House Bill 316, sponsored by Rep. Barry Fleming (R-Harlem), passed the House by a 101-72 vote in late February — prior to Crossover Day. The bill calls for the replacement of 27,000 direct-recording electronic voting machines to touchscreen ballot-marking devices that have some sort of printed paper component. The state’s current voting machines are 17 years old.
According to officials, with this system, voters would choose their candidate and cast their vote on the touch screen. Ballots would be printed for voters to review for accuracy. The voter would then place the paper ballot into a scanner to be counted. If approved, Georgia would become the only state in the country to use this kind of voting equipment in every precinct. Some districts in 24 states use similar touch screen-and-paper voting systems, according to officials.
“This would bring our state into the forefront of technology,” Rep. Fleming told members of the subcommittee. “We can put our voters first in Georgia and bring us into the 21st century.”
Fleming co-chaired the secretary of state’s Secure, Accessible and Fair Elections commission, which made the recommendation for this type voting machines.
The House vote was largely split along party lines. Republicans and many elections officials from counties across Georgia voiced support for the touch screen machines which are familiar to voters and create a paper ballot that could be used to check the accuracy of electronically tabulated results. However, Democrats and some activists say paper ballots bubbled in with pens would be more secure from hacking or tampering.
The bill also passed out of the Senate Ethics Committee along party lines. The measure was approved on a 7-5 vote.
If the bill passes the Senate and becomes law, the Secretary of State would issue a request for proposals from election machine vendors before selecting a specific system.
Initial cost estimates for the electronic touchscreen voting machines are about $150 million. Gov. Brian Kemp has included the funds in his Kemp’s 2020 budget proposal.
The Senate is scheduled to convene at 10 a.m. Wednesday. Today is a committee work day.
