Comité Ethics del Senado, 24 de marzo de 2026

Transcripción

293 turnos. Seleccione un tiempo para reproducir ese momento del video.

1. 0:13:18

   All right. Thank you all for being here. Uh, this is the, uh, Senate, uh, Ethics Committee meeting, and, uh, before we do anything, we're gonna say a prayer here, and I'm gonna ask Chairman Burns if he'll do that. Uh, number 13.

2. 0:13:31

   Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, just a moment before we pray. Uh, there was an incident in Cobb County today where a student brought a weapon to the school. Uh, the good news, that the school was on lock do- down, code red. Uh, everyone's safe. Uh, there was no injuries to anyone. Uh, I wanna compliment Cobb County Schools and certainly Cobb County Law Enforcement because they were able to neutralize the situation before any violence, and I'm grateful for that. And the reason I bring that out, my grandson goes to that school.

3. 0:14:01

   Mm. Wow. So, so let's take a moment and thank the Lord for things that are important, and it's life, and it's health, and it's family. Let's pray together. Father God, we are grateful. I'm grateful for the students at, at the school that my s- grandson attends, that they're safe, that they're sound, that the, the individual that had this episode can now get help, and treatment, and support. Uh, and we're grateful for the Senate, and this committee, and the work that it does. And even though we may differ in how we proceed, Lord, help us do the things that are in the best interest of our citizens and of our state.

4. 0:14:35

   In Christ's name, we pray. Amen. Amen.

5. 0:14:38

   All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. All right. Welcome, everybody. Uh, this is, uh, the posture that we are in. Uh, this is the same bill that Senate Ethics Committee, um, looked at and voted on several weeks ago. Uh, we heard, uh, uh, over an hour of testimony, uh, for and against, uh, that piece of legislation, uh, at that meeting. Uh, this same language was also presented on the Senate floor. Uh, there was much debate and discussion, uh, among, uh, the members on the Senate floor.

6. 0:15:10

   Um, and, uh, the- we were gonna hear this bill last week, so, uh, I guess that was on Thursday. And, um, so it's been out there. Everybody's had an opportunity to... Part of the reason that we, we held on it was to have more discussion about it to make sure folks understood, uh, everything within the bill. There's been, uh, three changes that we're gonna allow the, the author of the, of the bill to speak to in just a few moments. But, uh, just wanna kinda let the, uh, audience know, uh, that that's where we are with this legislation, and that we're not taking public testimony today, uh, due to all of that happening.

7. 0:15:47

   Um, and I feel like that, uh, there's been, uh, ample time to, uh, to have discussion with m- members about, uh, this bill. And so, um, I, I think, uh, Representative Clark is here. Her bill, uh, had previous language dealing with some judges in Gwinnett. Uh, it's my understanding that those have been consolidated into another bill, uh, similar to how we do, uh, our road naming and bridge namings, um, across the state. Uh, so her, her judge language is no longer in this legislation. It's in another piece of legislation.

8. 0:16:19

   Um, so I don't, I don't know if you would like to say anything to that, uh, Representative Clark, but, uh, go ahead, and then we'll, we'll give it over to the, to the other, uh, new author of the bill.

9. 0:16:31

   Um, do I push that button?

10. 0:16:38

    You're, you're good.

11. 0:16:39

    Am I good?

12. 0:16:39

    Mm-hmm.

13. 0:16:40

    All right. Um, uh, first I wanna say, um, um, hello. This is my first time presenting to this committee, and I'm a Georgia girl, born and raised. And so I was raised that you introduce yourself when you walk into a room and you address people. And so, um, I am a representative, Dr. Jasmine Clark. I'm also the chair of the Gwinnett delegation, which is why I carried the, uh, House, original version of House Bill 960. Um, this was bipartisan legislation signed by an overwhelming majority of the Gwinnett delegation, including leader Chuck Estration as the second signer, and it really did, um, fill a need for Gwinnett County.

14. 0:17:24

    Right now we only have 11 judges. We need 14.2, um, according to Judicial Council, and so we did make the top three list, and that allowed, uh, for us to get at least 12 judges, um, which I think is gonna get us on the path to where we need to be in Gwinnett County. I'll be very honest. When, um, this bill was assigned to Genit- Senate Judiciary, again, because I'm from the South and I g- uh, believe in introducing myself, I did come over to the Senate and introduce myself to Chairman Strickland, who did assure me that after crossover day it would receive a hearing.

15. 0:18:03

    I have been given assurances by members of this committee that that bill will be put into another bill, and so the people of Gwinnett County will be made whole, and we will not, uh, be disenfranchised in the process of this bill taking on a different form. Um, but I also want to put on the record that I was very shocked to hear about my bill being subbed as, again, Southern girl, I would have loved the courtesy of knowing this was going to happen and having the author of the, of the new version of the bill at least reach out to me either by phone or by email.

16. 0:18:42

    Um, if you don't know, if you're here, you don't know how our emails work, first name, last name. So it's real easy to get in contact with each other. That said, uh, Mr. Chair, thank you so much for indulging me, um, with the opportunity, um, to talk about and stand up for the people of Gwinnett County when it comes to the original version of House Bill 960, and I appreciate your time. And happy to take questions if there are any, but other than that, thank you, Mr. Chair.

17. 0:19:09

    Uh, thank you, Representative. And it's, it's actually my understanding that the, the language that was in your bill passed out of judiciary last night in HB 1215. Uh, so you, if you wanna check on that and make sure-

18. 0:19:20

    I'll check on that. Thank you very much.

19. 0:19:21

    All right.

20. 0:19:21

    I will definitely have my staff look that up 'cause we've been watching, so-

21. 0:19:24

    All righty

22. 0:19:25

    ... I appreciate it. Thank you very much.

23. 0:19:26

    Good, good deal. Thank you for being here. Um- Chairman Dolezal, do you wanna come on down and, or you wanna do it from there or what? I'm gonna turn it over to you. And, uh, before you get started, uh, just thank you for your work on this. Um, I know we had some questions and, and issues, and you've worked diligently to, to, uh, work those out with folks and get folks, uh, in the right place with this, uh, legislation. Um, and so thank you for the work that you've done on that. And, uh, I know you've made a few changes to, to improve this, and I think you're gonna speak to that for us.

24. 0:19:57

    And, uh, I'll turn it over to you.

25. 0:19:59

    Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, um, wanna give a shout-out as well. I, I think I re- mentioned this, Representative Clark, to you a second ago, but just in case I didn't, Shawn Still did ensure that that moved as well for you guys, um, with an eye towards going to as a member of your delegation. So, um, happy that that ... hear that got done yesterday. This, um, this is a substitute that is Senate Bill 568 with three changes, and three changes only. I'll just point you to those changes, 'cause I know we did have robust debate on that, on this bill previously, uh, before we voted on it on crossover day.

26. 0:20:32

    Uh, the first change is in section two and three. If y'all remember, there were fines, uh, civil fines relative to voter challenges, either, um, actual registered voter challenge or, or registration challenges. Those were $10,000. And that's been reduced to $1,000 per incidence in this bill. That's on page two, uh, lines 32 and 39. So that's just a reduction in the fine amount. There was a previous section of the bill that some members had heartburn over, and that was relative to as- assigned advanced to early voting locations.

