States across the country have collectively cut the number of polling locations that will be open on Election Day by nearly 21,000 compared to the 2016 presidential election.
The coronavirus pandemic has led to record-breaking numbers of mail-in voting and early voting across the country, with many states, such as Virginia and Georgia, expanding early voting and some states even mailing out ballots to all eligible voters. However, those initiatives have not offset what Vice found to be a “patchwork” of cuts and expansions “seemingly aimed at suppressing turnout.”
“A handful of states, including California and New Jersey, have drastically revamped how they conduct elections, pivoting heavily to mail voting and slashing polling places to reallocate resources to handle mail ballots,” the news outlet reported. “But other states reduced Election Day polling sites without doing much else to make voting easier in spite of the coronavirus pandemic.”
Vice’s analysis found 40 of the 45 states that do not regularly use all-mail voting decreased the number of Election Day voting locations compared to 2016. Five of those states and Washington, D.C., decided to use all-mail voting for this election. Some states, such as Maryland, have mailed every eligible voter an absentee ballot application, and 19 states require voters to apply for mail-in ballots themselves.
“Six states have eliminated at least half of their polling places for the 2020 election: California, Kentucky, Maryland, Nevada, New Jersey, and North Dakota,” Vice reported. California‘s cuts comprised nearly half of all cuts in the nation.
In Maryland, Republican Gov. Larry Hogan blocked a proposal to send absentee ballots to every voter, and Baltimore has gone from 296 Election Day polling locations to just 24 — leaving roughly 19,000 eligible voters per polling location.
Reducing the number of in-person voting locations can make it more difficult for lower-income people to vote. A recent study by Boston University and Harvard University found that whether or not voters had a car had a significant effect on their likelihood of voting. According to the study, 66% of voters with access to a vehicle voted in the 2018 midterm election — only 36% without access to a car voted.
The implications of the study have a disproportionate effect on minority communities, where more than one in four black voters lack access to a car.
A Pew Research study found that 39% of all voters plan to vote by mail, and another 21% intend to vote in-person before Election Day. It remains to be seen how the remaining 33% of voters who will be voting in-person on Nov. 3 will be affected by the cut number of polling locations.
