Raffensperger Calls on Georgia Legislature to Plug Loophole on Private Funding of Elections

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said the state legislature should close loopholes on private money funding election offices.

“It would be a legislative remedy. We are in session now, so it is something they can address,” Raffensperger told The Daily Signal on Thursday. “We have some election bills right now that are in the hopper. So, you can modify that as it goes through the committee process.”

As The Daily Signal recently reported, despite a 2021 restriction on private money, DeKalb County, Georgia, accepted $2 million from the U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence, a project launched by the Center for Tech and Civic Life that distributed controversial election grants from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in 2020.

“It was the will of the General Assembly that if outside organizations wanted to help supply funding for counties, it would actually be channeled through the state election board, so that it could then disburse the funds on an equitable basis,” added Raffensperger, a Republican, who was in Washington this week for the annual meeting of the National Association for Secretaries of State.

Some watchdog groups determined the election grants were targeted to Democrat-leaning districts and were being used to get out the vote.

Georgia is among 24 states that have enacted bans or restrictions on private money funding election administrations.

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