Georgia Lawmakers Adjourn Without Voting Reform Bill

The Georgia General Assembly adjourned its annual session early Friday morning without passing legislation to resolve a looming conflict in the state's voting system, leaving election officials facing uncertainty ahead of the November 2026 midterm elections.

Lawmakers had considered Senate Bill 214, which passed the House on Thursday night with bipartisan support but received no vote in the Senate before the session ended. The measure would have required Georgia to adopt a new voting process without QR codes by the 2028 presidential primary, while allowing current Dominion Voting Systems machines to remain in use for the 2026 elections. It proposed on-demand printing of ballots and hand-marked paper options as a presumptive model, though not mandatory, and would have adjusted the automatic recount threshold from 0.5 percent to 1 percent of votes, effective July 1. The bill also aimed to shift authority for optical character recognition audits from the Secretary of State to the State Election Board.

The impasse stems from Senate Bill 189, enacted in 2024, which prohibits QR codes on ballots starting July 1, 2025. Georgia's current machines produce ballots with QR codes that...