Secretary of State: Return Georgia mail-in ballots now

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s chief election official is urging residents to send in their absentee ballots now instead of waiting.

Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Monday urged the nearly 1 million voters who haven’t returned ballots to do so.

The June 9 primary is two weeks from Tuesday.

So far, nearly 510,000 people had returned their ballots as of early Friday, while another 61,000 had voted in person during early voting.

Ballots must be returned to county election offices by 7 p.m. on June 9.

Raffensperger took the unprecedented step of sending absentee ballot applications to all 6.9 million active registered voters statewide.