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Poll worker Kelly Greene cleans voting materials Tuesday morning at B C Grant Baptist Church in Baldwin.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Monday he was expecting upwards of 250,000 to 400,000 voters to turn out across the state, spurring long lines as polling places space people six feet apart, take time to clean voting areas and use fewer voting machines to limit capacity.
“Things would be better if we weren’t in this pandemic,” Raffensperger said at a news conference Monday. “But it is what it is.”
Some polling places were busy around Habersham County when they first opened up at 7 a.m. Tuesday, but the turnout throughout the morning was strong, but manageable, poll workers said.
More than 1.2 million Georgians have cast ballots so far by mail and during the early voting period, a record turnout for a primary election that should help curb the amount of in-person voting on Tuesday, Raffensperger said.
Habersham County received 6,132 mail-in ballots as of Tuesday morning out of the 8,395 mailed out. There were 2,500 early votes cast in the county with several crucial races in play, including for sheriff – the only race scheduled to be decided Tuesday night – as well as three county commission seats and new faces set to be elected for State House, State Senate and 9th Congressional District.
Election results will be available online here as soon as they are released.
Raffensperger cautioned Georgians not to expect a quick turnaround in results due to the large number of absentee ballots and short-handed staff at some polling places. He said no election results will be announced “until every precinct is closed,” which could mean a few days pass before results for some contests are announced.
Voters at several polling places in Atlanta stood in line for hours Tuesday, as poll workers in busy precincts struggled to operate the new voting machines.
Voters and poll workers in Habersham County seemed to be adapting well to the new machines, which involve touchscreens and scanners that record a paper printout of a voter’s completed ballot.
Habersham County polling places were clearly marked allowing for social distancing by potential voters waiting in line to cast their ballot.
Dr. Marybeth Sexton, an assistant professor of medicine at Emory University’s Division of Infectious Diseases, said voters who follow those distancing and sanitizing practices should be able to vote in person Tuesday without the risk of being exposed to the virus. But if some voters at polling places are not spaced out in line or are not wearing masks, it would be wise to get tested for COVID-19 four to five days after voting, Sexton said.
The surge in vote-by-mail comes as state and local elections officials face a daunting challenge to keep polling places sanitized and safe for voters and poll workers, particularly with polling places in some counties like Fulton closed or consolidated amid the virus.
Meanwhile, Georgia Democratic leaders have chastised the performance by Raffensperger and some county elections offices over the long lines and unreturned absentee ballots.
“The secretary of state and counties have had months to prepare for this election, but they have squandered valuable time that could have been used to prevent the democratic crisis we are seeing today,” said Sen. Nikema Williams, D-Atlanta, who chairs the Democratic Party of Georgia.
Beau Evans is a reporter for the Capitol Beat News Service, which is funded through the Georgia Press Education Foundation. Northeast Georgian editor Matthew Osborne contributed to this report.