I worked at a early voting polling place in Fort Lauderdale this weekend. I saw the best and the worst of American voting. The worst - the Republican Florida legislature had limited early voting to a total of eight hours during the entire weekend. They intended to create huge lines and they did. The best - despite waits of over three hours, virtually no one left.
I worked at a early voting polling place in Fort Lauderdale this weekend. I saw the best and the worst of American politics. The worst - the Republican Florida legislature had limited early voting to a total of eight hours during the entire weekend. Broward County decided to keep their polls open for five hours on Saturday and three on Sunday. Since the Legislature also limited the weekdays to 10 o’clock to 6 o’clock, these weekend sessions are the only non-working days for many working people. The lines were enormous. Even though the polling place closed at three o’clock on Saturday, it wasn’t until almost five o’clock that the last voter voted. On Sunday, the voting continued for almost three hours after the line closed. I understand the lines at early voting places in African American neighborhoods were voting for more than four hours after closing.
The hold up was not the voting itself. It was the laborious process the state legislature set up to verify voting status, combined with the lack of staff and machines to accomplish it. With only three computers at the station linked to the voter database, and only three printers printing ballots (we use optical scanners and each ballot is customized for the individual voter’s precinct), there was a huge bottleneck. There was no answer as to why they could not have had more machines. They certainly had notice. After I insured that people joining the line had the mandated picture ID, I mostly handed out water and sample ballots and answered questions. I felt like a flight attendant on a plane sitting on the tarmac for three hours - just trying to keep the passengers from revolting.
The best part is that virtually noone left. The voters were heavily Democratic. And the line was a mixture of young and old, African American, white and Hispanic, gay and straight, all determined to live through the wait and to vote. The polling place was near a progressive gay community that is fighting an anti-gay marriage constitutional amendment and the turnout was high. Everyone in line understood that it was insane and outrageous that anyone in this country should have to wait three to four hours to vote. But they also understood that the only near term possibility of change was to live through it. I best remember one moment when speaking with a few people at the front of the line who had already waited close to three hours to vote. They were talking about how outrageous the whole situation was and one of them - a younger white woman - just shrugged and said, "Yeah but in this election it’s worth it." I think that summed up the feeling of so many of the people that I spoke with. This time they were not just there to vote. They were there to vote for something.