The Department of Justice lawsuit challenging Georgia’s allegedly discriminatory election integrity law will only exacerbate the public’s lack of confidence in the voting system, Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger told National Review Friday.

The lawsuit, announced by Attorney General Merrick Garland Friday morning, alleges that Georgia’s voting law, signed by Republican governor Brian Kemp in April, discriminates against the state’s black voters — an argument Raffensperger called “offensive.”

“People need to understand that progressives, particularly the ones at President Biden’s Department of Justice have been trying to chip away at commonsense election reforms and election integrity measures that we’ve had in Georgia for decades,” Raffensperger said.

The lawsuit is especially frustrating for Raffensperger considering the trials and tribulations his office faced in the wake of the 2020 election cycle.

“We’ve been working tirelessly to rebuild the confidence of voters, and now the Department of Justice is taking another whack at the integrity of the process, which destroys voter confidence,” he said.

Polling shows that while Democrats were slightly more skeptical of the state’s voting systems prior to Election Day, Republicans were far more skeptical in its wake, after former president Trump repeatedly claimed the election was stolen and spread baseless claims of fraud. The flip-flop demonstrates that partisan efforts to discredit the levers of democracy do have an effect on voters’ trust in the democratic process.

The state has been under a microscope since it became clear that its election reform bill — SB 202 — was likely to pass earlier this spring. So great was the backlash to the legislation, Major League Baseball ultimately decided to withdraw its 2021 All-Star game from Atlanta. President Joe Biden deemed the legislation “Jim Crow on steroids.”

Garland introduced the suit by asserting that “recent changes to Georgia’s election laws were enacted with the purpose of denying or abridging the right of Black Georgians to vote on account of their race or color, in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.”

Raffensperger, an outspoken critic of Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, vigorously contests Garland’s characterization of the law.

“The reality is, it’s never been easier to vote in Georgia. Look at our turnout we had in the last election. And it’s never been easier to register, we have record registrations,” he said.

He also noted that the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) passed in 2002 with the support of then-Senator Joe Biden includes provisions similar to those Democrats now decry as discriminatory.

The bill “requires voters who register by mail to present a current and valid photo identification when voting in person, or if voting by mail, to enclose a copy of such identification or of a current utility bill, bank statement, or government document showing name and address” according to an official summary.

“SB 202, it incorporates the same ID requirements for ballot-by-mail that federal law, the HAVA law requires for people who register by mail” said Raffensperger, who questioned why the Biden administration was suing Georgia for instituting a safeguard its namesake once helped implement. Under the law, ID will replace signature verification, in which officials compare signatures on mail-in ballots to previously gathered signatures. The secretary is supportive of the change.

“We’ve been sued by both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party over the subjective measure of signature match. We’ve moved away from that and are using drivers’ license number. It’s very objective, and if you don’t have a drivers’ license, you can use the last four digits of your Social Security number,” he said.

Besides the ID requirement for vote-by-mail, Raffensperger also expects SB 202’s much-maligned provision that prohibits partisans from handing out any gifts —including food and water — within 150 feet of a polling place to be challenged. He’s unsympathetic to any complaints about it.

“It’s really a false flag, because last fall in the November election we had a two minute wait time. We had worked with the counties so that they could work on reducing their lines. We had an average of a two minute line time.” Raffensperger was indignant at the idea that anyone would be in dire need of hydration while waiting for such a short duration. Under the law, polling places are allowed to provide refreshment, only partisans are banned from doing the same.

Moreover, he noted that the provision was meant to prevent “last-minute politicking” on the line, not discouraging people from voting by denying them basic needs. “It’s good policy” he insisted.

Raffensperger seems to suspect that former gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams has something to do with the DOJ’s decision to target Georgia instead of New York or New Jersey, which provide for only nine days of early voting, or even Biden’s home state of Delaware, where early voting will be made available for the first time in 2022.

SB 202 extended early voting in Georgia from 16 to 17 days.

“Stacey Abrams poll-tested the words ‘voter suppression’… and she found that they were a strong emotional hook” Raffensperger explained before going on to say he believed this lawsuit was “really playing into her hands, because it’s not supported by the facts.”

Raffensperger expects turnout to be as high as ever moving forward, observing that Democrats’ dire predictions about the consequences of voter ID laws have not come to be.

“We have the appropriate balance of accessibility and security. When you have that balance, everyone has confidence that their vote will count.”

He also expects the DOJ to come up short in its attempt to take SB 202 off the books.

“We look forward to having our day in court because we know at the end of the day, we will prevail.”