A new bipartisan election integrity task force is bringing together Democrats and Republicans for a series of regional roundtables, according to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

Former Gov. Roy Barnes and former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, both Democrats and former U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss and former U.S. Rep. Drew Ferguson, both Republicans, are part of the nine-member task force. The four are part of the Democracy Defense Network, a bipartisan nonprofit that says its mission is to restore "faith in the transparency, safety, security, and validity of our election process."

Other members are election law expert Ben Ginsberg, former state senator Don Balfour, Joseph Kirk, Bartow County Elections Supervisor and Immediate Past President of the Georgia Association of Voter Registration and Election Officials; Nancy Boren, Muscogee County Elections and Registration director and Terry Norris, executive director of the Georgia Sheriffs’ Association.

The group will "push back" on election misinformation, Raffensperger said in an interview with The Center Square, something he is already doing. Raffensperger, who oversees the state's elections, stands behind the accuracy of the state's elections.

"We're just really saying, 'Here's what the facts are,'" he said. "We're showing that Georgia doesn't just stick its head in the sand. Georgia actually has a very open, transparent process and we engage people where they are to give them information so they can make an informed, intelligent decision."

The roundtables will start sometime after Labor Day, Raffensperger said.

Raffensperger said Georgia has the most secure elections in the country and polls back it up. A poll conducted by the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia and cited by Raffensperger after the 2024 presidential election showed that 98% of voters said they had no issue casting a ballot and 91.5% said they trusted the integrity of the process.

Georgia's elections have been in the national spotlight since 2020, when current President Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden. Raffensperger recorded a call with Trump in which Trump said, "I just want to find 11,780 votes."

The FBI and the Justice Department are continuing an investigation into the 2020 elections, focusing on Fulton County. The FBI raided the Fulton County Elections Office in January, and the Justice Department has subpoenaed the county for personal information about the poll workers in that election.

A panel of state lawmakers is discussing a new voting system that uses hand-marked ballots. The General Assembly passed a bill in 2024 that would eliminate the use of QR codes to count ballots, but there was no funding attached to the bill or guidelines for determining a new system that didn't use the codes.

The decision on a new voting system will be up to the next secretary of state, said Raffensperger, who didn't run for reelection but ran for governor.

"There will be a lot of new members in the next general assembly, bringing their thoughts on this," Raffensperger said. "I would encourage them to look at this group of folks that we have on this election integrity task force. They would probably give them some wise counsel and wisdom they could speak into it."