27. 0:21:09

    And so I described to y'all the reason for that and the, the reason why we did that was to reduce the ballot permutations that would need to be stocked at each early voting precinct. Uh, but we have completely removed that from the bill. So we would ... the, if this bill were to pass, you would still be able to vote at any advanced voting, uh, location in your county. And that would just require a stocking of additional ballots. Um, and that's just a policy decision that, um, I think that reasonable minds, reasonable minds can disagree on.

28. 0:21:41

    So that's been completely struck from this bill. And then the last change that was made is not substantive. Um, if you all recall the recount language that you see currently in the bill on line 278 to 284, this exact language previously was included in the risk limiting audit section of the bill. And frankly, it was misplaced in the bill because, uh, this recount would not be a risk limiting audit. A risk limiting audit has a actual scientific definition that involves, um, a, a predefined process, and this would be a different process.

29. 0:22:16

    So we just asked leg counsel to move that out of the section it was in, and into the section where the recount language is. And that was something we planned to do in the House previously. Um, but the bill was engrossed, and so we just got it fixed for this version. So reduced fines, no more as- advanced early voting location assignments, and then a, a relocation of the language that was in 568 relative to recounts is now, uh, in what I would say is the proper location in the bill.

30. 0:22:48

    But high level, Mr., uh, Chairman, this moves us to hand-marked paper ballots that will be machine tabulated, what we've kinda colloquially referred to as the Florida Model. Um, and then we have additional recount provisions in here, as well as availability of some data, uh, both voter, uh, uh, voter roll data, as well as some of the security logs from the machines and just some other what I would call minor changes, like prescribing the color paper that will be used and things like that. But this is the exact same bill that we had, uh, in 568 that you all have seen minus the three changes that I mentioned.

31. 0:23:24

    All right. Well, thank you for your work on this. I know you spent a lot of time on it, and, uh, some great changes there. Um, and, uh, at this time I'll open it up for any questions from the committee, if there are any. I know we've already seen this before, so, um, anybody got any question? All right. Uh, number five.

32. 0:23:46

    That's me.

33. 0:23:46

    Oh, all right. Senator Jackson.

34. 0:23:48

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, so I just would like to revisit the section around the hand recount, uh, for, for the provision. So is it your intention for, say, a presidential race in which there are literally hundreds of thousands of ballots, is it your intention to see those recounted by hand within two days?

35. 0:24:13

    Um, that, um, I'm not sure-

36. 0:24:15

    This is-

37. 0:24:15

    ... where the, the two-day process is in here. We would intend to have that done, be it before certification. So a period of two business days. So within ... Um, if you look at line 279, well, it begins on line 278. It says, "Within a period of two business days." Yeah, I think that the idea there is that we would be beginning the conducting of that within that period of time. If we need to refine that language, I'd certainly be open to that. Yeah. So it's not your intention to have it done, completed by two day, within two days. I- It's your intention for it to have been started. Yeah, I think that ...

38. 0:24:46

    And it may be more clear there to say prior to certification, um, would be an option of, of language that we can change there. But yes, I, I do not believe that we'd be able to complete that within the, within the two business ... That's a good catch. Thank you. Uh, may I follow up on that question? Mm-hmm. Um, and then also to your, your fines, uh, again, I just wanna go ... I know you lowered it from 10K. Thank you. Um, however, because these are often done in batches, I still am very concerned about the cost of this mistake on the backs of the county.

39. 0:25:19

    Because if you have a batch of 100 names that need to be removed, and somehow that batch got, you know, didn't happen in the timely manner that it was supposed to happen, you're still talking about a fine of $100,000. And so I'm gravely concerned about the cost that this has on counties, um, for something that really could just be simply an oversight.

40. 0:25:43

    And, and so I, I, I, I would ask that you would be open to adjusting these fees downward even more to relieve some of the, the pressure on our counties, um, when it comes to, to complying with this piece.

41. 0:25:54

    Senator, my hope would be that we never had to fine anyone. Um, my concern would be is that if we have fines that are too low, um, that the voter rolls are not maintained as they clearly should be under Georgia law, which I believe is actually happening currently. Um, and so the original intent with the $10,000 number was to make it such that we really, uh, pushed the counties to ensure that they are complying with our law. Uh, but there is an adjudication process, as you know, that goes-- that where these, uh, these provisions make their way all the way through a court system, um, before they are-- would be found to be, uh, in failure to comply.

42. 0:26:32

    So it would, it would need to be, I think, real gross negligence before it would reach that point. Um, but I'll, I'll yield to the will of the committee, um, on what an appropriate number would be. Ad-admittedly, we are, we are choosing numbers here that, that different people could disagree on.

43. 0:26:48

    Can you-- But can you just help me, um, see where in the bill that this says that it has to go through an adjudication period first before the fines are established? Like, help, help me see, because right now it just-- I'm reading it as the moment they fail to comply. It doesn't actually give me a timeline for how much time they have to comply.

44. 0:27:05

    When I get back to my computer, I can pull up the underlying code sections for you. I happen to know, um, some folks that have gone through this process. I've actually sat through in my own county where some of these have been challenged. Um, and, and certainly know it to be a process that is deliberative or-originally with the local election board. Um, and then there are other appellate processes throughout, uh, throughout the code section there. I, I don't know what fine number you would have in mind. I think the challenge is currently there is, there is no teeth, um, that is, that is in, in the code.

45. 0:27:38

    And so, um, th-this is an attempt to ensure that there is some sort of compulsory, uh, I guess, force that would push the-- that would push on the counties to ensure we're gonna have clean voting rolls.

46. 0:27:51

    Yeah, certainly. I, I, I don't mind teeth. I just don't want people being gutted, um, by a mistake. And so, uh, you know, you reduced it from ten thousand to one thousand. I would welcome it reduced the same amount, the same exact kind of way to one hundred. Um, to me, it seems like a reasonable effort. And then if, if you would just allow me one, one final question for now. Uh, can you talk to me about-- So the reason you explained why you wanted people to have an assigned voting location for early voting was because of the number of permutations and ballots that would be required.

47. 0:28:21

    So can you just walk me through how this would work if you're saying you're voting at the, I don't know, Fulton County Library in, in early voting? How many permutations of ballots are those folks gonna have on hand? And also, who's paying for the cost of all of those ballots that are being printed, which ostensibly won't all be used?

48. 0:28:44

    Yeah. So, Senator, I think I've shared with this committee before, my dad's been retired for about a decade, but he used to be a paper ballot salesman in his home state of Illinois, of all things. It's ironic. Um, and he just worked for a printing company, right? And, and like most states, um, Illinois does not have uniform voting equipment. Georgia is an outlier. Um, I, I think actually the only state in the union that is using ballot marking devices on a statewide basis. And so Dad would drive around to county clerks, and he would sell their, their printing services, and the county clerks would choose and, uh, to go with his company or a different company, and they would order those ballots.

