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A couple of voting advocacy groups founded by failed Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia Stacey Abrams was hit with a historic fine by the Georgia Ethics Commission for violating campaign finance laws to shore up Abram’s 2018 election.
“Today, the State Ethics Commission entered into a consent agreement with the New Georgia Project and the New Georgia Project Action Fund for a total of $300,000,” the Commission released Wednesday Georgia State Ethics in a statement. “This represents arguably the largest fine imposed in the history of the Georgia Ethics Commission, but it also appears to be the largest ethics fine ever imposed by a state ethics commission in the country related to a funding case of elections and campaign”.
Abrams founded the New Georgia Project in 2013 as part of an effort to register more minority voters and young voters. The organization was founded as a charity that can accept tax-deductible donations, while the New Georgia Project Action Fund worked as the fundraising arm of the organization.
The groups admitted they failed to disclose about $4.2 million in contributions and $3.2 million in expenses that were used during Abram’s 2018 election efforts, according to the commission’s consent order. The groups were hit with a total of 16 violations, including failing to register as a political committee and failing to disclose millions of dollars in political contributions.
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Stacey Abrams (Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images/File)
The groups were accused of similar activity in 2019, when they reportedly failed to disclose $646,000 in contributions and $174,000 while advocating for a ballot initiative.
“This represents the largest and most significant case of an organization illegally influencing our state elections in Georgia that we have ever uncovered, and I believe this sends a clear message to both the public and potential bad actors moving forward that you We will demand accountability,” the ethics commission continued in its statement on Wednesday.
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Abrams left the group in 2017, and Sen. Raphael Warnock took over as CEO of the New Georgia Project from 2017 to 2019, the Associated Press reported. Warnock was elected as a US Senator from Georgia in 2020.
Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, who also serves as senior pastor of Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, speaks from the pulpit. (Paras Griffin/Getty Images/File)
A spokesman for Warnock’s Senate office told the AP that he worked “as a longtime advocate for voting rights” and was unaware of the campaign’s violations. The spokesman added that “compliance decisions were not part of this work.” Fox Digital also reached out to Warnock’s office for additional comment, but did not immediately receive a response.
Abrams ran for governor of Georgia in 2018 and 2022, but lost to Republican Gov. Brian Kemp in both races. Abrams gained national attention after the 2018 race when he refused to concede to the Republican despite losing by 60,000 votes.
In the middle of the 2018 race, he promoted the New Georgia project on his X account, which at the time was called Twitter.
“When Abrams sees a problem, she doesn’t wait for someone else to take care of it, she does it herself. So when she saw that 800,000 people of color in Georgia were not registered to vote, Abrams immediately set out to fix the problem. and founded The New GA Project,” he tweeted.
The New Georgia Project said in a comment to Fox News Digital that they are “pleased to finally put this matter behind us” so that the group can “fully devote their time and attention to their efforts.” get involved and register civically black, brown and young voters in Georgia.”
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“Although we are disappointed that the federal court’s decision on the constitutionality of the government of Georgia Transparency and Campaign Finance Act was overturned on purely procedural grounds, we accept this outcome and look forward to turning the page on the activities that took place over five years ago,” the group continued.
