Georgia GOP official grilled by CNN's Blitzer over post-election push to restrict voting rights

On Monday's edition of CNN's "The Situation Room," anchor Wolf Blitzer cornered Georgia's Republican lieutenant governor, Geoff Duncan, about the flurry of new GOP-backed legislation in the state to restrict voting rights, following Democrats' sweep of the presidential election and both Senate seats.

Under questioning, Duncan opted not to discuss the proposed legislation that would limit who can vote by mail, and focused only on the less controversial bills to clean up the election counting process.

"To your credit, you forcefully defended the integrity of the 2020 election, vote counting in Georgia," said Blitzer. "Why are you and some other Georgia Republicans pushing voting restrictions that would actually make it harder for people to vote in Georgia?"

"I think this is a bipartisan effort looking forward," said Duncan. "I think both Democrats and Republicans have introduced election reform ideas that are common sense ideas, that aren't trying to make a point but truly trying to make a difference. Things like making sure the counties release, at the time they close the election, total number of outstanding votes would have made a difference on election night. Looking for opportunities to allow counties to start processing those absentee ballots well before the election is over so we don't have to wait days. I'm going to personally work with the Democrats and the Republicans to try to get some big ideas across the finish line."

"Will these new ideas that some Republicans are now putting forward actually make it more difficult, let's say, for minority voters in Georgia to actually cast their ballot?" Blitzer pressed him.

"I certainly would never support anything that makes it more difficult to vote," said Duncan. "Certainly, make it harder to cheat but not more difficult to vote. Quite honestly, a win for us in with Georgia is to see a record number of folks voted in the last election, 5 million, to see an even higher number of folks vote in the next series of elections."

Watch below: