ATLANTA — More than half of Georgia's registered voters have already cast a ballot -- busting early voting records to numbers seldom seen in the Peach State.
With more than 4 million votes ready to be counted, people online were wondering if Georgia election workers started early. Here's a look at when people can start seeing results on Election Night.
THE QUESTION
Does Georgia count votes before Election Day?
SOURCES
- Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger
- SB 189
- Georgia election code
THE ANSWER
No, Georgia doesn't count votes before Election Day because of state law.
WHAT WE FOUND
Georgia's Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has addressed this several times in news conference updates leading up to Election Day. In his 10:30 a.m. update, he outlined why people could see an influx of results just after 8 p.m.
"We will have, with SB 189, all of this early voting, so that's over 4 million ballots cast early and the absentees that were accepted - all of that will have to be uploaded and reported no later than one hour after the polls close," he said in his morning update.
Georgia's SB 189 outlines several deadlines that the Secretary of State touched on.
The law requires all votes cast during the early voting period and absentee ballots be tabulated by 8 p.m. on Election Day. However, counting is legally not allowed to start before 7 a.m., the time polls open.
Georgia election code serves as a guide for election workers who make sure ballots were filled out correctly. If they were, and absentee ballots were accepted, they were then prepped to be counted on Election Night. It's all to make the vote-counting process more efficient.
For those watching for results, expect to see a data dump just after 8 p.m. People can keep an eye on the results at 11alive.com/election.