I recently volunteered as a poll watcher for the Republican party in my state. I know, it’s insane to support your local party and that I should just homestead and jack-off to goat-humping instead. Because fighting for the future in politics is for stupid people. You need to build a community, even as you get constantly kicked out of your community for being a smart ass.
Anyway, I had a recent training session, which was really just an introductory session to what the task involves. It was a pretty standard training session where they went over the rules and the different roles that I could fill. But there were a few interesting takeaways I got from it:
- People were definitely asking about the electronic ballot machines and hinting at fraud. They were definitely concerned about whether or not they were connected to the Internet. So a lot of people were like me and signing up in order to help keep election fraud from rearing its ugly head.
- In terms of the electronic machines, there are at least four different companies who make them. The presenter made a comment that the localities who used the Dominion machines had discrepancies that weren’t seen in localities who didn’t.
- Despite my state eliminating the Voter ID requirement, it wasn’t really gotten rid of. In actuality, you have to present some form of identification, which can be a utility bill. So really, most people are just going to show their driver’s license anyway because that’s the easiest one to present.
- It’s clear that the majority of people there are looking to help prevent any kind of fraud. Even the GOP party presenter was hinting without outright saying it that there was fraud in the last election.
That’s pretty much it. I haven’t decided if I will just be a poll watcher or an election officer. Or whether I’ll work during the early voting times. But I do want to help out in any way I can so that things go smoothly where I live.