White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Monday that President Biden will continue to advocate for ways to make it “easier” to vote, while refusing to back down on his earlier comments on a new Georgia voting law that, since then, it has been verified.
Last month, Biden said the new Georgia voting law would end voting at 5 pm, making it difficult for people to work. The Washington Post, however, gave this statement “four Pinocchios” because this section of the law gives counties the option of extending voting time.
Psaki, at a press conference at the White House on Monday, was asked whether the president would change the way he is talking about Georgia’s voting law after verifying the facts.
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“Well, fundamentally, the president doesn’t believe it should be more difficult to vote. He believes it should be easier,” said Psaki. “And this bill makes it more difficult to request and return an absent ballot.”
President Biden speaks to members of the media after arriving at Ellipse at the National Mall, after spending the weekend at Camp David, Monday, April 5, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo / Evan Vucci)
((AP Photo / Evan Vucci))
Psaki added that “this reduces the length of the second round of the Georgia election, making it more difficult for large jurisdictions to offer early voting and imposes new strict restrictions on the ability of local authorities to set voting times to meet the needs of voters in their county” .
“These are all parts of the account,” she said. “So his opinion is that we need to make it easier and not harder to vote. And that will continue to be what he stands for.”
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When pressed again, Psaki replied, “I think we can – the fact-checkers will also tell you – that this bill does not facilitate the vote of people across Georgia.
When asked again whether Biden can recognize that Georgia law does not change election day voting hours, Psaki fired back.
“It also does not expand them for early voting and makes early voting shorter,” said Psaki. “So there are many components of the legislation that concern him. And that is what he was expressing.”
Psaki said there are components of the law “that make it more difficult to vote”.
Georgia enacted extensive electoral reform last week that required voter identification for absentee voting instead of relying on matching signatures for verification, limited the ballot box to one per county or one per 100,000 voters, extended early voting days and the initial voting hours standardized at a minimum from 9 am to 5 pm and a maximum of 7 am to 7 pm. Legislation prohibited outside groups from distributing food and water to those in line within a radius of 50 meters.
The law also gave more electoral authority to the state legislature controlled by the Republican Party. It states that the General Assembly should select the president of the state election council, rather than the council being chaired by Georgia’s secretary of state. It also reduces the run-off from nine to four weeks.
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The state electoral board can now also investigate the county’s electoral boards and has the power to suspend the county’s electoral superintendents – although the board can only suspend four at a time.
The law was enacted after a Democratic sweep in the state of Peach, which Trump lost to President Biden by just over 11,000 votes. Trump claimed massive electoral fraud in the state, and fought with Republican Governor Brain Kemp and Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in dealing with the elections. Nine weeks after the November election, the current Republicans Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler lost to Democrats John Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.