I voted today — it was a reality check.
I’ve acknowledged the importance of civic engagement since I helped my mother organize rallies for Barack Obama’s first presidential campaign in 2008. Even as a little kid, I would watch the evening news with my parents and unabashedly share my political beliefs with anyone who would listen. As I got older and more aware of injustice, I sought ways to make a more tangible impact — I ran for student government, volunteered for local campaigns, lobbied senators, and interned at the statehouse. On election day in 2016, I was just three months short of being eligible to vote for president. My two best friends and I sat on my living room couch, impotently watching the results come in. As a young woman on the edge of adulthood, the reality of Trump’s victory was undoubtedly personal, yet my voice was futile. The fact that a racist, misogynistic, inexperienced zealot garnered enough voters to defeat a highly qualified, experienced female politician was heartbreaking, however, in the days following the election I found myself more infuriated with the millions of Americans were privileged enough to protest both candidates by not voting at all.
On November 6th, 2018 and I registered to vote for the first time. In the past two years, the Trump Administration has halted plans to address the wage gap, blocked funding for planned parenthood, targeted the Affordable Care Act, weakened on campus sexual assault proceedings and appointed a man accused of sexual assault by multiple women to the Supreme Court. For the past two years I have been angered and disillusioned by Trump’s presidency. Walking into the Middletown City Hall, I felt empowered for the first time since the last election. Walking out, I felt more disenchanted by our country’s democracy than ever before. While I anticipated long lines and tedious paperwork, I quickly realized that the entire system is outdated and ineffective.
When it was my turn to register, I gave my information to an elderly man who kindly explained to me that he was unfamiliar with the technology. After taking my information, he told me that he had filled out the wrong form, and I needed to wait in another line to have the woman pull up my information (not to mention the fact that he noticeably cringed when I registered as a Democrat) — with only three people ahead of me, the line took over an hour. I passed the time making small talk with other indignant voters. The technology was ill-equipped to effectively process and store the registration information, and the staff was clueless as to how to operate the system. Once I reached the front of the line, I waited for almost another hour for the woman to locate my registration form while mass of people waiting behind me grew larger and larger, also waiting to have sort out their wrongfully entered information. Apparently, my name was misspelled, causing the delay, the same problem that delayed the process for the three voters ahead of me. I was redirected back to the man who took my initial information, who redid the form with the help of another employee. Again, he entered my information incorrectly. I insisted on a paper form to ensure I could enter the information myself without any technical difficulty, but was repeatedly told the issue would be resolved shortly. After three hours, I was so frustrated I asked for my driver’s license back and planned to leave without casting my vote. Instead, I was finally handed a paper application to fill out myself. From there, the process took a total of fifteen minutes and I was able to cast my ballot.
Disenchanted by the entire process, I walked out of City Hall without taking an “I voted” sticker. The reality is, it’s hard to exercise your civic duty, and that’s probably why no one does it. Not only is the process time consuming and frustrating, but it disenfranchises students and full-time workers — not to mention the numerous unnecessary voter registration laws that implicitly restrict minorities from casting their vote. While I have always known the American voting system is inherently flawed, being confronted with the reality was incredibly disheartening, especially because the issues that made the process so tedious could have easily been remedied — updated computer software that could effectively process the information would expedite the process and online registration would greatly reduce the risk of human error, requiring fewer lines. Most importantly, implementing automatic voter registration would eliminate the on-site registration process all together and considering election day a national holiday would make the process more accessible to working class Americans while reducing the flood of people who arrive after work hours and delay the process further. I voted, yet I feel just as powerless as I did in 2016. It has become more clear than ever that serious voter reform is necessary to make our democracy truly inclusive.
