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Despite
virus
threat,
Black
voters
wary of
voting
by mail
By
COREY
WILLIAMS
apnews.com
DETROIT
-
Despite
fears
that the
coronavirus
pandemic
will
worsen,
Victor
Gibson
said
he’s not
planning
to take
advantage
of
Michigan’s
expanded
vote-by-mail
system
when he
casts
his
ballot
in
November.
The
retired
teacher
from
Detroit
just
isn’t
sure he
can
trust
it. Many
Black
Americans
share
similar
concerns
and are
planning
to vote
in
person
on
Election
Day,
even as
mail-in
voting
expands
to more
states
as a
safety
precaution
during
the
pandemic.
For
many,
historical
skepticism
of a
system
that
tried to
keep
Black
people
from the
polls
and
worries
that a
mailed
ballot
won’t
get
counted
outweigh
the
prospect
of long
lines
and
health
dangers
from a
virus
that’s
disproportionately
affected
communities
of
color.
Ironically,
suspicion
of
mail-in
voting
aligns
with the
views of
President
Donald
Trump,
whom
many
Black
voters
want out
of
office.
Trump
took it
a step
further
Tuesday,
suggesting
a
“delay”
to the
Nov. 3
presidential
election
— which
would
take an
act of
Congress
— as he
made
unsubstantiated
allegations
in a
tweet
that
increased
mail-in
voting
will
result
in
fraud.
“I
would
never
change
my mind”
about
voting
in
person
in
November,
said
Gibson,
who is
Black
and
hopes
Trump
loses.
“I
always
feel
better
sliding
my
ballot
in.
We’ve
heard so
many
controversies
about
missing
absentee
ballots.”
Decades
of
disenfranchisement
are at
the
heart of
the
uneasy
choice
facing
Black
voters,
one of
the
Democratic
Party’s
most
important
voting
groups.
Widespread
problems
with
mail-in
ballots
during
this
year’s
primary
elections
have
added to
the
skepticism
at a
time
when
making
Black
voices
heard
has
taken on
new
urgency
during a
national
reckoning
over
racial
injustice.
Patricia
Harris
of
McDonough,
Georgia,
south of
Atlanta,
voted in
person
in the
primary
and said
she will
do the
same in
November.
“I
simply
do not
trust
mail-in
or
absentee
ballots,”
said
Harris,
73, a
retired
event
coordinator
at
Albany
State
University.
“After
the
primary
and the
results
were in,
there
were
thousands
of
absentee
ballots
not
counted.”
In
Georgia,
roughly
12,500
mail-in
ballots
were
rejected
in the
state’s
June
primary,
while
California
tossed
more
than
100,000
absentee
ballots
during
its
March
primary.
Reasons
vary,
from
ballots
being
received
after
the
deadline
to
voters’
signatures
not
matching
the one
on file
with the
county
clerk.
Multiple
studies
show
mail-in
ballots
from
Black
voters,
like
those
from
Latino
and
young
voters,
are
rejected
at a
higher
rate
than
those of
white
voters.
In
Wisconsin’s
April
primary,
thousands
of
voters
in
Milwaukee
said
they
didn’t
receive
absentee
ballots
in time
and had
to vote
in
person.
Lines
stretched
several
blocks,
and
people
waited
two
hours or
more.
In
Kentucky’s
June
primary,
more
than
8,000
absentee
ballots
were
rejected
in
Jefferson
County,
which
includes
Louisville.
Many
people
in
Louisville’s
historically
Black
West End
neighborhood
voted in
person
because
they
didn’t
receive
an
absentee
ballot
or
simply
wanted
to vote
in a way
that was
familiar
to them,
said
Arii
Lynton-Smith,
an
organizer
with
Black
Lives
Matter
Louisville.
“That’s
particularly
why we
knew we
had to
have the
poll
rides as
an
option,”
she
said,
referring
to
groups
offering
voters
free
transportation
to
polling
places.
“It’s
not as
easy to
do an
absentee
ballot
and the
things
that
come
along
with it
than it
is to
just go
in
person.”