49. 0:29:20

    And then what would happen is you would show up to vote, and you would receive a, a ballot permutation. Fulton County, Senator, I think is a perfect example. And the reason I was originally bringing the policy position I brought before you before, if you think about how long linearly Fulton County is, you, you basically go all the way down to the airport and all the way up to Alpharetta and the Forsyth County line. And so, um, what you will have to do now is you will have to stock ballots in Alpharetta, um, for Fulton County's, whatever the-- a southern city in Fulton County might be.

50. 0:29:51

    And similarly-

51. 0:29:52

    South Fulton

52. 0:29:53

    ... South Fulton.

53. 0:29:54

    You read my mind.

54. 0:29:54

    And, and at the South Fulton precinct, if there is one, you're gonna have to stock ballots for the Alpharetta City Council race. And that's the reason why I had the previous policy position, um, that was misconstrued as being voter suppression, um, as seemingly everything is around here. Um, so in an effort to not have that label over this bill, we took it out. I, I would say that I believe that, that the logical, proper, um, policy position is to do what we did in the original bill. Um, but I certainly can be flexible and understand that this is a process that requires, uh, being open to change.

55. 0:30:29

    So the number that I heard, to answer your question directly, I think that I heard about a hundred and five. So you will be stocking a number of permutations of ballots throughout Fulton County. Now, the flip side of that is, is that there's only twenty-seven or so, I think, counties in Georgia that have more than one advanced voting location at all. So for the bulk of your counties, you're-- you have one advanced voting location. Everyone's going to vote there. They're gonna stock those ballots. That's gonna be-- There'll still be permutations of ballots there, though, 'cause you'll have congressional seats, for example, that might be split within a county.

56. 0:31:00

    And if you're on one side of the county and I'm on the other, we've got a different congressman. They're gonna have to, they're gonna have to pre-print those ballots and stock them. That is the allure of the ballot-on-demand printing technology that has emerged, that we see being used, I think, in places like Arizona, where you give them a card, they print your ballot, and there's no pre-ordering of, of ballots. The challenge with that is you see examples where that equipment fails, and you've seen in Maricopa County, for example, I believe, was the county where you saw those machines go down, and then you ha-- don't have the ability to give ballots to anyone at all.

57. 0:31:31

    And that's equally, I would say, problematic. So in this world in which nothing is a panacea and there are trade-offs, I think that's the, that's the challenge that we're faced with. So call it a hundred to a hundred and ten. I don't have the exact number. Somebody gave it to me at some point in time. I just forgot. Um- But, but certainly if, as this goes through the process, we determine that we wanted to put Section 9 back in there, I think that that's a defensible policy position depart- despite what the agency might say.

58. 0:31:54

    Yeah, and one, one final question, Pharrell. Your enactment date for this, when are you expecting this-

59. 0:31:59

    This would be done to comply with Senate Bill 189. It would be en- en- enacted upon the governor's signature, and that would have us in the posture of having this for our November election this year. And there's... That's-- That to me is something that we need to seriously look at because as you know, Senator, we... And I know you, you went to the Senate floor and gave a speech and said, "Hey, we're the legislature, we can change it back," right?

60. 0:32:21

    That's right.

61. 0:32:21

    And we can. But if we change it back, we're changing back to voting on Dominion Software 5.5a, which has been confirmed by the Department of Homeland Security, by CISA, who sits in Department of Homeland Security, of having nine vulnerabilities to attackers. And those are just nine vulnerabilities that have been known and published on the internet for a couple of years now. There may be more that we don't know about. And I, I don't wanna see Georgians voting on a system that has been declared by a federal agency as being, as being insecure.

62. 0:32:52

    But to be clear, you want to change how we do elections totally and fully by November?

63. 0:32:58

    Yes, ma'am.

64. 0:33:00

    All right. Uh, Senator Mallow.

65. 0:33:04

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, to my good friend, the Chairman of Transportation, um, I had the first recount in the state of Georgia when I was in the May 19th primary or whatever that day was in 2020. Um, and I went to a runoff, and we-- my race at the time was the first hand recount in the state of Georgia. Um, I paid a lot to attorneys, and we, on both sides, picked the people we wanted to do the hand recount.

66. 0:33:34

    I won by 56. By 20, we certified by 19 because we lost one sheet of paper in this process of hand recounting. Uh, and the point of my question is, the votes would have been even more skewed if we weren't balancing back to the tabulation. And the reason I say that is the tabulator totaled the votes in a batch, and we counted to balance back to the batch that was tabulated. And when that number didn't match the tabulated total, we would go back and count again to ensure the accuracy.

67. 0:34:07

    Because the hand recount, when you hear Mallow, Westbrook, Westbrook, Mallow, and somebody's making a tally, right? And how they handled the ballots, um, if we didn't do that, I probably would have lost the race because fatigue and people hearing the same name over and over again. So my question would be, nothing in l- from line 276 to 284 talks about balancing the hand recount back to the tabulated totals. Um, and I just have concerns about that because the machine can count better than humans.

68. 0:34:38

    Uh, you and I both know that. Um, and so if there's no recourse to challenge a discrepancy between what a human has counted and what the machine, um, has counted at the same time, because minus-- you, you deal with the ballots the way they are today. Their QR code, boom, boom, boom. Um, and I see some of our folks in the audience shaking their heads. I actually went through this recount. I know this 'cause I lived it, okay? This is lived experience. That poses an issue as you're trying to balance a total, because you would say a person counting, which has fallacies and errors, is more accurate than a balanced total when you should be finding if there is a discrepancy and you've counted it three times, there is a discrepancy versus, "Well, we counted it and we agree there's a discrepancy, so we just made a discrepancy." You see where I'm going with that, Senator?

69. 0:35:23

    Um, can you speak to kind of that process with the hand recount? 'Cause there's not really one. In fact, the Secretary of State was down in Chatham County to observe us do that recount.

70. 0:35:32

    Yeah, I, I don't know that I followed 100% of that, to be fair. Um, I did-- I, I know in 2020 we obviously had the hand, the whole-- the hand count statewide, and I went to observe some of that personally, and it certainly is a process that is undeniably more involved than feeding the pieces of paper through a machine, right? I mean, I, I think that obviously we can-- a- a- anybody would agree with that. Um, I think that if th-- as this makes its way through the process, um, the-- this may be something that we wanna look at. Um, I know that the General Assembly had a policy that we put into our budget last year that rather than doing a hand recount, we actually in the last election ran that through essentially the ballot scan image analysis, where they captured the ballot images and, and analyzed that.

71. 0:36:16

    I know that there are advocates in the room that would tell you that they believe that recounts can be done quickly. They've demonstrated that. There's a, there's a hand recount roadshow that's making its way around the country, I believe, um, that was just here recently in Georgia. Um, and the-- I, I would leave it to the experts that have, that have lived that, similar to you, but maybe done it more than one time, um, as to what the best practices of that, of that may be. But I would think that to, to close the loop on your question, reconciling that against a known count, a- at least in terms of a raw count of the sheets of paper, I think would be of high value.

