Civil rights groups blast Georgia officials for voter website crash

A civil rights group is criticizing Georgia officials for a voter website crash on Election Day in a state hosting one of the key Senate races this cycle.

{mosads}Officials from Election Protection, one of the nation’s largest nonpartisan voter protection coalitions, said Tuesday that there are reports of voters being unable to access the state-run website to verify their voter registration status.

That website crash has led to jammed phone lines as voters try to reach their county board of elections to verify their status.

“This is completely unacceptable,” said Lawyers’ Committee President Barbara Arnwine, who leads Election Protection. “The state of Georgia had a responsibility to ensure that their websites and phone resources were operational and available to voters at all times, yet the website continues to have ongoing problems.”

Civil rights groups have criticized Georgia officials for losing 40,000 voter registrations from mostly minority voters.

A state judge ruled last month against civil rights groups that wanted to force Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp to account for the missing registrations.

Georgia’s Senate race is one of the most high-profile races in the 2014 cycle. A Nov. 2 NBC News/Marist poll had the race within a few percentage points, with GOP candidate David Perdue leading Democrat Michelle Nunn 48 percent to 44 percent.