On Thursday, March 25, the Georgia Senate passed the House version of SB 202, and shortly afterwards, Governor Brian Kemp signed it.

Here is a news story about the bill, which changes many election laws.

Although the bill has no changes to ballot access law, it will affect ballot access indirectly. The Georgia Libertarian Party has been suing the state over the ballot access restrictions for U.S. House, ever since 2017. The case is still in U.S. District Court, and is fully briefed. Cowen v Rafensperger, n.d., 1:17cv-4660. The state’s chief argument for its restrictions is that if minor parties and independent candidates can get on the November ballot for U.S. House, that will increase the number of U.S. House races which need a runoff. In Georgia, if no one gets 50% of the vote, there must be a runoff. Obviously when the state only permits two candidates on the ballot (which is the case), there is no need for a runoff, except in the extremely unlikely possibility of a strong write-in candidate.

The state says it is very undesirable to hold a runoff for Congress, because runoffs can’t be held until January of the year after the election, so a Georgia member of congress elected in a runoff doesn’t even get to Congress until after that session of Congress has started. But SB 202 changes the runoff schedule. The new law says runoffs will be only four weeks after the November election, not nine weeks. This compressed schedule is achieved by using ranked choice voting for overseas absentee ballots. So now, the state’s main argument for the ballot access restrictions is eliminated.