election since 1968, and was removed from the polls. She went to vote, and had to take more than 2 hours to get a provisional ballot. This is someone who has never failed to vote. The problem we have is that it's death by 1,000 cuts. It's not sufficient to simply purge voters from the rolls for inactivity. He removed voters who were eligible. And the larger issue is this. Trust in our democracy relies on believing that there are good actors who are making this happen. And he was a horrible actor who benefited from his perfidy.

53,000 voter registrations put "on hold"

The injunction would seek to reopen voter registration in Georgia to ensure that 53,000 registrants on hold in Kemp's office--and possibly others affected by an outage of the Georgia Department of Driver Services and the state's voter registration website--would be allowed to register for the upcoming election. The last day to register to vote was Tuesday.

The strict policies enforced by Kemp's office for voter registration and verification have been under scrutiny in his gubernatorial campaign. Under Kemp's verification policies, voter application information must perfectly match information on file. If they don't match precisely, officials can put the application on hold.

OpEd: Precise name-match disenfranchises voters of color

An analysis conducted by The Associated Press found that almost 70% of the registrants currently on hold are black. Georgia's population is 32% black. [Kemp's gubernatorial opponent Stacey] Abrams needs strong African-American turnout in the state to win the governor's race. Allies of Abrams argue that Kemp is deliberately trying to purge voter rolls to his advantage.

Kemp's office said in a statement in July, "Despite any claim to the contrary, it has never been easier to register to vote in Georgia and actively engage in the electoral process. The numbers do not lie."

Stricter voter ID laws against threat of illegal voters

The two have long been on opposite sides of the debate over elections issues, with Kemp advocating for stricter voter ID laws to prevent what he called the threat of illegal voters casting ballots and Abrams contending those new rules could disenfranchise minorities, the disabled and the elderly.

But they clashed the sharpest during the 2014 after Abrams new voter registration group, the New Georgia Project, which said it submitted 86,000 voter registration forms during the 2014 cycle, but Kemp's office argued that tens of thousands of applications were either missing or had not been properly submitted.

Protect our elections from fraud with Voter ID

Secretary Kemp also implemented his Stop Voter Fraud website and Voter Fraud Hotline allowing citizens to report questionable election activities online or by phone. Additionally, Kemp's Investigations Division increased its partnerships with state and local law enforcement to investigate and prosecute voter fraud.

Under Secretary Kemp's leadership, Georgia's elections are secure, accessible and fair. Kemp continues his efforts every day to stop voter fraud and make it as easy as possible for all citizens to participate in the democratic process.

Some say voter fraud is no big deal: Not on my watch

This is not some hypothetical, philosophical, political theory. It is a reality found every day in countries around the world. The outcome of failed elections and lost faith is violence and chaos. To anyone, Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal, who seeks to undermine that process and rig the results, I have a simple response. Not on my watch.

Require voter ID to ensure purity of elections

Legislative Outcome: Passed Senate 32-22-0 on Jan. 24, vote #599; Sen. Kemp voted YES; passed House 111-60-6 on Jan. 25, vote #564; signed by Gov. Perdue Jan. 26.