Georgia officials react to Trump’s address on election security

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) — Georgia officials and lawmakers are digesting a primetime address from President Donald Trump on Thursday, during which he made claims of unsafe election machines, noncitizen voting, and deep state cover ups all primarily tied to the country’s 2020 election.

The White House followed up Trump’s address with a large upload of documents purporting to show evidence of the president’s claims. The included reports from the nation’s national intelligence agencies on the topics the president touched on, but at times contradicted his sentiments.

Georgia officials were quick to respond.

Republican Congressman Mike Collins, who received Trump’s endorsement in his race against incumbent Georgia Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff, defended the president’s willingness to keep a watchful eye on the nation’s election systems.

“Our right to free and secure elections should be protected relentlessly, and every American should be alarmed by our enemies’ ability to disrupt our elections and jeopardize our right to vote,” Collins said in an online post. “There is no time more important than now to pass the SAVE America Act and safeguard democracy.”

Trump, at the end of his address, urged Congress to pass his “Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements” or SAVE Act, which would require proof of citizenship to cast a vote in the U.S. So far, it has stalled in the Senate.

“If you look at voting today it’s in such bad shape in so many states and we are committing to fix it,” said Trump. “Addressing this crisis of election security demands that congress must pass the SAVE America Act. How easy is that to do? Unless you want to cheat.”

Georgia’s Democratic lawmakers also were skeptical at best about Trump’s claims.

“The president is rehashing his demented fantasies about an election being stolen in 2020 as a pretext for interfering in the election in 2026,” said Sen. Raphael Warnock.

Gabriel Sterling was the COO at the Georgia Secretary of State office in 2020. He agreed with Trump that election security is extremely important, but said the president made claims he couldn’t back up.

“When it was done it was essentially, is that it” said Sterling of the president’s address. “He talked about how the vulnerabilities could be exploited. Well the vulnerabilities of any system could be exploited and every system has vulnerabilities. That’s why you have people, processes, rules and laws and training around it so that they won’t be exploited.”

But the real world effects of Trump’s address took shape Friday. In his own separate address, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said state’s that don’t conform to the White House’s plan for enhanced election security could risk losing funding and grant dollars.

“Meaning that if these states want grants and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they’re going to have to implement security,” he said. “We’re not trying to get into anything else, but we’re saying that the machines had to be secured.”