Politics

Over 6,000 Georgia Dems cast blank ballots in apparent slap at Biden on Israel

About 2.2% of Democratic primary voters turn in blank ballots
“I secured my vote” stickers are displayed as polls open during the Georgia presidential primary elections at the Joan P. Garner Library in Atlanta on Tuesday, March 12, 2024. Miguel Martinez /miguel.martinezjimenez@ajc.com
“I secured my vote” stickers are displayed as polls open during the Georgia presidential primary elections at the Joan P. Garner Library in Atlanta on Tuesday, March 12, 2024. Miguel Martinez /miguel.martinezjimenez@ajc.com
By Mark Niesse and
March 14, 2024

Over 6,000 Georgia voters left their ballots blank in Georgia’s Democratic presidential primary, an organized effort to send a warning to President Joe Biden over his support of Israel’s war against Hamas.

The “Leave it Blank” effort, which amounted to about 2.2% of all Democratic ballots cast Tuesday, is the latest warning from primary voters that they could withhold their votes for Biden in the November election against Republican Donald Trump. It is unclear how many of the blank ballots came from protesters.

Georgia’s protest vote follows mobilizations in several other primaries, led by Michigan, where 13% of Democratic primary voters picked “uncommitted” instead of a candidate. Georgia doesn’t have an “uncommitted” option, but state law allows voters to turn in blank ballots.

“It’s important that we send the president a message that if he is expecting to win this state ... he needs to end the war in Israel and Gaza,” 34-year-old Devin Barrington-Ward, a former candidate for the Atlanta City Council, said after voting Tuesday. “Folks are going to be having real serious questions with themselves around what is the point of having this president if he’s going to have us in a protracted conflict in the Middle East.”

At least 6,446 Democratic voters left their ballots blank across Georgia, according to an analysis of election results and turnout by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Some of the highest rates of blank Democratic ballots were found in metro Atlanta counties, including 8% in Forsyth County north of Atlanta, a conservative-leaning area with a growing number of liberal voters. Clinch County in South Georgia had the state’s biggest proportion of blank Democratic ballots, at 11% of 189 ballots cast.