More than one million Americans have already voted in the 2020 presidential election, the highest number of votes cast at this period in the race in US history.
The unprecedented surge has been driven by new state laws designed to help people vote safely during the coronavirus pandemic, according to election observers, a clear sign that the crisis is changing the way people cast their ballots.
The figures also suggest higher than usual voter interest in one of the most divisive and polarised elections in generations.
“We’ve never seen so many people vote this far in advance of a presidential election before. We are in uncharted territory,” Michael McDonald, a political science professor at the University of Florida, told The Independent.
Mr McDonald noted only 9,525 people had voted by the same time in 2016, and described the shift as “historic”.
The record numbers come after many states changed their laws to make voting easier during the pandemic. This included the expansion of mail-in ballot measures and early in-person voting.
A total of 1,012,211 ballots have already been cast across 13 states, according to the most recent figures.
Virginia, which adopted a new law that allows early in-person voting, has seen the highest number of votes cast, at 287,000. North Carolina and Wisconsin follow closely behind, and 248,000 and 238,000 respectively.
“The offering [of early voting] is important. It wouldn’t be possible for people to vote if there weren’t voting options available to people at the moment. It it a supply and demand equation,” said Mr McDonald, an election expert who monitors early voting numbers posted by individual states.
But he added that voter interest is playing a role: “There is also clear a demand to vote early, where people are casting their ballots at the first opportunity.”
Still, the numbers do not give any indication as to who is winning the race. Democrats tend to vote early, and so are overrepresented in preliminary numbers. Republicans tend to turn out in higher numbers on election day.
The coronavirus pandemic had led to a dramatic increase in the number of people requesting mail-in ballots this year, as many look to stay home on election day.
According to a recent survey, more than one-third of Americans plan to vote by mail in November. Some 48 per cent of people who plan on voting for Joe Biden will do so by mail, and only 23 per cent for Mr Trump.
Donald Trump has repeatedly attacked the expansion of mail-in voting across the US, claiming without evidence that it is vulnerable to fraud. His campaign has sought to limit its use in key swing states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, while encouraging his own supporters to vote by mail in states where he is favoured, like North Carolina.
Isn’t it consensual when she gave him the photos when they were together 🔚
From a lawyer: “The photos were consensual. But she did not consent to distribution “
He really thought he did something with that comment and his lil stank emoji at the end lol
Reblog to save a LIFE dat shit is not ok
for the ladies, and even gentlemen, who follow me and find themselves in this situation.
Same goes for you Men. If your ex leaks photos of your dick or any videos you sent her, you can sue too. Yea, giving the photos with consent is Aight, but spreading them around and “exposing” Ain’t it chief
A peaceful, Indigenous demonstration against the border wall in Organ
Pipe Cactus National Monument ended with demonstrators in a stand off
and physical altercation with U.S. Border Patrol agents and National
Park Service officers Monday [21 September 2020] afternoon.
Construction was brought to a halt for most of the day. […] The action was put by together the O'odham Anti Border Collective and
Defend O'odham Jewed, a network of Akimel O'odham, Tohono O'odham and
Hia-Ced O'odham organizers — not all of which are federally recognized
tribes.
Ancestral O'odham land spans the Phoenix area and Tucson and continues across the border into neighboring Sonora. Speaking in front of a
huge canvas panel reading “Borders = Genocide, no wall on O'odham
land,” one Akimel O'odham demonstrator said they’ll keep returning to
protect it.
Before it became a part of Organ Pipe in the 1950s, Quitobaquito and the
man-made pond it drains into was home to generations of Hia-Ced O'odham
communities.
Trenching for the border wall could be seen in the area in front on the
thicket of trees surrounding Quitobaquito. Bollard panels lay flat
nearby.
[…]
Demonstrators spent more than five hours at the site praying, singing
and chanting over the hum of stalled machinery. Private security
personnel and National Park Service were on scene.
Two National Park Service officers approached the group twice
throughout the morning and asked them to move to the side, citing safety
concerns.
The demonstration continued without incident until around 1pm, when
more than a dozen U.S. Border Patrol agents, some armed with paint ball
guns and rifles, arrived on ATVs and in SUVs. Two National Park Service
officers charged the line of demonstrators, breaking into a brief
scuffle trying to forcibly break through the human chain before pulling
back. […]
The protesters faced off against a line of Border Patrol agents and
Park Service officers for almost an hour as O'odham organizers continued
to speak and sing. One Tohono O'odham speaker described how living
along the border has shaped her community.
“We cannot move without you all over us, we cannot walk through our
desert without these cameras filming everything we do, you don’t have
that in your community,” a Tonono O'odham speaker said. “But then you
come here, thinking you can take whatever you want.” […]
Another scuffle broke out when park service officers backed by Border
Patrol agents moved in on the line again. For several minutes, officers
and agents shoved protesters and attempted to pull them away from each
other as they crumpled to the ground.
—
Headline, photo, captions, and text from: Alisa Reznick. “Stand off …” Arizona Public Media. 22 September 2020.
The protestors are on instagram at @ defendoodhamjewed . There are videos and images of this incident. They’ve also been asking for financial aid!
This harvest scene in Menna’s tomb shows a man carrying the crop in a
large net suspended from a pole which rests on his shoulders. At the
edge of the field two men are resting under a tree, each seated on a
stool. The one on the left appears to have fallen asleep, while the
other is playing a flute. A goatskin, probably filled with water, is
hanging form the branches of the tree. On the right a supervisor is
supporting himself with a staff. The heel of his front leg isn’t resting
on the ground, suggesting that he is handicapped.
Menna was an 18th dynasty inspector of estates and overseer of harvests
and his tomb (TT 69) is located in the Sheikh Abd el Qurnah Necropolis
on the Westbank at Luxor.
Pictured second from left is Mike Jackson, one of the cofounders of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners, a seminal LGBT+ rights group in Britain which supported the nationwide strike of miners against Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government in 1984-5. Here is what he thinks of our forthcoming book, Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion: “This work is a great resource which works on different levels. Requiring just a few minutes reading we can casually find out what happened on any day of the year in terms of working class history. We can then choose to share that knowledge through social media instantly turning it into political education for our friends and followers. But if time permits we can delve deeper using an extensive list of footnotes giving us instant digital access to sources for further reading. I’ve listened to many hours of WCH’s podcasts and this book reflects their house style. It’s a style that unearth’s compelling histories previously buried (often deliberately or neglectfully), it is global and it endeavours to give ALL the wonderfully diverse peoples of the working class a voice, leaving no-one marginalised. It is also clear, concise and uncompromising. Did you know about the strike of astronauts on Skylab 4 in 1973?”
You can preorder your copy on our Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-bookhttps://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1541327612719050/?type=3