72. 0:36:53

    Thank you, Senator.

73. 0:36:54

    Yeah.

74. 0:36:54

    All right. All right. Any further questions? Um, I'm not seeing any, Mr. Chairman. Um, all right. Number six, Senator Orrock.

75. 0:37:08

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, I was-- W- we had testimony, uh, that the, the-- this approach to the coming elections, uh, is viewed as highly problematic by the people on the ground who run elections county by county by county. A- a- and the word chaos constantly, uh, recurs as tr- trying to, uh, run a May primary, then faced with May runoffs, and then by July 1st, with less than eight months until voting begins, uh, in the midterm elections, uh, they're asked to, uh- comply with the, I- I- I've lost count of how many changes there are in the bill as, as presented.

76. 0:38:01

    A- and that ... W- when I hear from people who've been doing this for years, not but ... You know, as a public service, frankly, as a public service. And my mother, uh, uh, worked the polls, um, um, in her prime years. Um, a- and I hear those folks who are on the ground running elections county after county after county, and they say, "This is not workable in this, in this timeframe." I mean, h- h- how can you ignore, uh, the, the, the, uh, that perspective when ...

77. 0:38:39

    that's shared by people who have been doing this, uh, longer than some of us have been alive almost? Uh, how, how can we turn a deaf ear to that and say, "Proceed with this bill as it's written. Um, uh, w- we really are dismissive of your, of, of, of your experience of, of, of running elections. Uh, and, uh, we, we don't, we just don't accept your, uh, your, your, the testimony that's on record here of, of, of the, that this is not going to be workable in that timeframe."

78. 0:39:13

    Senator, I think to be fair, you ... a- as you recall the testimony from the last committee meeting you were in, there was someone that sat in this chair and said that exact thing. But there was a gentleman who sat in this chair who is an election official who said the exact opposite. And so I think that what we can say is there is disagreement. And I ... by ... Uh, first, I'm not talking me, I'm talking another individual who's from a very large county, one of the top lar- five largest counties in the state that testified that he was in support of this bill. What I would tell you as well, Senator, is when I first read the CISA report, which I believe is all the way back in 2022, and discovered that some of the concerns that would, had previously been referred to as conspiracy theories in terms of the hackability of our machines was actually confirmed by CISA, we got on the phone with our election officials.

79. 0:40:04

    And we began to have conversations about the very first recommendation that's in that report. And that recommendation is pretty simple, Senator. It's to update the software. And do you know what we were told? Same, same kind of version of that, "Well, we can't do it during this year because it's an election year. We maybe can look at doing it next year." And then w- there was an exc- there was actually off-year elections, so there was elections then. And so here we are, four years later, the only state in the union running Dominion software 5.5a statewide.

80. 0:40:39

    And while I share and respect your concern about the individual who sat here and said, "This is gonna be hard to implement," I wish you had the same concern with us running software that the experts at CISA, these are also experts if we wanna, if we wanna do an appeal to authority. These are also experts who have said that this software is vulnerable. And they gave us one job initially, which was to update the software. Why haven't we done it? We haven't done it because we've heard excuses about how hard it is to update software.

81. 0:41:13

    Well, Senator, these are tablets. And you walk around with a mini tablet in your hand all day long. I do as well. And the process of updating the software on a tablet really isn't all that involved. But the problem is, is that doing it at scale is what has been expressed to be the, the difficulty. And it's unfortunate, um, that we are in this situation where we're having to choose between two scenarios, um, that, that probably admittedly both have downsides. Um, and so you're, you're choosing to side with, with one downside, and that's fair.

82. 0:41:46

    I'm choosing to side with the other downside, um, because I don't think we're ever gonna be at a point where people are gonna say, "You know what? This is really easy. Let's do a wholesale change to ballot on demand," and everybody's just gonna say it's simple. I think that you're gonna walk through difficulties during that process as well. But thank you for your question, Senator. I appreciate it.

83. 0:42:04

    All right. Number five, uh, Senator Jackson.

84. 0:42:07

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, just a, a question. I raised this on the floor earlier, and I'm still trying to figure out if this solves. We have people who, uh, are part of a Vote Safe program where because of, uh, um, experiences with violence or with stalking, their information is secured. We created a whole program in a bipartisan effort to maintain confidentiality. Um, so can you talk to me, this enumerated list of electors that has to be published-

85. 0:42:35

    Mm-hmm

86. 0:42:37

    ... would this therefore name the names of those people who are hel- who should be held confidential? Would that publish their names on a site that would be accessible to their, to their victimizer?

87. 0:42:49

    Senator, can you point me to the line? Uh, there's a couple different sections here we-

88. 0:42:51

    Yeah. So, so you have it in here a couple times. I'm looking specifically at line 135. So this is gonna be posted on the Secretary of State's website. "An enumerated list, an enumerated list of electors who cast ballots during such primary election or runoff."

89. 0:43:11

    Right. So that, that is just adding to the list of things that will be available. The, the denominator language you probably recognize right above that as being from Senate Bill 202. Um, that's something that, um, I was actually able to work with some people on getting that language in originally. The elector list is already available. So y- you may have, you may have access. We have something on our side, um, that, that we ... Uh, uh, it's the g- state GOP gives us access to it that lets us see voter information, 'cause that's all public record, right?

90. 0:43:41

    The fact that I voted and pulled a Republican primary ballot is public record. And this is just saying that that public record is going to be available in this timeframe, in the same timeframe that we make other things available. You've probably seen- Some of the conversation about voter rolls and people looking at voter rolls and, um, people being registered to vote in certain locations or people born a certain year being registered to vote, all that's being pulled from the public record. I cannot give you a 100% an- a certainty answer of whether those people are removed, the folks that you're speaking of, um, 'cause I don't know if they are or not, but let me ask some folks and get you that answer.

91. 0:44:17

    But what I would tell you is we're not creating a new, a new set of data here. This is data that is already available. It's just making it available by a date, so a time certain.

92. 0:44:26

    But you're also making it available via a website that's way more easy to access than the thing that you and I have on our phones made available to both parties, right?

93. 0:44:33

    Yeah, that's a, that's a valid point.

94. 0:44:35

    And so that, that is of grave concern to me, especially, you know, if this were just a general election where, you know, you have hundreds of thousands, but because it's being posted for something as simple, really it could be something as simple as a special election in a small district, um, that could really narrow down the geographical location for a person who, um, is a victim. So I just wanna make sure we, we get clear on that and continue to protect them.

95. 0:44:56

    Yeah, let's find the answer to that. I would just say that y- y- the distinction you're drawing that is correct is that you currently need to go get these da- these data files-

96. 0:45:05

    You gotta work at it

97. 0:45:05

    ... proactively, right?

98. 0:45:06

    Yeah.

99. 0:45:06

    Um, but that is data that is, that is currently publicly available. We're not making new data available. It, it is becoming more accessible here. Um, so that is, I just wanna clarify that distinction for those people who may not know that.

