This was the scene about 4:30 yesterday at the election center in Downtown Sioux Falls (photos by Theresa Stehly) the line was several blocks long.
This of course could have been avoided a couple of different ways;
• Do what I have done for almost a decade, vote as soon as early voting starts. I believe I voted about a week after it started and there was about 3 people voting when I walked in. I have done this for a long time because I got tired of the musical precincts in every local election (something else that should end, another form of vote suppression).
• We should mail every registered voter a ballot, NOT an application, in at least state and national elections.
• We should have dozens of drop boxes available throughout the county at city and county properties (this of course would be possible if we didn’t have a political hack as the mayor of Sioux Falls who belongs to a party that promotes voter suppression).
What is crazy is that while we hand out $20 million dollar TIF’s and build $26 million dollar mural substrates, we can surely afford to make voting easier.
We live in a great country that allows us to choose our officials, but we make it really f’ing hard, even right here in South Dakota. I never thought I would see the day that people had to stand in this long of a line in Sioux Falls to vote. These pictures made me very sad.
****Note; if you have not mailed your ballot in yet DO NOT! I won’t make it to the election center by Tuesday. Drop it off in person or have a friend do it for you!
Word on the street is, that there are 40,000 absentee ballots in Minnehaha and 20,000 new voter registrations this year.
Free bus rides all day Tuesday, Election Day. This can help some people get to the polls. Spread the word. And wear a mask!
Those are the photos I took yesterday at 4:30 and posted on my facebook page .
My thought as I observed that huge line was that we needed more room/locations for citizens to move through the process more quickly.
It was wonderful to see so many people participating.
After harping on it for years South Dakota Democrats are listening to me, wising up and are registering as Republicans.
Billie Sutton was a fart in a haboob who bought Susan Wismer’s mailing list and bombed my inbox begging for money. The South Dakota Democratic Party has apparently learned nothing from the failure of a cowboy running for Montana’s At-large congressional seat. Primaries are expensive and allow far too much mischief: since turnout is so pathetic especially during midterms the drain-circling South Dakota Democratic Party should end them and choose candidates at the state conventions.
No South Dakota Democrat will get a dime from me until the county chairs are filled and unless Democrats weave cannabis into their platform at their state convention and arch-conservatives run for offices outside the Greedy Old Party it’s curtains for SDDP in 2020, too.
This happens BECAUSE this is the world’s greatest democracy.
That people are inconvenienced to stand in a line to exercise one of the privileges afforded to those in this great country – clearly a first world problem.
You mention ways in which voters could avoid this situation.
Unless these people are standing in line to drop their ballot in the ballot drop boxes which are available, the issue of ballot drop boxes seems moot to discussion of this line of voters.
Dropping your ballot in a box takes a lot less time than standing in line. I have also argued that standing in line for hours is an extra tax.
The screed by kurtz is well off topic, but now we have a name to apply to the growing number of Democrats in Taupeville; those who have registered as Republican in order that they can camouflage into the Kool Kidz Klub of Popularity (aka The Republicans of Sioux Falls).
This shall forever be known as “The kurtz Effect”.
Leaving it to “Woodstock” to reply to the question from Taupians, “who TF is kurtz?”
Voter turnout seems to have blossomed from prior elections. People are upset with government and they’re using their privilege to show it. I have my doubts about mail ballots. It can work but there must be positive ID and ballot security.
This is not necessary if we would return to tradition and vote on the first Tuesday in November and mail absentee in October. The more you insist we tinker with government, the worse it gets.
What I am saying is to simply things, because as they stand right now, they are anything but simple.
The city, county and school district should use all the same precincts, for every election. Simple.
Instead creating double the paperwork, just send a ballot to all registered voters. Why send an application first? Simple
Why not also have everyone, once they turn 18, be automatically placed on the voter rolls, like they do in many European democracies?
I agree that polling places that should be set and left alone for every vote. Ballots should not be sent to every voter without their request as this is ripe for Chicago politics shenanigans.
Employers are required to provide (not pay) time within open polling times for employees to vote and this needs to be enforced. I would be willing to allow in-person voting for 1 week before at all government buildings. I’ve long advocated for drive thru voting.
Voting a serious matter and needs to be taken seriously by every voter. I bet if you asked, most of those people could have voted on Tuesday BUT it’s this insisting by candidates that push fear to vote early that make these folks stand 3 hours in line. It will take me less than 15 minutes at my polling place 8AM tuesday. And I’ll wear a mask.
We have noticed something very heartbreaking in our neighborhood, and it doesn’t appear to be covered by our local “media”….
ALL the Trump signs in our hood are gone, only thing left are flags that are too high to reach. My buddy has a car driving by, someone running back and taking a sign. I drove around quite a bit this weekend, and didnt see any Trump signs, and sparse Biden signs. There were tons of local race signs.
Even though yall obviously need the govt to tell you what to do every waking moment, don’t you think this is going a little too far?
Please tell the truth here, have you noticed the same thing?
Why on earth would you stand in line to early vote? I was in and out at 8:30 this am in under 10 minutes. Absentee and vote in person is the only way we should vote, and ID should be required. That isn’t suppression, just make a point to do it every 2 years. 10 minutes every 2 years isn’t much to ask. You snowflakes need to Nick up and quit whining so much.