Mistrust
by Black
voters
runs
deep and
is
tightly
bound
within
the
nation’s
dark
past of
slavery
and
institutional
racism.
Black
people
endured
poll
taxes,
tossed
ballots,
even
lynchings
by
whites
intent
on
keeping
them
from
voting.
Over the
decades,
that led
to a
deep
suspicion
of
simply
handing
off a
ballot
to the
post
office.
Black
people
were the
demographic
least
likely
to cast
votes by
mail in
2018,
with
only 11%
using
that
method,
according
to the
U.S.
Census
Bureau.
By
comparison,
24% of
whites
and 27%
of
Latinos
reported
voting
by mail
that
year.
“For
Black
folks,
voting
is
almost
like a
social
pride
because
of the
way they
were
denied
in the
past,”
said Ben
Barber,
a
researcher
and
writer
for the
Institute
for
Southern
Studies
in
Durham,
North
Carolina.
Among
the
places
where
Black
voters
say they
have had
to
overcome
institutional
obstacles
is
Shelby
County,
Tennessee,
which
includes
Memphis.
In the
past,
voters
have
received
ballots
for the
wrong
district,
and
groups
have
sued to
challenge
the
security
of
electronic
voting
machines,
invalidation
of voter
registration
forms
and
failure
to open
polling
places
near
predominantly
Black
neighborhoods.
The
Rev.
Earle
Fisher,
senior
pastor
at
Abyssinian
Missionary
Baptist
Church
in
Memphis
and a
prominent
Black
civil
rights
activist,
is one
of the
plaintiffs
in a
state
lawsuit
calling
for
mail-voting
access
for
everyone.
He said
he’s not
pushing
his
community
to vote
by mail
but
wants to
ensure
it’s an
option
given
the
health
dangers.
To
ease
doubts,
he wants
voters
to be
able to
drop off
their
ballot
at a
polling
place so
they
won’t
have to
worry
about
the post
office
delivering
it on
time.
“I
would
like to
see
every
righteous
and
creative
method
and
measure
taken,
but we
are up
against
a voter
suppression
apparatus
that
oftentimes
is
orchestrated
by, or
at least
sustained
by,
people
who are
elected
or
appointed
to
office,”
Fisher
said.
Trump
has made
clear he
believes
widespread
mail-in
voting
would
benefit
Democrats.
He has
alleged
—
without
citing
evidence
— that
it will
lead to
massive
fraud,
and the
Republican
National
Committee
has
budgeted
$20
million
to fight
Democratic
lawsuits
in at
least 18
states
aimed at
expanding
voting
by mail.
The
extent
to which
Black
voters
adopt it
in
November
is
likely
to be
dictated
by the
coronavirus.
As
infections
surge,
there
are
signs
more
Black
voters
may be
willing
to
consider
the
option.
In
Detroit,
for
example,
about
90,000
requests
for
mail-in
ballots
have
been
made so
far —
the most
ever,
City
Clerk
Janice
Winfrey
said.
How
well the
option
is
promoted
also is
important.
In 2018,
Democrat
Stacey
Abrams’
campaign
mailed
1.6
million
absentee
ballot
requests
to
Georgia
voters
during
her
unsuccessful
bid for
governor,
emphasizing
that it
was a
safe,
easy way
to vote.
Record
numbers
of Black
voters
voted by
mail in
that
election.
That
shows
they
will
embrace
the
process
if they
hear
from
friends
and
family
that it
works,
said
Lauren
Groh-Wargo,
Abrams’
campaign
manager.
NAACP
President
Derrick
Johnson
praised
how
Abrams
was able
to
bridge
that gap
but said
this
year is
different.
The
model
can’t be
replicated
nationwide
before
Nov. 3,
he said.
“Stacey
did a
good job
in the
four
years
leading
up to
2018 to
build
out a
program
to get
it
done,”
Johnson
said.
“The
runway
between
now and
November
isn’t
long
enough
to get
it
done.”
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