100. 0:45:16

     And then, then my final question is, are we having to buy new things to make this happen? I just, I'm not 100% clear here. Are we, do we have to buy new machines, buy anything new other than a whole bunch of paper? We're good about that.

101. 0:45:32

     We're about-

102. 0:45:33

     Reams and reams and reams of paper

103. 0:45:34

     ... we're gonna buy a lot of paper.

104. 0:45:35

     I need to go in the paper business. I need to be like your daddy, apparently.

105. 0:45:37

     Yeah.

106. 0:45:38

     But are we-

107. 0:45:39

     Yeah, he, uh-

108. 0:45:39

     Does this system-

109. 0:45:40

     I can promise you he didn't get rich, unfortunately, but, um-

110. 0:45:44

     Does this system require us to buy new things?

111. 0:45:49

     So certainly there's the, the, the printing process. I, there may need to be some additional scanners that may be purchased. You and I voted on the budget that gave us $15 million in our amended budget to kinda implement the, uh, Senate Bill 189, so there is some funding that is sitting out there for that. I've seen the House put a number out of $150 million, uh, that they may be looking to add, um, for election number looking forward. Um, but these people will vote, Senator, the same way that, um, we vote absentee by mail.

112. 0:46:17

     Mm.

113. 0:46:17

     Which is by filling out a piece of paper by hand, and so we would scan that, uh, in, in a similar manner. And there may need to be additional scanners that would be purchased perhaps, but the, the, the policy position moving forward continued to be that the state would be the, the entity that would make that purchase.

114. 0:46:33

     So what are we spending the $150 million on?

115. 0:46:36

     That was... No, no, that's not in this bill. That was when the-

116. 0:46:38

     Okay

117. 0:46:38

     ... when the House was kinda dealing with their... They've got a similar bill working over there. They've, that was a number that was thrown out as a quote in the newspaper. I cringed when I saw it, 'cause I don't think we need to be doing that. Um, but th- th- appropriating money is something that we're probably gonna have to do no matter what we do. It's just a question of how much it might be.

118. 0:46:54

     But your contention is that if we were to enact this bill as is, we do not need to go out and buy millions and millions of dollars of equipment to make this happen.

119. 0:47:02

     Um, uh, it may be millions. I don't think it's gonna be tens or hundreds of millions. We, we, uh, we appropriated $15 million in the amended budget to help implement this process.

120. 0:47:12

     Okay.

121. 0:47:12

     Or a, I should say a process. This process wasn't en- envisioned at that time.

122. 0:47:15

     Sure.

123. 0:47:17

     All right. Senator Orrock, do you have a question?

124. 0:47:19

     Thank you so much. I, I, I did have a second question, um, that, uh, uh, I, I didn't get to, uh, um-

125. 0:47:26

     Are you trying to figure out if you're a yes or a no, Senator?

126. 0:47:29

     No, I'm trying to-

127. 0:47:30

     I'm kidding with you

128. 0:47:31

     ... let the people of, good people of Georgia know what's happening. I'm, uh, uh, I'm hearing from across the state the concern. Uh, and I'm, and I'm hearing from people that run these elections in county after county, not just in, in my Fulton County. So, uh, the, the question of the money, uh, w- what's the burden on, on the counties? And, and, and w- what are they being charged to spend money on in order to comply, uh, w- with the changes that your bill would institute?

129. 0:48:04

     Senator, I think that we, there's an open question as to kinda how we make the paper purchase. I'd be fine looking at a budget appropriation for that. The bill is silent on that currently. Um, but as this makes its way through the process, I think that that's a conversation that we can have. I think that the reality, Sen- Senator, is that this bill is not gonna pass as it passes the Senate. So this is us, um, passing a bill to start the, start a process with the House, because we're sitting here on day, what day are we on? 37? And we passed a bill two years ago, um, that I, I think the bulk of us voted for, I don't really remember, um, to have us on a voting system that's not voting by QR code by this November's election.

130. 0:48:44

     And, and Senator, there's just, there's some of us that aren't willing to back off of that.

131. 0:48:48

     Well, I would say that, that the, the, the, the majority party has, has had a, a good, a good amount of time to get us to a different place than where we are right now. You know, a handful of days before sine die. And, and this pale male, "Well, we gotta do it now because we gotta do it now because we gotta do it now," and yet we h- we have, I would dare say, frittered away a l- a, a great deal of time, uh, that we didn't do it. And, and, and, and then this rush to, uh, cram through a, a, a bill, uh, i- i- in this amount of time, you know, not even w- w- w- without...

132. 0:49:27

     The negotiations with the House haven't begun, to my knowledge. They, and they ca- uh, and, and, uh, won't until a, a, a bill is passed. So, um-

133. 0:49:39

     Senator, this is my eighth year here, and I think for the first time we agree on half of something. Um, so I'm gonna celebrate that. I would, I would agree with you-

134. 0:49:46

     Well, uh, maybe I better be cautionary.

135. 0:49:48

     Look out.

136. 0:49:50

     Maybe that's what he's planning.

137. 0:49:50

     I would agree with you that something should've been done sooner, and it has not been for lack of trying. Um, Senator Burns is somewhere in the room. He's passed a number of pieces of legislation. He's been negotiating with the House. Um, but, but frankly, I'm not gonna blame the House For this, um, senator, we've been, we've been swimming uphill a- against the executive, uh, branch and the, and the gentleman who's in charge of the elections on this, and we haven't been able to get to an agreement there. So I would, I would not disagree with you that this should have been solved sooner. Um, I can tell you that for me, that the week the CISR report came out back in, I believe it was 2022, we...

138. 0:50:25

     I won't forget it 'cause I was on vacation in Mexico and I was on the phone talking about election equipment. Um, didn't wanna be doing it, but it was the right thing to do, and four years later we're still not quite at a solution yet. But, uh, hopefully this gets us a step closer.

139. 0:50:36

     But how do the, how does the counties, how do they come... You... Uh, we heard testimony that they're gonna have to change their training for the, for the poll workers. Um-

140. 0:50:46

     Well, senator, that's always gonna be true. I mean, whether we do it in 2028-

141. 0:50:49

     No, but they are already set up. They're training them now. And oops, here's... That was now the, the outdated information. Here's new information. And they're, and they're talking about what that costs and, and also how off-putting that is to people who have been doing it a certain way, know what to do. I mean, yeah, retraining is always, uh, essential and necessary, but the time to do that, the time to craft that training, bring the people in, test and retest, uh, is, is, uh, w- uh, we're, we're, we're, we're talking about timeframes and where the counties come up with the money.

142. 0:51:28

     You know, we... I, I, I don't think anybody would disagree that we gravely underfund our election process. You know, we, we do not, uh, uh, put the money into it that it deserves and merits, as important as this civic function is. And, uh, wh- where, where counties that are strapped are gonna come up with money is, is an, is, uh, uh, again, an unknown.

143. 0:51:54

     All right. Last question down here. Senator Mallow.

