The ACLU of Georgia's 2024 LEADers at last year's Annual Membership Meeting.
Following a productive legislative session, our voter access work continues, and we’re asking folks from Dade to Ware counties to step up for democracy. Georgians, take note: you can make a big difference by joining the ACLU of Georgia’s Local Election Advocates and Defenders (LEAD) program.
LEADers are positioned across the state to help us keep a watchful eye on local election offices, which make important and impactful decisions that govern your constitutional right to vote.
The White House continues to carry out dangerous and unnecessary attacks on voting rights that could block millions of eligible citizens from voting. So it’s more important than ever to bolster our program and empower volunteers to work at the local level and hold officials accountable to Georgia voters.
In 2025, our voting experts and their team of volunteers influenced voting rights legislation down at the capitol, applauded the creation of a study committee on ERIC and voting technology, and built valuable relationships with lawmakers. Recently, the team held two virtual panels featuring election leaders.
The officials discussed the impact of recent legislative changes, such as SB 202 and SB 189, on election administration, including increased costs and administrative burdens. They also noted challenges like voter turnout, accessibility, and misinformation.
Travis Doss, Executive Director for the Richmond County Board of Elections and President of the Georgia Association of Voter Registration and Election Officials (GAVREO), told our LEADers, “Those bills prompted big changes and kind of created a trend for omnibus bills to emerge every session. We’ll be looking for the two omnibus bills introduced this session (HB 397 and SB 175) to come up again in 2026, each having some good things and some bad … It’s the ebb and flow of being an elections administrator. We know there are things we’ll have to change and get done, and that’s the way it works.”
Another meeting featured a panel discussion with boards of election members from various counties — Athens-Clarke, Gwinnette, Cobb, and Forsyth. Setting local elections policies was a major topic of discussion, as were the headaches caused by mass voter challenges.
“The state has made it very, very easy for citizens to bring mass challenges to their boards. Sometimes we’ll get thousands of voter challenges at one time. That took up a lot of our time last year,” said Stacy Efrat, secretary for the Cobb County Board of Elections and Registration.
Our volunteers said they learned a lot from the meetings. Katherine Gauntt, who works out of DeKalb County, noted her biggest takeaway was that “each county is making a herculean effort to adhere to the ever-changing legislative mandates while ensuring the voter's experience is accessible, organized, auditable, and legal.”
Currently, the members of LEAD are helping track study committees and continue to monitor Board of Elections legislation. We continue to host monthly meetings with LEADers to discuss various election-related topics and often invite board members or election directors to serve as experts on these topics. Want to lend a hand? Apply to be a LEADer here!
