On Tuesday, primary voters in four states – Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia and Texas – will choose their nominees for various offices.
Many of the storylines from the races in these states revolve around the influence of former President Donald Trump, as candidates with his endorsement vie for the Republican nomination. And the elections in Texas are a bit different: Voters initially cast ballots in the Lone State State on March 1, but candidates are participating in a runoff for contests in which no one received more than 50 percent of the vote.
All four of these states have open primaries, meaning any voter can cast a ballot in the nominating contests. Alabama, Arkansas and Georgia will all hold any necessary runoffs on June 21.
With states altering election laws to either increase or limit access to voting in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and unproven allegations of election fraud, The Fulcrum has been analyzing the changes. Here’s a review of the laws in each state holding primaries Tuesday.
Alabama
Alabama’s most notable race is the contest to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Richard Shelby. A former Shelby aide, Katie Britt, has a narrow lead over Rep. Mo Brooks and Army veteran Mike Durant in the race for the GOP nomination. Brooks had been endorsed by Trump, who later rescinded his backing. Republican Gov. Kay Ivey is also on the ballot again. Republicans also have a high-profile nominating contest to replace Brooks in the House.
A runoff seems to be the likely scenario in the Senate race and could happen in the gubernatorial contest as well. The primary victors are virtually assured of winning in November.
While Alabama allowed absentee and early in-person voting in the 2020 election in response to the pandemic, the state made neither policy permanent. An excuse is usually required to vote by mail, but the state expanded its list of acceptable situations in 2019, alongside requirements for absentee voters to include a copy of their photo identification with their application and have their completed ballot postmarked no later than Election Day and received no later than a week after the election.
In 2021, the state introduced rules that extended the time voters have to return absentee ballot applications and the time election officials have to process those ballots.
The state banned voting outside and curbside voting in the name of election security last year, though critics have said the rule will make it more difficult for individuals with disabilities to cast ballots.
Alabama has also added new election crimes in recent years, including a law that prohibits individuals from revealing the content of another voter’s ballot — such as by taking a photograph — and one that prevents residents of Alabama from voting in another state.
The state created a new misdemeanor this year, prohibiting election officials from using private funding for election administration, voter education, and voter outreach.
Read more about changes in Alabama.
Arkansas
Sarah Huckabee Sanders, one of Trump’s White House press secretaries, is the leading candidate in the most prominent race in Arkansas: the contest to be the Republican nominee for governor. And Sen. John Boozman seems likely to win reelection, but he may first have to go through a runoff.
Lawmakers have not introduced or passed any election legislation this year, according to the Voting Rights Lab. But the state has enacted some measures to remove barriers to voting and other to restrict that access after Trump beat President Biden there by almost 28 points in 2020.
In 2019, the state allowed voter identification to be presented in a digital format. The General Assembly also extended absentee voting to active duty members of the Arkansas National Guard and passed a law to require audits of electronically counted votes.
The state passed more laws in 2021. One mandated voters provide an ID by noon on the Monday following the election as the only acceptable method to verify one’s identity. Voters with religious objections would be allowed to receive a driver’s license or identification card without a picture.
Another law dictates that election officials cannot distribute unsolicited mail ballot applications or ballots to voters. The state moved the deadline to apply for those ballots from the day before Election Day to the Friday before.
Read more about changes in Arkansas.
Georgia
Republican voters will choose whether Gov. Brian Kemp gets to face Democrat Stacey Abrams, whom he narrowly defeated in 2018, as he seeks reelection. Former President Donald Trump endorsed Kemp’s primary opponent, former Sen. David Perdue, following Kemp’s refusal to overturn Georgia’s 2020 presidential election results. The other high-profile race in Georgia features former Heisman Trophy-winner Herschel Walker, who is seeking the Republican nomination for Senate. The victor will face incumbent Democrat Raphael Warnock.
While the state has traditionally supported Republicans, Georgia flipped blue in 2020 for the first time since Bill Clinton won the state in 1992.
In 2021, Georgia passed a GOP-backed, wide-ranging bill that received national attention for its efforts to tighten access to voting, including mail-in and in-person options.
Under the omnibus bill, voters are required to provide their driver’s license or state identification number on their mail-in ballot application and completed ballot. Election officials cannot mail absentee ballots to those who did not request them.
The absentee ballot application period was cut from six months to less than three before an election, and officials can only issue those ballots until 29 to 25 days before an election (compared to 49 to 45 days before an election previously).