144. 0:51:58

     Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, Senator, just a, a follow-up question, um, to my colleague, uh-

145. 0:52:04

     Mm-hmm

146. 0:52:04

     ... Senator Whip Jackson. Um, I, I did have a question related to right now we have the QR code on ballots. Um, would those go away now with-

147. 0:52:16

     Yes. So this would move to a, a full handmark. Basically, the, the... I'll call it the Dominion machines, uh, the li- the company's changed. Um, but for the l- just for vernacular, uh, the current ballot marking devices, if you go in and vote in, in person, um, you touch a screen, it prints out a ballot. That ballot's got a QR code, and, um, this would go to a hand-marked paper ballot, and it would r- it would change that part of the process.

148. 0:52:41

     Absolutely. Um, and Senator, I just would, uh, lift up, um, the same, uh, security concern that my colleague listed up earlier. Um, as line 35 calls out, uh, enumerated list of voters, that enumerated would be a detailed list. And then there are several other sections preceding section nine in the bill that talks about the discrepancies, um, with totals and how totals should be tabulated and posted from even the precinct with the person's ballot information in there. Um, and if individuals do get a ballot and they are in that program, then by just sheer math, which I know you could follow this logic, if there was a discrepancy by one to two votes in a particular precinct and you had an idea where that person may live, you would absolutely be able to pinpoint a victim of domestic violence by sheer math, uh, just analyzing where you may think that person would be if there's not a way to further protect them.

149. 0:53:31

     But couldn't you do that now? He- help me understand why you couldn't do that now.

150. 0:53:34

     Well, now it would be extremely difficult because you're looking by QR code, and if these ballots were to be published, then that person's ballot would be listed among those that would be available if they were all scanned and available online. And if the totals don't match, then you have an enumerated list of all the electors. How do they get protected in the information sharing? You see what I'm, what I'm asking?

151. 0:53:56

     So is your contention that, that somebody would... Because they could see the scanned ballot image, they would know how somebody fil- maybe filled in the oval versus somebody else? 'Cause, 'cause right now if, if 101 people vote at the Midway precinct, uh, and that, and I go and pull and see that who voted in the election, I can see what their home precinct is. That's my home precinct. Uh, all that information is available currently. I don't know how the QR code change plays a role in that. Um, so I'm, I'm not following you on that. I, I think that you... Yeah, I'm, I'm just not sure that I'm tracking-

152. 0:54:27

     Well, when you scan all the ballots back online, my question is if all the ballots are available online and the enumerated list of all the electors is online, I don't even have to do the homework. I can take that, drop it in ChatGPT, and tell it to find all the instances where this particular characteristic may have occurred, if that is a person's name. Because you are gonna put a list of electors online and enumerated list, meaning it'll be detailed. Then if I go by a name or an alias, if that's how they're voting, then I could absolutely ChatGPT will tell me that was found on this day in this precinct, whatever. Um, but I just wanna make sure we can protect those vis- victims of domestic violence because if you publicly make all data available, and at the end of all bills we put and we repeal all conflicting laws, then we may repeal something through the enumeration of voters, and that's just my concern.

153. 0:55:12

     Yeah, I think that what you would see, you, you're gonna have a data file that has the, the ballot images available, which you have right now. Even, even in the, in the case of the hand-marked absentee ballots. You're g- You can go download those ballot files currently. You'll have a list of who voted, but there's nothing that necessarily ties that person to the actual ballot. In fact, constitutionally, we cannot have that. So if, if there's, if there's... If, if we can collectively brainstorm some ways to protect what you're concerned about, I certainly share, uh, represent- or Senator Jackson's, um, thesis that we should make sure those people are protected.

154. 0:55:47

     So if maybe we can brainstorm that.

155. 0:55:51

     One final question.

156. 0:55:52

     All right. Fi- final, final question, and we're gonna let everyone else-

157. 0:55:55

     Oh, oh, okay. I'm, I'm very stuck on this, these papers. Um, so I just got some, um, information in from DeKalb County. They have 432 permutations of ballots. 432 different permutations, and a ballot is more than one page long, right? So these ballots are gonna be lengthy. So you're talking about hundreds of thousands of pieces of paper.

158. 0:56:17

     I think the full face ballots are one page, but your, your point is taken

159. 0:56:21

     There's no... I mean, even if there's a question on there, you automatically, it's the question is written in such a way it's guaranteed to put you on two pages, right? Um, so, so my question though is, like, where is the process to ensure safe transition for all of these ballots? I mean, you are gonna have blank paper ballots just available sitting in the church's sanctuary, I guess, while they're waiting to be needed to use because we use churches for, you know, early voting locations. Like, they're, they're sitting some- So like how do we ensure...

160. 0:56:54

     I, I'm concerned that this is even greater security threat because you've got just random ballots just there printed. Hundreds of thousands of them because you have 432 permutations into Cap County.

161. 0:57:06

     So the reason we do this-

162. 0:57:06

     So just talk to me about that process-

163. 0:57:08

     Yeah

164. 0:57:08

     ... of, of security, making sure that you don't have literal ballot stuffing, right? This is an opportunity for ballot box stuffing when you've got this many pre-printed and a- available on site in somebody's sanctuary.

165. 0:57:20

     So I- that's why we have the language in 92 and nine- on lines 93 to get to the, the batched serialization, so that essentially we are tracking what ballots are legitimate ballots. And frankly, this was a problem going back to 2020. I mean, you want to talk about opportunities for ballot stuffing, we sent out 6.3 million absentee ballot request forms, um, around the state with a weakened, uh, signature match process done through the, um, the, the consent agreement, and we know that a number of those, tens of thousands of them were sent out of state, um, due to the first class stamp with the National Change of Address.

166. 0:57:55

     And so we... I, I think I shared with you the Gabriel Sterling story in committee last time, right? That's just one story of one guy that happened to figure out that someone voted illegally from his house or, or using his home address. So I would tell you there's a lot of things I'd like to do in the election process to, to beef up security, but the, the serialized ballot ident- batch identifiers here will essentially have batches of random numbers that will ensure as they are being tabulated that those were, those were ballots that were, that were in the, in the queue and in the system, if you will.

167. 0:58:25

     Um, and so you would, you would go through a process, and other states do this, where you essentially cross-reference that against known and approved serials. These might be serials that are 20 characters long, um, to maintain the, the secrecy of the ballot. But that, that's the intent of that language there. Now, if we're gonna argue the inverse, I wanna go back to my original policy position and say that we, we recognize... I, I know you have a position in favor of hand marked paper ballots, right? So unless you're going to ballot on demand printers, you're going to have this challenge. And the, and the general assembly, if we don't do it this year, is gonna have to answer the question of do we wanna, do we want to assign advanced voting locations to reduce those permutations, or do we wanna have the press scream about voter suppression for three weeks until they realize people, 90 plus percent of people vote at their home precinct anyway when they vote early, that we just are willing to bite the bullet on that.

168. 0:59:16

     I'd be fine biting the bullet on that personally, but there's 236 of us that need to come to an agreement on that.

169. 0:59:23

     And why don't we have just on-demand ballot printing devices? Those exist.

170. 0:59:27

     Yeah. So there's a procurement challenge, um, with those. Um, I, I think that-

171. 0:59:31

     What, what does that mean exactly, there's a procurement challenge?

