There’s a growing lib narrative that there’s voter suppression going on in Kentucky ahead of tomorrow’s primary:
KY voters: The state reduced the number of polling stations by 95%. There’s only one polling place in all of Jefferson County, where half the state’s Black population lives. Please vote early if you can’t vote by mail/absentee. Don’t let them steal your rights. Please share!
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) June 21, 2020
But this cut in polling places is not what it seems:
Ahead of Tuesday’s primary election—Kentucky has cut the number of polling places from 3700 to 200?
That means ONE polling locations for the 616K registered voters in Louisville’s Jefferson Co—where half KY’s black voters live
Voter Suppression 101https://t.co/QHYFk4RcXB
— Qasim Rashid for Congress (@QasimRashid) June 20, 2020
University of Kentucky professor Robert Farley calls this narrative “literally wrong about everything, generally on things that would take 90 seconds of research to debunk”:
It's pointless to argue now, but the developing narrative about voter suppression in Kentucky is literally wrong about everything, generally on things that would take 90 seconds of research to debunk.
— Robert Farley (@drfarls) June 20, 2020
Wow, that seems important:
Important corrective on voting in Kentucky https://t.co/orDmIldUjm
— Michael Cohen (@speechboy71) June 21, 2020
Basically, they have reduced the number of polling places, but that’s because of coronavirus and they did so with a bipartisan plan to keep voters safe. And at the same time, the state has been pushing early voting and absentee ballots at a scale unheard of before in Kentucky elections:
For those wondering how voting will work at one (huge) voting place in Louisville Tuesday & how turnout may effect Dem #kysen primary, here’s some context from turnout numbers in recent years compared numbers from last week on mailed absentee ballots plus early voters (1/2)
— Joe Sonka ? (@joesonka) June 21, 2020
The actual number of people voting tomorrow in Lexington, for example, should be around 30,000, and that number still doesn’t include early voters:
So, again, at 50% turnout, we would expect around 120k total voters; that leaves maybe 30k voters remaining–and that doesn't include early votes from the past 2 weeks or on Monday. 7/
— Josh Douglas (@JoshuaADouglas) June 22, 2020
And lines will be manageable:
That said, election officials–who are looking at this closely–suggest that even if Louisville and Lexington have even record-breaking turnout, lines shouldn't be more than 30-45 minutes. THAT'S STILL NOT GOOD, but it's not many hours (I hope!). 10/
— Josh Douglas (@JoshuaADouglas) June 22, 2020
But don’t believe us. Here’s Erin Keane, editor-in-chief of Salon:
Appreciate the national attention on Louisville's vote. I think it's important to note that condensing in-person voting to (very large) fairgrounds was done in conjunction with daily messaging on expanded mail-in absentee voting. https://t.co/3DBnBvksDF
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
And she notes this plan is bipartisan and not “GOP ratf*ckery”:
The pandemic primary plan wasn't GOP ratfuckery, the Rep. SOS and Dem. Gov worked together on allowing coronavirus to qualify anyone for absentee mail vote (usually very restricted). Beshear talked about it frequently in his daily coronavirus briefings which Kentuckians do follow
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Jefferson County has had about a week of early voting allowed at the Fairgrounds, which is also not usual. (I would love for early and mail-in voting to become standard for us, even after the pandemic.) Could Tuesday still be a disaster? Yes.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
It will depend on the number of ballots that didn't make it to homes in time and the number of voters who didn't get the messaging on requesting; those voters could still crowd the fairgrounds polling place on Tuesday, if they can get there.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
And all of that said, we might still have record turnout for the Democratic primary via mailed ballots.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Geographically, the fairgrounds are pretty close — not exactly, but close — to the center of Jefferson County. And it still takes too long (an hour+) to get there by bus from a lot of places in Louisville. That's a problem, too.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Kentucky has been a low turnout state in recent memory. It's a late primary by pres. standards & even later this year because of the pandemic delay. It's important to note the baseline is low. High turnout could be from mail vote accessibility, protests, pandemic, #KySen, combo?
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
All of this is to say, it's been clear for 3 months now that we were going to be between a rock and a hard place on voting this year. All of the polling places I've used in Louisville have always been staffed by people over 65, folks Beshear has fought to keep safe from covid.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Keeping all or even many of Jefferson Co.'s polling places open would have required a longer lead time than they had even with pushing the primary back a month. But the virus isn't going away before November so I'm hoping there's time to do more for the general.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
TL;DR — never be complacent about voting access, but also don't jump to generalized panic without considering important local context.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Beshear's briefings being the daily family TV hour for the first two months of shutdown means this is probably the most informed a lot of Kentuckians have been in years (no shade, just … none of this is normal!) about what state government is doing on a day to day basis.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
When talking about Louisville, it's also important to note that Booker is a highly visible state rep., not—especially in the West Louisville neighborhoods in and around his district—a newly recognized option. Louisville's known; energy's been here. Lex might be a different story
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Voting access for all, and especially minority-majority precincts in every state, must be protected. And low turnout shouldn't be part of anyone's electoral strategy, it should be seen as the civic embarrassment it is across the board and aisles.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
I'm not claiming everything *will* be fine. Clearly "fine" is a ridiculous concept in a state that has had such trouble getting out the vote in a normal year. But also not helpful is deciding it *will* be a disaster. We don't know that yet.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
Kentuckians for the Commonwealth — @kftc — does good work if you're looking for somewhere to direct support.
— Erin Keane (@eekshecried) June 21, 2020
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