Stacey Abrams told a congressional panel that Georgia's 2018 election was wracked with "incompetence and malfeasance." Abrams lost the November governor election to Brian Kemp, and said the election was rife with voter suppression.
The congressional hearing was held at Atlanta's Carter Center Tuesday. Abrams was the star witness in a hearing dominated by Democrats, who have recently re-gained control of the US House of Representatives.
"Senator Abrams oh – Governor Abrams?" joked U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Georgia) of Lithonia, who was part of the panel, along with Reps. Sanford Bishop and John Lewis.
The former candidate for governor delivered a list of issues she says plagued the 2018 election -- and mostly blamed then-Secretary of State and now Governor Brian Kemp.
"From issues with registration, to ballot access, to the counting of votes," Abrams said, "the behavior that was evidenced over the course of a decade by the then-Secretary of State demonstrated a deep disregard for the voting rights of all Georgia citizens."
Abrams has pivoted from Georgia candidate to national figure, having recently given the Democrats' response to President Trump's State of the Union address.
"Incompetence and malfeasance operate in tandem, and the sheer complexity of the state’s voting apparatus smooths voter suppression into a nearly seamless system that targets voter registration, ballot access and the ballot counting," Abrams told the panel.
Republicans were conspicuously absent from the hearing. The state Republican party tweeted the hearing was “yet another example of Washington Democrats using taxpayer money to prop up failed candidate Stacey Abrams and her false narrative.”
The chairwoman of the panel, U.S. Rep. Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio), said the one-sided hearing was nonetheless "absolutely (fair), no question about it." She said Republican members, who declined to attend, had the opportunity to invite Republican witnesses to speak.
Fudge said he expects new federal legislation on voter access to go through Congress before the 2020 election. And she said she expects Republicans to support it, though no Republicans were in attendance to verify that.