172. 0:59:34

     Meaning there's, there's o- only a few vendors. If we wanna get that done by November and you go to an open bid process and that bid process gets challenged, then there's just not enough runway, not enough time to get that done in time. And I, and I would say the other, the other thing with the ballot demand, and I, and I support the concept of ballot on demand, um, you, you do wanna make sure that you don't have issues at your, at your precincts where you see the long lines and your, a precinct essentially gets shut down for, for failure of the m- the machines to work.

173. 1:00:04

     All right. Last question. Um, all right. Thank you all. Uh, at this time I'd entertain a motion for due pass.

174. 1:00:11

     Mr. Chairman.

175. 1:00:12

     Hold on, let me get you in the microphone here, Mr. Chairman.

176. 1:00:15

     Well, if it's appropriate time, I'd move for a due pass on HB 960, LC474277S.

177. 1:00:23

     All right. We've got a motion. Do I have a second?

178. 1:00:32

     I have a second.

179. 1:00:33

     Mr. Chairman.

180. 1:00:34

     I need a second.

181. 1:00:34

     Oh.

182. 1:00:35

     You need a second, I'm sorry. Okay. All right. Second, Senator Dolezal. All right. Um, all right. Any further discussion?

183. 1:00:45

     Mr. Chairman, amendment.

184. 1:00:47

     All right. All right.

185. 1:00:49

     Um, I, I think that the bill's author will see this as a friendly amendment, and certainly he can comment afterwards. Um, but I'm making a motion that we, uh, amend line 280,

186. 1:01:03

     where it says con- conduct, we strike conduct and replace it with the word initiate a manual recount. So the motion is on line 280 to strike the word conduct and insert initiate.

187. 1:01:22

     Second.

188. 1:01:24

     All right. Got a motion and a second on that friendly amendment. Um, unless you're finished. Okay.

189. 1:01:34

     No, I have additional amendments of-

190. 1:01:35

     All right. W- we'll vote on this one. Is it in a different section, different line?

191. 1:01:39

     Yes, a different line, sorry.

192. 1:01:40

     Okay. Well, so let's vote on this one. All those in favor of the friendly amendment, please raise your hand.

193. 1:01:48

     Um.

194. 1:01:49

     Unanimous.

195. 1:01:50

     Unanimous.

196. 1:01:50

     Okay.

197. 1:01:52

     I was looking for Senator Orrock's hand seeing she-

198. 1:01:55

     I'm not a fan of Orrock. Have him do an amendment to Orrock.

199. 1:02:00

     All right.

200. 1:02:00

     Oh, yeah.

201. 1:02:01

     All right. I recognize you for next amendment.

202. 1:02:05

     And then the next amendment may be, uh, might need a little more conversation. Uh, but I move that we strike 1,000 on line 32 and line 39 and replace it with 100. That is my motion.

203. 1:02:23

     Second.

204. 1:02:25

     All right, we got a motion and a second on the, the, uh, amendment. Any discussion on this amendment?

205. 1:02:31

     I've got a little just off the cuff, Mr. Chairman.

206. 1:02:33

     All right. Um, let's, number 15 is that you, Chairman.

207. 1:02:36

     I'm just wondering if we're getting Senator Jackson closer to a yes-

208. 1:02:39

     Yeah

209. 1:02:39

     ... with all these, with all these changes. Uh, Mr. Chairman, th- when this bill was, when we were originally envisioning this bill, um, $100 is where we started. And we wanted to make a statement, and so I'd be happy to move to $100 and, um, hope that my goodwill gesture-

210. 1:02:58

     ... uh, finds its way to a, a hand raise on a yes. But let's, let's ... I'll, I'll ... That was already, it was already seconded, I believe.

211. 1:03:04

     It was.

212. 1:03:05

     Yeah.

213. 1:03:06

     All right. Uh, number 13, S- Senator Mallow.

214. 1:03:09

     Absolutely. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to highlight after we had passed that, uh, voter challenge bill, there's a big issue down in Bryan County that it came, brought a list of like 1,000 people and challenged people's voter status. And that, I mean, it, it was all over the news. I got so many phone calls about that. So I think that would be helpful coming down off the, the number a little bit. Um, and I mean, you had everybody in Bryan County at that meeting, and there were 500 hot, and that was a big deal. So if I could avoid that and having to pay $100, we're not like the metro counties. You know, we got a little bit of money down in Savannah, but we'd have to tax the hell out of people to pay 1,000.

215. 1:03:43

     So thank you.

216. 1:03:45

     All right. I don't see any more-

217. 1:03:48

     Registration

218. 1:03:48

     ... discussion. Uh, let's vote on the second amendment. Uh, we got a motion and a second on it. Uh, all those in favor of the, uh, amendment to move from, uh, 1,000 to 100, please raise your hand. Another unanimous. All right. Good deal.

219. 1:04:04

     And then, Mr. Chairman, I have one final amendment. It will definitely, um, perhaps not be received-

220. 1:04:09

     Come on

221. 1:04:09

     ... in the same, uh, in the same vein.

222. 1:04:11

     Come on now, Senator.

223. 1:04:12

     I-

224. 1:04:12

     We're on a roll here

225. 1:04:13

     ... but I have here an amendment, um, from the representative actually, that I would like to at least enter into the record. It's an amendment that would strike the language, uh, that the senator, what's your district number?

226. 1:04:26

     27th.

227. 1:04:27

     Senator from the 27th offered, and, um, replace it with the existing language. So it's HB 960 as it was originally introduced. I have that amendment. I know how my friends are gonna feel about it, um, but I still need to do my duty to rep- I used to represent Gwinnett County actually for a long time. And so I am offering a motion that we amend back to the original version. The LC number is there, uh, and you can see that.

228. 1:04:54

     All right.

229. 1:04:55

     Second.

230. 1:04:56

     We have a motion- ... and a second. Uh- Substitute. Yeah. Yeah. All right, everybody, uh, does anybody want to look at this? Everybody knows what we've got going on, right?

231. 1:05:09

     The thing that passed out of Judiciary last night.

232. 1:05:11

     The thing that passed out of Judiciary last night.

233. 1:05:13

     Yeah.

234. 1:05:14

     Just for everybody's clarification, passed out of Judiciary last night. So, um, we got a motion and a second on amendment AM470197. Um, all those in favor, uh, raise your hand.

235. 1:05:29

     I'm for it but I'm not going to lie for it.

236. 1:05:32

     One, two, three, four in favor of the amendment. All those opposed to the amendment, please raise your hands. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight opposed. Uh, the amendment fails. So did you have, Mr. Leader?

237. 1:05:48

     Just quick point of order, Mr. Chairman. Does that mean that language for, from Gwinnett County when it hits the floor is gonna probably lose?

238. 1:05:57

     Could be. I can't answer that, Mr. Leader. Um, all right. Do you have ... Recognize you.

