2020 Election Update: Six states and Puerto Rico will hold their primary elections over the next couple of weeks. Here’s the rundown:
Tomorrow, voters in Kentucky and New York are holding presidential primaries after postponement due to the coronavirus.
Delaware, New Jersey, Louisiana, and Puerto Rico will hold theirs throughout July.
Connecticut will be the final state to hold its primary, just days before the Democratic and Republican National Conventions.
If you live in one of these states, and were unable to request an absentee ballot or never received your ballot in the mail, you can still vote in person. Find your polling place here.
Expect Long Lines and Fewer Polling Places: Kentucky will have fewer than 200 polling places open tomorrow, which is especially concerning because the state usually has about 3,700 in any given election. There has also been a tremendous surge in absentee ballot requests, but we are hearing that many Kentuckians still haven’t received their ballot.
Jefferson County, the most populous, with 776,000 residents and half of the number of eligible African American voters in Kentucky, will have just one polling site available on Election Day. (read more)
Voting Rights and Institutional Racism: Stacey Abrams may not be the person to join former Vice President Joe Biden as his running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket, but she is making her mark on the 2020 election.
Abrams is perhaps best known for her 2018 gubernatorial bid in Georgia, a race that was plagued with allegations of voter suppression because her opponent, then–Secretary of State Brian Kemp, effectively oversaw his own election. Now, she is using her organization, Fair Fight, to highlight the intersection of voting rights and institutional racism — and to level the playing field.
“We have the power now to demand better,” Abrams told Fortune in an interview last week. “The issue is making sure we have full access to the power of citizenship, and until we fix voter suppression, we don’t.” (read more)
Conservative Case for Absentee Voting: A new report from R Street Institute, a conservative think tank, aims to boost GOP support for voting by mail — by explaining how the process is based on “conservative principles.”
“Voting absentee or by mail is a safe, trusted and age-old practice,” the report argues, adding that “polling data indicate very clearly that the public strongly favors expanded access to absentee voting and that its results are partisan-neutral.” (read more)
Go Home Facebook, You’re Drunk: At this point, it is hard to imagine anyone wants to hear from Facebook about its intention to “strengthen” our democracy — especially considering the company’s role in the 2016 election. Nevertheless, CEO Mark Zuckerberg is moving full steam ahead with an initiative to register 4 million of its users to vote.
“To achieve this, we’re creating a new Voting Information Center with authoritative information, including how and when to vote, as well as details about voter registration, voting by mail and information about early voting,” Zuckerberg wrote in a recent op-ed. (read more)
WhoWhatWhy and Readers’ Picks of the Week:
- Clark County Election Officials Recommend Large-Scale Mail-in Ballot Distribution for General Election (Nevada Independent)
- California’s Elections Boss: State’s Voting Changes are Model for the Country (San Francisco Chronicle)
- Iowa Governor Will Restore Voting Rights to Paroled Felons (New York Times)
- LA County has Found the Cause of Its Hours-Long Poll Lines. It Wasn’t the New Voting Machines. (Politico)
- The Damage of Trump’s Voter-Fraud Allegations Can’t Be Undone (Atlantic)
- US House Panel Hears From Facebook, Google, Twitter on Election Security (Reuters)
