In Georgia, a bloc of New American Voters — recently naturalized citizens that have earned the right to vote — has the potential to play an outsized role in the outcomes of critical federal and state races. This voting bloc is multiracial, multigenerational, geographically diverse, and majority female.
New American Voters hold distinct ideologies, experiences, and viewpoints, and will be motivated by a variety of issues this November. Georgia became the center of the political universe during the November 2020 presidential election, with newly naturalized citizens comprising a critical part of the record turnout among voters of color in the state.
With a competitive Senate election (rated “toss up” by the Cook Political Report) and a contested gubernatorial election (rated “toss up” by the Cook Political Report) in 2022, Georgia will again be one of the most critical states during November elections.
Georgia ranks first in the nation in the New American Voters Impact Model, which was created by the National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA) and the U.S. Immigration Policy Center (USIPC) at the University of California, San Diego to showcase the potential electoral power of this critical voting bloc.
This report offers data that illustrates how New American Voters can have an outsized impact.
Georgia’s cohort is part of an estimated 5.19 million newly naturalized citizens across the U.S., according to New American Voters 2022: Harnessing the Power of Naturalized Citizens, a report released by NPNA, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), APIAVote, and the U.S. Immigration Policy Center at the University of California San Diego.
The power of this potential voting bloc is determined by individuals’ ability to both register and vote this November. This electoral season presents many challenges, including the need for organizations to adapt their voter engagement work to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, language access issues, and ongoing efforts to restrict access to voting, particularly targeting voters of color.
One form of voter suppression that has emerged in recent years is the increasing backlog and processing delays of citizenship applications.
According to the latest data from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), there are over 700,000 pending citizenship applications nationwide, with 23,533 citizenship applications backlogged in USCIS’ offices in Georgia.
While the national average processing delay is around 11 months, it is nearly 18 months in USCIS’ Atlanta office.
This means that immigrants who are eligible for citizenship and who would have otherwise naturalized and have had time to register to vote in this year’s elections may not be able to do so given the naturalization application backlog.
Georgia-based organizations named in this report are partnering with NPNA’s New American Voters Campaign, a non-partisan nationwide effort to address naturalization barriers and encourage newly naturalized citizens to register and vote.
The 2022 collaboration continues momentum from the 2020 campaign, which engaged naturalized voters and builds on decades of organizing efforts to register and mobilize voters of color in Georgia.
Georgia’s New American Voters are a constituency whose voices will be heard and whose issues should be addressed by all political parties and candidates.
Executive Summary
1 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, “Number of Form n-400 Application for Naturalization by Category of Naturalization, Case Status and USCIS Field Office Location.” October 1, 2021 – December 31,2021. https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/reports/N400_performancedata_fy2022_qtr1.