Georgia announces signature matching review for presidential election ballots

After three recounts, Georgia certified the 2020 presidential election.

But on Thursday, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced a statewide move to match signatures to their absentee ballots in all 159 counties in the state. 

The announcement comes just weeks before two Georgia Senate runoff elections on Jan. 5 will determine which party controls the Senate.

Raffensperger announced that the signature matching will be done in partnership with the University of Georgia. The study will review a random sample of signatures for mail-in ballots that were cast in the presidential election.

"We are confident that elections in Georgia are secure, reliable and effective,” Raffensperger said.

“Despite endless lawsuits and wild allegations from Washington, D.C., pundits, we have seen no actual evidence of widespread voter fraud, though we are investigating all credible reports. Nonetheless, we look forward to working with the University of Georgia on this signature match review to further instill confidence in Georgia’s voting systems,” he also said.

Earlier this week, Georgia officials announced an audit of signatures for mail-in ballots in Cobb County, a suburb of Atlanta.

The Trump campaign claimed that Cobb County did not properly conduct signature match in June,” said Jordan Fuchs, Georgia’s deputy secretary of state. “After the countywide audit, we will look at the entire state. We will look at the entire election to make sure signature match was executed properly.”

After the third and final recount, Biden won Georgia by 11,779 votes, or .2%.