In terms of in-person voting, the law prohibits mobile voting centers unless the governor declares a state of emergency, and polling location hours cannot be extended without a superior court’s order. It also limits early in-person voting availability.
Under the new law, it is punishable as a misdemeanor to offer “gifts” — including food and drink — at a polling place, and as a felony to watch a person cast their ballot unless the viewer is an authorized assistant or minor.
The bill also authorized Georgia’s attorney general to open a hotline for anonymous tips of illegal election activities.
This year, Georgia has passed one election-related bill, according to the Voting Rights Lab, that grants the Georgia Bureau of Investigations the authority to pursue claims of election fraud allegations.
Read more about changes in Georgia.
Texas
Texas
In Texas, some races were left undecided after the March 1 primaries, including the Republican nomination for attorney general and the Democratic nomination to represent the 28th district in the U.S. House.
While lawmakers have enacted some laws to increase access to voting since 2019, such as authorizing the secretary of state to maintain an online tracking system for voters to check the status of their ballots and making interpreters available at in-person polling locations, some laws tightened voting rules.
A month before the 2020 election, Gov. Greg Abbott issued an order limiting absentee ballot drop-off locations to just one per county. In 2021, the state limited the excuses available for someone to use an absentee ballot.
Texas hasn’t introduced or passed any legislation regarding voting and election administration in 2022, according to the Voting Rights Lab.
Demonstrators rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court as justices hear oral arguments on whether President Donald Trump can deny citizenship to children born to parents who are in the United States illegally or temporarily, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)
Luz Angela Nuñez with her daughter Aisha Quershi Nuñez at their home in College Point, Queens. Photo: Mia Anzalone for Documented.
Kimberly Alvarez, 25, with her daughter Evangeline and her husband John Alvarez in Medellin, Colombia. Photo courtesy of Kimberly Alvarez.Alvarez arrived in New York City in February 2024 with her husband John Alvarez as asylum seekers from Venezuela. In April 2025, Alvarez found out she was pregnant with her first child, a baby girl. Her first reaction, she said, was fear.“How am I going to keep her alive?” she said. “That’s what I was thinking. ‘How am I going to be able to take care of her?’”At the beginning of Alvarez’s pregnancy, she said she was aware of the immigration enforcement occurring around the country, but vowed not to let it deter her from showing up to her doctor’s appointments.“When you went out, you were always on alert because you didn’t know if [ICE] might be around. I never saw anything suspicious,” Alvarez said. “But of course, you feel scared.”In October, when Alvarez was six months pregnant, her husband was detained by ICE agents at 26 Federal Plaza. When the immediate shock wore off, she obsessively checked the Online Detainee Locator System to find out where her husband went. A day later, she discovered that he was being kept at Delaney Hall detention center in New Jersey. Alvarez quickly set up an account to pay for phone calls, and every two days, she would pay about $10 for a one-hour call, updating her husband about the baby, her appointments and how she was doing.“Crying was the only way for me to release the tension,” said Alvarez, who worried that her lack of sleep and bad diet were impacting her baby. “Crying was the only way for me to release the tension.”—Kimberly AlvarezThat tension built up day by day, week by week following her husband’s arrest. Alvarez had stopped her work as a cleaner in the neighborhood’s synagogues two weeks before her husband’s detention because of her pregnancy. The plan, she said, was to rely solely on his income as a maintenance worker for “the food, the rent, everything.” Left with few choices, Kimberley had to rely on her mother’s income as a cleaner. The older woman had moved to New York from North Carolina to assist with Alvarez’s pregnancy. “I feel like I’m supposed to help my mom, not the other way around,” Alvarez said. “I felt powerless because I couldn’t do anything.”On Dec. 9, Alvarez gave birth to a daughter, Evangeline. While her baby was healthy, Alvarez’s anxieties did not go away. While she returned to cleaning synagogues a few months after Evangeline’s birth to help make ends meet, Alvarez and her daughter rarely left home. Alvarez said she felt paralyzed, getting frequent alerts from a neighborhood WhatsApp group when ICE was spotted nearby. One day, she said, ICE arrested her friend’s husband in Sunset Park, in an area where she would sometimes take Evangeline for walks.“I’m so afraid that I’ll go out and run into one of them and that they’ll take her away from me,” Alvarez said. “That’s my biggest fear, that someone will take her away from me and I won’t know where my daughter is.”In March, her husband decided to voluntarily remove himself from the United States and move back to Colombia, where he is originally from. It was a family decision, but it was not a happy one — hiring immigration lawyers was too expensive, Alvarez said, adding that staying in the U.S. felt too uncertain. 
