Almost 8,000 new voters have now been added to Georgia’s 6th District

Chamblee: (left to right) Gary Peeler and Roberta Goldbaugh prepare to vote early in the Georgia 6th District runoff as poll workers Nancy Love and Esther Wilder check their papers at the North DeKalb Senior Community Center in Chamblee on Tuesday May 30, 2017. Early in-person voting got underway Tuesday in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District, kicking off the official countdown to the June 20 runoff between Republican Karen Handel and Democrat Jon Ossoff. JOHN SPINK/JSPINK@AJC.COM.

Credit: John Spink

Credit: John Spink

Chamblee: (left to right) Gary Peeler and Roberta Goldbaugh prepare to vote early in the Georgia 6th District runoff as poll workers Nancy Love and Esther Wilder check their papers at the North DeKalb Senior Community Center in Chamblee on Tuesday May 30, 2017. Early in-person voting got underway Tuesday in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District, kicking off the official countdown to the June 20 runoff between Republican Karen Handel and Democrat Jon Ossoff. JOHN SPINK/JSPINK@AJC.COM.

Nearly 8,000 voters have now been added to voting rolls in Georgia's 6th Congressional District ahead of the hotly contested June 20 runoff between Republican Karen Handel and Democrat Jon Ossoff.

The total includes two types of voter: the newly registered, plus so-called "transfer" applications — already registered Georgia voters who moved into the district after March 20, when the registration period originally closed.

It comes after a federal judge earlier this month extended voter registration in the district through May 21, part of an ongoing lawsuit over how Georgia handles voter registration ahead of federal runoff elections.

As a result, according to the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office, 7,942 people as of Tuesday afternoon had newly registered or transferred into the 6th District following the reopening of voter registration.

The 6th District already boasts more than 521,000 registered voters. The impact of several thousand more is unclear, but it has the potential to swing a race that polling suggests is separated by only a few percentage points and within the margin of error for either candidate.

Early voting ahead of the runoff began Tuesday and will run through June 16.