Ga. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger visits Columbia County Sheriff’s Office

APPLING, Ga. (WJBF) – Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger made a stop at the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday.

Raffensperger’s office is increasing teamwork and strengthening security measures ahead of the November election.

“We’ve been doing these regional tabletop exercises, it’s really about election security,” Raffensperger said. “So we’ve been doing cyber security, physical security and just making sure everyone understands that Georgia will have a safe, secure, accurate election come November.”

Local election officials and law enforcement were given scenarios and had to work together to come up with a plan.

One scenario was an elevated threat alert for elections offices around Georgia.

“We get so immersed with what’s going on with elections, and we need to make sure that we keep that communication because just because it’s all a part of our world, we need to make sure its all a part of everyone else’s and we work closely with law enforcement as well,” said Travis Doss, the Richmond County Board of Elections Assistant Director.

“I think our voters in Columbia County, especially our poll workers, they enjoy having a deputy,” said Nancy Gay, the Columbia County Board of Elections Director. “We have a deputy everyday at our precinct and it brings a little sense of comfort and peace knowing that they’re there.”

Raffensperger also provided election system upgrades and changes.

“No matter how you vote this year, it’ll be supported by photo ID. So if you vote absentee, photo ID. In person early, photo ID, or election day, same thing,” he said. “All the early voting you do before election day, that’ll all be reported by 8 p.m. election night and we really think that’ll give voters confidence.”

His office is assuring all voters are U.S. citizens.

“About 18 months ago we did an audit of our voter rolls, and about 1,632 people that attempted to register, but they couldn’t verify citizenship. We’re now finishing up our second audit, and we’ll be able to report those results in a couple weeks just to give voters confidence that only American citizens are voting in our voting rolls,” Raffensperger said.

Raffensperger also headed to Greene County and Morgan County on Wednesday. The presidential election is on November 5th.

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