Georgia Democrats complain of voting problems

ATLANTA (AP) Georgia Democrats and civil rights activists complained of voting problems Tuesday, and blamed the state's top elections official, Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp. <br /> <br /> The DeKalb County elections office was crowded with people whose names weren't on the list of eligible voters even though they've been registered for past elections. Some were told they were ineligible because they didn't update their voter registrations to match their driver's license. Others said they had tried to match these documents, but their applications weren't processed in time. <br /> <br /> Many were given provisional ballots, which often aren't counted unless races are very close, and even then the burden is on citizens to prove that they are or should be legally registered, or their vote won't be counted at all. <br /> <br /> Democratic Rep. Stacey Abrams of Atlanta had gone to court complaining that 50,000 voters still weren't on the eligible list by the end of October, but a state judge declined to intervene, saying the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and the New Georgia Project had failed to prove that Kemp's office had done anything wrong. <br /> <br /> Diamond Walton, an 18-year-old college student, had been living in Fayette County and changed her address so she could vote closer to Columbus State University. She called these groups for help after being told to cast a provisional ballot because she wasn't on the eligible list. Only when she produced confirmation of her registration did officials find her name on an alternate list, she said. <br /> <br /> ``It was pretty overwhelming and a little discouraging because I thought my vote wouldn't even matter,'' Walton said late Tuesday afternoon. <br /> <br /> Kemp has said that forms from every eligible voter were processed, but Abrams said Walton was a clear example of voter suppression efforts. Kemp's office didn't respond to repeated requests Tuesday by The Associated Press to comment on the allegations. <br /> <br /> ``A registered voter changing her address required a team of national lawyers to be able to vote,'' Abrams said. ``That should not be happening in the 21st century in Georgia.'' Calls to the Secretary of State's office Tuesday night weren't immediately returned. <br /> <br /> Meanwhile, the voter information website Kemp's office runs was so plagued with technical problems Tuesday that people trying to learn their polling places got an error message between 7:30 and 10:30 a.m. <br /> <br /> Some voters had to use paper ballots because electronic voting machines were incorrectly programmed to feature the wrong candidates, or because the local officials forgot to bring electronic voting cards, DeKalb County Elections Director Maxine Daniels told WSB-TV.