239. 1:06:06

     Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to be recognized to make a motion. I, I'd like to be recognized to make a motion that on, uh, uh, li- on lines 288 and 289, uh, restore, uh, uh, strike the language that's been added, that strike, "Shall be responsible for overseeing the administration of this code section by election superintendents," and, uh, and return ... and, and, and then on line 293, strike the lines that, uh, I mean, r- r- uh, that say the Secretary of State shall have no role in conducting, overseeing, or administering the provisions of this code section unless requested by the State Election Board.

240. 1:06:47

     I, I will maintain to you we have an agency in support of ... Speaking of, that's my motion.

241. 1:06:52

     Second.

242. 1:06:53

     All right.

243. 1:06:54

     And, and, and, and sp- and just to-

244. 1:06:58

     It's, it's, yes, it's a motion to amend.

245. 1:07:01

     That's all.

246. 1:07:01

     Uh, we got a motion to amend and a second. Um-

247. 1:07:05

     And if I could, uh, on discussion, uh, if that's fine.

248. 1:07:09

     Yes, we're in discussion now.

249. 1:07:10

     Right. Thank you. Um, the, the, the purpose of this is that we have an entire election section. We have a secretary of state elected statewide by the voters of this state to conduct elections, being a, a very central and primary, uh, role, uh, of that constitutional office, officer. And what we've done here, uh, the, uh, if, i- i- if, if we fail to s- to, to strike this, uh, language as, as my amendment would do, uh, a state election board, not staffed, highly partisan, uh, and without, without the budget or the expertise to conduct and oversee and administer, uh, this code section, uh, it, it, it, it, uh ...

250. 1:08:03

     This just, uh, calls out for our attention to restore to our constitutional officer, the secretary of state, and the agency that he, over which he presides, to assume their proper role in overseeing elections.

251. 1:08:16

     All right. Thank you. We got more discussion down here Ch- Chairman Burns?

252. 1:08:20

     Uh, no. Uh, I'm, I'm fine.

253. 1:08:22

     Okay.

254. 1:08:22

     Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

255. 1:08:22

     Mr.-

256. 1:08:23

     I, I would say at the appropriate time, I'm ready to call the question.

257. 1:08:25

     Okay.

258. 1:08:26

     Underline bill.

259. 1:08:27

     Mr. Leader, did you have something?

260. 1:08:29

     Yeah, I, I just, I mean, 'cause I think we've heard this a couple times about not holding politicians accountable. I mean, I think the majority party's been very clear about not being afraid to hold even people in our own party accountable. I wish my friend from Atlanta would hold her senators accountable so we could access Hartsfield Airport and the lines that we're having to deal with.

261. 1:08:51

     Oh.

262. 1:08:51

     Oh, I knew I'd get a reaction out of that one. But, um, but just point of clarification, Mr. Chairman, um, if we remember back in 2023, I mean, I think the legislature, because of the software that wasn't updated, I think we, we asked Secretary Raffensperger to bring to appropriations, I think Senator Burns was sitting in front of me when we went through this series of Q&A, um, to bring a budget, an official budget, um, for his agency related to cybersecurity.

263. 1:09:21

     It wasn't 'til later he brought an informal cost estimate as to what happened or what the cost should be to address, um, these issues back in 2023. And I do wanna remind, as a also point of order, Mr. Chairman, that, um, I mean, it was President Biden's CISA that in 2023, um, cited, including many major private sector cybersecurity companies, the shift related to hacking, influence of information, social media manipulation, and other aspects of American infrastructure related to cyber threats from foreign adversaries, um, on American elections.

264. 1:10:02

     So, um, just for the fact that, you know, Secretary Raffensperger runs an agency and he's a Republican, doesn't mean that we don't sit here and hold him accountable, especially when we have assets and American infrastructure under constant attack, um, that as we've seen even from countries, um, like Iran and China and others that are active. That's not conspiracy theory. That is from our US Federal Government, from President Biden and also, uh, President Trump. Seems very bipartisan to me, so I just wanna make sure that's clear when we talk about cybersecurity, um, in this committee and what's goin' on.

265. 1:10:39

     And yes, please fix the airport lines.

266. 1:10:42

     All right. Uh, number five, but-

267. 1:10:44

     Yeah

268. 1:10:44

     ... didn't know the question's been called here, so.

269. 1:10:47

     Yeah. I, I understand. I just wanna be clear, this is not accountability for the secretary of state. You're literally relieving them of their duty.

270. 1:10:54

     That's right. And this is-

271. 1:10:55

     And I'm not even clear that this is constitutional, that we can remove the role and responsibilities of the secretary of state.

272. 1:11:02

     Constitutional officer.

273. 1:11:03

     It's a constitutional officer who has certain responsibilities by the Constitution. I'm not clear this is constitutional. I certainly don't know that we can do this without a two-thirds vote. And so I think that it's prudent for us to strike the language that takes his powers away from the state, um, secretary of state, so that we don't end up in litigation for years, um, talking about why this was not proper and good in the first place.

274. 1:11:26

     All right. We, we got a question here. Let's, let's vote on this bill, um, 'cause, 'cause the question-

275. 1:11:33

     There's an amendment.

276. 1:11:33

     Yeah, the, the amendment.

277. 1:11:34

     The amendment is on the floor.

278. 1:11:35

     Uh, okay. We, I thought we already voted on the amendment.

279. 1:11:38

     Oh, no, we haven't. We, we-

280. 1:11:40

     Oh, your, your amendment. I'm, I'm sorry. Y'all are working me to death here.

281. 1:11:43

     I know. Well, I'd like to just-

282. 1:11:44

     All right, all those, uh-

283. 1:11:46

     Is the state election board gonna do cybersecurity now? Is that, is that the

284. 1:11:51

     I- Yes, sir. Huh? Okay.

285. 1:11:57

     Oh.

286. 1:11:57

     Let's, let's vote on the amendment. Um, turn all these mics off. Uh, all those in favor of the Orrock amendment, uh, please raise your hand. Four in favor. All those opposed to the Orrock amendment.

287. 1:12:13

     And number one down. This one's nine.

288. 1:12:17

     Eight.

289. 1:12:18

     Sorry.

290. 1:12:19

     All right. So that, uh, amendment fails. All right. Now we're back to the original bill, uh, as amended by, uh, the Jackson, two Jackson amendments, uh, on, uh, LC474277S. All those in favor, please raise your hands. This is the bill. In favor of the bill. One,

291. 1:12:46

     two... Eight in favor. Uh, all those opposed. One, two, three, four opposed. All right. Um, Mr. Chairman, you have a bill. Before everybody leaves, real quick, um, just to give me a moment, I, I wanna thank, uh, my admin, Annalisa, and my intern. Uh, I hope and pray this is our last ethics meeting. Um, so I wanna thank all of y'all as the committee members. We've had a lot of long meetings, um, and y'all have done a great job, so thank you for hanging in there with me. And, and thank all of y'all for, for being here as well.

292. 1:13:18

     And I have some special guests here. I do wanna recognize my wife and my daughter, uh, Lily, are here. So thank y'all.

293. 1:13:29

     And I hope everybody has a good night, and, uh, we are adjourned.