Tuesday Block 1

Tuesday Block 1

Now.

>> a global shutdown during an election year.

You can't make this stuff up.

No doubt, it has caused frustrations and complications for those who want to see their candidate actively campaigning and the other question, how can voters cast their ballots?

Joining me, chris from the election commission, and good to see you, sir.

>> thank you for having me.

>> before we get to the changes that have been made, a quick civics lesson for everybody, and perhaps you can walk us through what a presidential primary and caucus are.

>> so these are the june primaries, the statewide primaries, and they're how the democratic and republican parties choose their nominee for the general election in november.

So nobody is being elected but the parties are deciding between, you may have to democrats running for office, or two republicans, or three or four or five, and this is the process of who is going to represent the party on the november election ballot.

This is from u.s. senate down to even smaller local office, so lots of offices, you know, and what offices will be on an individual voter's ballot depends on where they live, what districts they live n.

And some offices might not have a primary because only one filed for each of the parties.

>> and you answered my next question, and that was for all of the different offices, i'm sure that a lot of people have black lives matter segal of the signs up and down the highways for the candidates for different positions, and that stands for everybody, and typically, how are primaries held here in south carolina?

>> well, it's a statewide election, and a polling places are open, and usually in a state-wide primary, the turnout is coined of low, usually less than 20%, whereas in a presidential election, you could get 75% turnout.

So historically, a low turnout election, and most people in primaries vote at the polling place, but the numbers are showing that that is going to be different this year.

>> so let's start talking about the changes.

How have things changed this time around?

>> so the biggest change is the increase in absentee by mail voting, and then we have the general assembly amended state law recently, to allow anyone to vote absty.

So prior to that change in the law, you had to be either 65 years or older, you had to be a person with disabilities, and your job kept you from going to the polls, where you would have trouble going to the polls so, the general assembly opening up state law absentee to all south carolina voters, and now all 3 million absentee voters have s.

Even before the change, we were seeing a drastic increase of people voting absentee by mail, obviously due to the coronavirus pandemic and wanting to stay safe and vote by mail.

But with the change in the law, we're seeing those numbers rise even higher, approximately 170,000 people have at least started the process of voting absentee, and that number, just to give you something to compare it to in both the 2016 state-wide primaries, and the 2018 state-wide primaries, a total of 65,000 people voted absentee total for each one.

2016 and 2017 and 2018.

>> people want their vote to count, and let me ask you, if you want to request a ballot, how do you also submit the ballot?

>> so if you want to vote absentee, you have two options.

Vote by mail.

[ audio difficulties ] application, sign it, and then you can scan it, and email it into the voter registration office and mail it back.

>> if you don't have a printer?

>> if you don't have a perimeter, you have to call your voter registration office and say i want to vote in the democratic, republican primary, whichever one, and me send you an application, and they mail it back, and then they mail you a ballot.

>> when is the deadline?

>> the deadline is the friday before the election, but i don't recommend waiting that long.

>> and whether is the election.

>> june 9th.

>> so that's coming up right up.

>> tugs, june 9th, so the friday before that, would be june 5th, the deadline to apply, but don't wait that long.

If you want to vote absentee by mail, get it n because you have to do these things by mail, and it takes a little time.

>> so june 9th, keep that circled on your calendar.

And finally, the president may be moving his convention from north carolina because of their laws allowing people in great numbers from coming together.

And do you think it's going to be held here?

>> i have no idea.

>> okay, all right.

And also, one quick question, do you think this is going to continue into november or will people be able to go to the polls in november?

>> i think it's safe to say that to some extent, this will continue into november, and that extent may be that people get comfortable voting absentee by mail.

And those that will qualify in november will continue to do it.

So we're kind of expecting that some people will continue, regardless of what the coronavirus situation looks like, and if it continues like it is now, obviously, we'll see great increases in november as