Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger calls for end to runoff elections

Dec. 14 (UPI) -- Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger Wednesday urged the state General Assembly to end election runoffs in the state.

"Georgia is one of the only states in the country with a General Election Runoff," said Raffensperger in a statement. "We're also one of the only states that always seems to have a runoff. I'm calling on the General Assembly to visit the topic of the General Election Runoff and consider reforms."

Raffensperger said no one wants to deal with politics in the middle of their family holiday. He said runoffs are even tougher for counties that had "a difficult time completing all of their deadlines, an election audit and executing a runoff in a four-week time period."

Georgia's General Assembly convenes in January. Raffensperger said they could select from a wide range of options to address runoffs to help further the goal of safe, secure and efficient elections.

Georgia's 2022 midterms broke previous turnout records.

Raffensperger was among election officials in three states to be subpoenaed Tuesday by Justice Department Special Counsel Jack Smith to provide documents related to former President Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

Raffensperger recorded a phone call in January 2021 from Trump as the former president urged the Georgia Sec. of State to "find" 11,780 votes for him to overturn the 2020 election result in Georgia.