Posted on 10/29/2020 11:48:26 AM PDT by SJackson
With less than a week before the election, Iowans are losing places to cast ballots.
Voters in Iowa are facing shuttered polling locations less than a week away from Election Day, largely due to the various outbreaks of COVID-19 that have gripped the state.
Iowa is one of the several Midwest states experiencing record upticks in new coronavirus infections, with 1,133 Iowans testing positive for the virus yesterday. Two days prior, Iowa set a record for the number of new cases, reporting 2,691 on Oct. 26. In total, more than 121,000 people in Iowa tested positive for the coronavirus.
The current state testing positivity rate sits at 12.8 percent, well above the 10 percent rate recommendation to begin reopening economic and public sectors.
Reporting by NPR, the Iowa Public Radio News and the Center for Public Integrity finds that hundreds of polling centers have closed due to COVID-19, leaving voters with fewer local options.
"All of us, we are going to have to look up where we need to go. I mean, I'm not sure which place I would go," Sheena Thomas, a voter in Des Moines, told reporters. "That's going to be an issue for everybody."
Thomas ultimately decided to vote absentee, but mass shutdowns and consolidations in locations can lead to confusions as to where to go, as well as longer lines to cast ballots.
These closures also come during a contentious presidential election and many local elections, leading officials to fear that a lack of polling centers may skew the election outcome. NPR further notes that since 2016, Iowa has lost 261 polling places, which affect roughly 30 percent of the state’s voters, many of whom reside in urban areas.
The same analysis also revealed that communities with larger proportions of people of color have also experienced higher rates of polling place shutdowns, leading to more fears of voter suppression.
"I'm certain that it's going to make it harder for people to vote. But I am seeing a resolve right now, where people are determined," Vikki Brown, the chair of the Black Hawk County Democrats, told reporters. "Whatever you do, we're going to counteract it."
Black Hawk County is one of the most diverse areas in Iowa and has seen larger portions of polling place closures.
Some of the main reasons for closures during this election stem from concerns over hosting polling places during the pandemic, as well as shortage of volunteer poll workers willing to come into contact with hundreds of people.
As a solution, polling places may be consolidated during the primaries in multiple states, such as in Atlanta and Milwaukee.
“On Election Day, we can anticipate to see long lines in areas where there have been mass closures," Leigh Chapman, the director of the voting rights program at the Leadership Conference on Civil & Human Rights, said regarding the 2020 Election Day.
While hundreds of thousands of Iowans appear to intend to vote absentee, like Thomas, polling station closures have proven to slow voter turnout. |
Yep. Called this one...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3871759/posts
How to Defeat Mail-in-Voting Part II
Review the section “The Coming Lockdown”.
BS
Honest question to Iowa folk: Are they just now closing anything else due to “Covid.”
This thread helped me decide to vote today. I would prefer election day-only voting, but next Tuesday looks bad for me, so...
Predictable. This is going to happen all around the country. They may keep big cities open because those are Rat areas
This doesn’t make sense. Iowa is nothing but fields and fields if corn and soybeans with a house here or there, often miles apart. There are a few scattered small towns scattered here or there, but the towns are pretty tiny. There are only a fewplaces that you could call a city. Desmoines is one of them but pretty much everything else is spread apart and small. Contact with other people is relatively low. So this so called increase in ANY contagious illness doesn’t make sense.
Exactly.
Considering I have heard rumors of mayors closing polls for “health concerns “,none verified, I expect the weekend to ramp up. Yet trick or treat is still on in Black Hawk county
An early vote only gives the machine time to change or lose it.
Sounds fishy but we don’t need Iowa’s 7 electoral votes all that much. If we win any of the big northern states, it will take Trump to 270 with or without Iowa.
Ha, ha, well, he will have to find something sturdier than me to lean on.
Does this surprise anyone else besides me.... it was predictable. All well staged and played... just as Fauci, he knows.
"In terms of early voting, 614,000 Iowa citizens voted prior to Election Day 2012, with 43 percent of those being Democrats and 32 percent being Republicans. So although the state does not release information about which candidate these early ballots are cast towards, just looking at the party turnout gives us a fairly accurate idea, and in 2012, the early voting turnout indicated an eventual Obama victory.According to the Iowa Secretary of State, [in 2016] about 311,000 people have voted early thus far, or at least that’s the number of Iowans whose ballots have been officially received by their county. Of those with their ballots in already, 46.5 percent are registered Democrats, 33.3 percent are registered Republicans, and 19 percent are not affiliated with any party."
yeah, except the whole premise of the article is that going to vote at the polls is at risk, which would lock in the current dem lead. In normal circumstances, I’m not worried about Iowa, but if election day turnout is suppressed, there is trouble.
It is about the same level of head in the sand as your last post.
Just voted here in Iowa today. Waited a bit but it wasn’t bad.
If polling places have consolidated it likely affect Dems more than Reps I would think. As the polling places affected would likely be in our larger metro areas which are Dem.
We are expecting this in Wisconsin. Michigan, Pennsylvania and North Carolina should also expect their stares to signaficantly reduce available polling locations. And if you are in a conservative suburb expect Antifa and BLM protesters.
I have a feeling that this will be the “plan” all over the US and they know Trump voters will vote in person.
And now we have the REAL voter suppression DemoKKKrat style.
Gotta clear the broken glass for those of fainter hearts, though.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.