Pizza At The Polls: The Absurdity Of SB 202 First Hand

On Thursday, December 1, I went to the Ponce De Leon Library voting precinct in Atlanta to distribute pizza on behalf of Pizza to the Polls, a nonpartisan organization that delivers pizza to people participating in civic life. I was helping feed early voters who faced a 2-hour wait time to cast an early ballot for the 2022 Georgia Senate runoff election. Under any reasonable circumstances, this would have been a simple task. But Georgia’s State Bill 202, which was signed into law last year, has made my home state’s electoral process unreasonably complicated.

To comply with SB 202, I first had to ensure I was at least 25 feet away from the line to enter the precinct, and 150 feet away from the precinct itself. That meant finding a private space in the area that was far enough away to meet the law’s requirements but still readily visible to voters. In a dense, urban setting like Atlanta, this is easier said than done. Luckily, a nearby church fit the bill and let me set up in their parking lot, which was directly facing the precinct’s long line. I then called the Deputy Policy Director of the ACLU of Georgia to confirm that I was not in danger of facing criminal charges. For distributing pizza.

This entire song and dance was made necessary by the SB 202 clause banning “Line Warming,” a practice wherein volunteers and organizers give voters waiting in line water, food, and election information materials as a means to keep them in line. State legislators justified banning this practice by claiming it may improperly incentivize or bias voters, thus hurting election security.

SB 202 also created unnecessary barriers to voting on college campuses as well. First off, the bill bans Mobile Voter Units, easy mobile precincts that can be parked on college campuses. SB 202 also bans non government buildings from becoming precincts unless they are an election day precinct, this hurts early voting on private colleges as they do not have the resources to host both early voting and election day, affecting nearly 80,000 students across the state.

The same law mandated that a runoff, such as the one that took place on Tuesday, December 6, must take place within 30 days of a general election and that early voting during said runoff can only be 1 week, with weekends optional for counties - drastically reducing the typical three weeks of early voting made available to Georgians in last month’s general election, as well as last January’s senate runoffs.

The resulting shortened planning period between the general and runoff elections, exacerbated by the Thanksgiving holiday, made it hard for counties to do essential things like recruit poll workers, establish and prepare precincts, and promote accurate information to voters, causing issues like long lines and public confusion over precinct availability and location - none of which does anything to make Georgia’s elections more secure.

SB 202 also drastically cut the window and availability of mail-in voting, a safe, secure and reliable practice that enabled millions to vote amidst a global pandemic in 2020 and continues to be a vital way to make elections accessible for all - regardless of how bad actors choose to demonize the practice by lying about its security. This exacerbated the issues caused by the runoff’s condensed timeline by forcing more voters to show up in person. In fact, some Georgia counties neglected to mail any absentee ballots at all.

In the end, millions of Georgia voters showed up to cast their ballots in the December 6 run-off - and I’m proud to say that dozens of voters at the Ponce De Leon Library got pizza from my makeshift stand. But in both cases the end result belies a process made unnecessarily complicated - and in some ways damaging to the integrity of Georgia’s elections.

Long lines at polling places should not be normalized just because people are willing to wait hours to vote. They are indicative of an election apparatus that is too small, with insufficient resources and too few voting methods - both in terms of in-person polling places and viable mail-in options. They make the process of administering, securing, and accounting for my home state’s elections unnecessarily difficult, which goes directly against the stated purpose of the law that created these conditions.

If Georgia’s lawmakers want to make elections more secure and effective, they should provide resources that enable communities to fund and administer sufficient polling places and voting methods to serve everyone fairly and efficiently. People should not be made to stand for hours in uncomfortable December weather simply to fulfill their civic duty because they lack alternative options.

Complicating every part of the election process does not make our democracy more secure. It only makes everything - from casting a ballot to distributing pizza - unnecessarily difficult.

If you would like to support Pizza to The Polls, Please follow them at @PizzatothePolls and donate to

If you would like to support the ACLU of Georgia please follow us at @acluofga and donate at https://action.aclu.org/give/support-aclu-georgia-foundation?ms=web__aff_ga_header_act