Voter Forms

ATLANTA (CBS46) -

Ten clergy members from churches across metro Atlanta gathered at Ebenezer Baptist Church Thursday to publicly urge county registrars to process the thousands of voter registration forms caught in limbo because of an investigation into voter fraud.

"We will call our government officials to task when they impede any citizens' moral and civic right to vote, " said Dr. Gary Charles of Central Presbyterian Church in southwest Atlanta.

Investigators from the office of Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp are investigating New Georgia Project, led by the highest-ranking Democrat in the Georgia House of Representatives, Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, of Atlanta. The investigation has found 25 voter applications with forged signatures, according to an investigator, and 26 others that are suspicious.

At a specially called Georgia Election Board meeting Wednesday, board members pointed out that the percentage of forged signatures is small. New Georgia Project has registered more than 85, 000 people in the last six months.

Of those 85, 000 voter registration applications, 51, 000 have not been processed, according to Abrams, leaving potential voters in limbo. Most of the applicants are African-Americans, Latinos and Asian-Americans, she said.

"We're concerned about this, not as black people and white people, not as Democrats and Republicans, " said Dr. Raphael Warnock, pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, the home church of the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. "We are concerned about this as citizens of Georgia."

"Seems to me that the voter registration process should be the frontline of hospitality, a process of welcome into what it means to be an invested citizen and a Georgia resident, " said Dr. James Lamkin of Northside Drive Baptist Church in Buckhead. "To the extent that this is not happening here and now or anywhere at any time in America, that process needs addressing."