MSNBC’s Joy Reid spread some fake news on the Tuesday edition of The ReidOut when she claimed that Georgia is preventing people from voting early in the state’s Senate runoff because state law requires that Robert E. Lee’s birthday be celebrated. In the real world, the holiday being observed is Thanksgiving.
Coming out of commercial break, Reid played a clip of Sen. Raphael Warnock decrying the move not to have early voting the Saturday after Thanksgiving, "We should be striving to give the people of Georgia fair access to the ballot box. We just saw an election in November where the people of Georgia made it clear that they want to use Saturday voting. Hundreds of thousands of voters, Georgia voters voted on Saturday. They have demonstrated what they want. And there's nothing in the law as it is currently written to prevent it."
Responding to that video, Reid declared, “As the Georgia Senate runoff campaign kicks into high gear, Senator Raphael Warnock announced he's filing a lawsuit to allow Georgians to vote early on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.”
That acknowledgement of Thanksgiving’s existence should have been the end of this faux controversy, but Reid continued, “Because of a law Republicans passed in 2016, it is currently illegal in Georgia to have early voting on any day that immediately follows a state holiday. And Friday, November 25th, is technically a state holiday. Celebrating the birthday of none other than Confederate general and literal traitor, Robert E. Lee.”
The law actually states two days from a holiday and Saturday is two days after Thanksgiving as COO in the Office of the Georgia Secretary of State Gabriel Sterling explained to David Axelrod on Twitter:
“Voting rights” champion Stacey Abrams also voted for the law that Reid is now deploring as some form of Confederate nostalgia.
Continuing with high levels of absurdity, Reid claimed, “That one day of voting is even more essential after the Republicans’ Jim Crow 2.0 law passed last year, cutting the state's runoff calendar in half. It used to be nine weeks, now it's down to four.”
Why do Georgians need nine weeks or 35 additional days to vote when they are, by now, very familiar with the candidates? Why is MSNBC spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories about elections?
This segment was sponsored by Chase.
Here is a transcript for the September 15 show:
MSNBC The ReidOut
11/15/2022
7:33 PM ET
RAPHAEL WARNOCK: We should be striving to give the people of Georgia fair access to the ballot box. We just saw an election in November where the people of Georgia made it clear that they want to use Saturday voting. Hundreds of thousands of voters, Georgia voters voted on Saturday. They have demonstrated what they want. And there's nothing in the law as it is currently written to prevent it.
JOY REID: As the Georgia Senate runoff campaign kicks into high gear, Senator Raphael Warnock announced he's filing a lawsuit to allow Georgians to vote early on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Because of a law Republicans passed in 2016, it is currently illegal in Georgia to have early voting on any day that immediately follows a state holiday. And Friday, November 25th, is technically a state holiday. Celebrating the birthday of none other than Confederate general and literal traitor, Robert E. Lee
That one day of voting is even more essential after the Republicans’ Jim Crow 2.0 law passed last year, cutting the state's runoff calendar in half. It used to be nine weeks, now it's down to four.
