Shannon spoke earlier than her friends on Tuesday’s Crossover Day—a legislative deadline for payments to cross one chamber earlier than they are often determined within the different chamber this session. She mentioned language within the elections invoice is “so poor” there’s actually no approach to know you’re complying with it. She learn this part:
“No ballots shall be dealt with with no ballot official being current and with out documentation on the chain of custody documentation types of who’s dealing with such ballots and when and why such ballots are being dealt with. After the exercise requiring the dealing with of ballots is accomplished, such ballots shall be resealed in poll bins or different safe containers which shall be recorded and witnessed on chain of custody documentation types as specified by the Secretary of State and shall be signed by the individuals having custody of such ballots.”
Shannon requested what the phrase “dealt with” means and supplied a dictionary definition as “to really feel or manipulate with arms,” or “to handle a state of affairs or an issue.”
“So what are we speaking about right here?” Shannon requested. “Are we saying that you simply’ve received to have a ballot official accessible in the event you contact a poll, in the event you transfer a poll?”
She even requested the committee if the vast majority of actually necessary actions are already supervised by an election official, then, “What extra actions would you wish to see supervised?” Her query didn’t get a solution.
Shannon moved to the part of the invoice that might give the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) authority to analyze elections.
“As Republican legislators throughout the nation work to ban the correct educating of historical past, it is time for a historical past lesson,” she mentioned. “There is a huge cause why we shouldn’t be involving the GBI in our elections. This nation in addition to this state has had a historical past of utilizing legislation enforcement to suppress, to mainly do voter suppression.” This works by making these in Black and brown communities scared to train their political energy, Shannon mentioned.
She informed the story of the Quitman 10, noting it must be known as the Quitman 12 to precisely characterize the variety of these arrested within the metropolis about 230 miles south of Atlanta.
Shannon mentioned, quoting Yahoo Information and the Equal Justice Initiative:
“When Black ladies flipped the majority-white faculty board within the small city of Quitman, the State of Georgia arrested them and charged them with 120 separate felony counts of voter fraud. Let’s speak concerning the Quitman 10, which was really the Quitman 12, and the way involving the GBI in Georgia’s elections in 2010 […] destroyed the lives of many and had the impact of suppressing Black voter turnout though nobody was ever convicted of any wrongdoing. Not sufficient folks know this story, however it’s related and up to date historical past.
This story is one thing that sounds prefer it’s out of the 1960 civil rights motion, nevertheless it’s not. That is from 2010.
When Nancy Dennard began working for Brooks County colleges in 2000, African People had no representatives in key county positions, and he or she felt that some faculty board members appeared extra serious about stopping property tax will increase than offering colleges with adequate sources. So she determined to run for a seat on the varsity board. After shedding campaigns in 2004 and 2008, Miss Dennard started to give attention to absentee voters.
The Republican-controlled state legislature—that’s us—had made it simpler to make use of absentee ballots in 2005, and Republicans had been commonly counting on this voting tactic. In a particular election in 2009, Miss Dennard gained.
She then recruited two different Black ladies—middle-school math trainer Diane Thomas and lifelong educator Linda Troutman—to run for varsity board in 2010. Most voters, Black and white, voted Democratic in Brooks County, so the July main was the important thing race. Black turnout tripled from the earlier two midterm elections and each ladies prevailed, flipping the board from a majority-white to a Black majority.
Six weeks later, state legislation enforcement officers beneath the authority of then-Secretary of State Brian Kemp arrested Miss Dennard at her house 4 days earlier than Christmas.
They took her away in handcuffs, positioned her in a squad automotive, and walked her into the police station. Eleven of her political allies had been additionally arrested, together with Linda Troutman, Diane Thomas, and Thomas’ sister, Lula Good, who was an lively marketing campaign volunteer.
The Quitman 12 had been charged with 120 separate felonies. Mug pictures of them in orange jumpsuits had been plastered all throughout the newspaper entrance pages. They broadcast repeatedly on native TV and information and likewise used on the Fox Information station talked about voter fraud.
[…]
Miss Dennard informed Yahoo Information that she and her allies had been arrested as a result of that they had upset the racial hierarchy. ‘They thought they might make an instance out of me, and that might kill the spirit of this motion,’ she mentioned. ‘I knew we had carried out nothing mistaken.’
The arrests created an impression within the Black group that vigorously exercising the fitting to vote could be punished.
Sound acquainted?”
