BIBB COUNTY, Ga. — Tuesday marked the first day of early voting in Georgia. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger kicked off early voting by reassuring Georgians in his message.
"We're gonna make sure that we have safe, secure, accurate elections and we've been working on that," he said.
Along with ramping up election security, he says his time modeled the poll check-in experience similar to Chick-Fil-A's customer service strategy.
"We also think that voting should be fun, so lines have to be shorter than one hour. We think that's important," he said.
Going back to the primaries, he said election equipment was checked in all 159 counties, adding his office will conduct additional audits during the process and afterward to ensure accurate results.
"The counties checked 100% of their equipment also with logic and accuracy testing; every piece is checked before it goes out that it's accurate, recording everything," he said.
Raffensperger said he's aware of threats but is confident there will be no disruptions to the election process.
"We do work with citizen national organizations that have capabilities far beyond what people have at the state level," Raffensperger said. "So we understand that there are threat vectors out there and we're looking at that, but you have a human readable text that's on official paper ballot that has a watermark seal on it."
He says the seal signifies the ballot as state property. As a reminder, he says voters will cast their votes on the machine which will print their choices, then they'll be able to check the accuracy of their ballot before it enters the scanner. So while he's not worried about cyber-fraud, he encourages everyone to get out and cast their vote early.
"It helps the counties; they'll just have fewer voters to have to worry about and move them through on that election day," he said.
If you're planning on voting now, you can visit any early polling site in your county. If you're unsure on the status of your voter registration, Raffensperger says you can enter your information into Georgia's my voter page online, or call your county election office.