Some Republicans in the legislature think so, claiming that it will ensure our elections are as clean and fair as possible.
But others are saying this will decrease voter participation, and some even call it “voter suppression.
But what are the facts?
Fewer days of early voting…same number of votes
Research shows that decreasing days for early voting does not depress voter turnout—and some studies have even linked it to increased voter turnout.
And that’s not all.
I’m sure this won’t come as a surprise to you, but counties often spend hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars (and countless hours) maintaining voting sites for weeks.
It’s expensive and exhausting.
In other words, reducing early voting days saves a lot of money and time for North Carolinians.
So how can we save money and ensure participation?
A steady fact of life is that we can’t make everyone happy. However, there is a fair compromise.
One of the complaints about early voting in North Carolina is that most counties don’t allow voting on Sundays (when some data shows many African-Americans vote).
But if we extend voting to just one Sunday during the early voting period, we can increase access for communities across North Carolina.
In addition to that, we can reduce the number of early voting days across the state. By pairing these two (pretty common sense) ideas together, we can save money and ensure fair opportunities to vote.
Do you think high-income counties spend the most money per student? It sounds plausible. But the answer might surprise you—some of North Carolina’ poorest counties are the ones shelling out the big bucks on education. Read to find out more.
Sadly, our state has a long history of electoral candidates illegally buying votes. Recently, a candidate in the Democratic primary accused a competitor of paying for votes. She’s filed a court petition, but if history is any indication, this case may take years to resolve. And many offenders are never even caught or punished in the first place. Find out more about vote buying in North Carolina.
Remember when Gov. Cooper made all those executive orders during COVID based on “science”? Those who opposed him were presented as selfish and irresponsible. But many of his orders were simply autocratic violations of citizens’ and business’ rights—with little or no relation to the actual science. Read on to see just how far many of his orders went.
Join The Carolina Journal’s Editor-in-Chief Donna King and John Locke Foundation’s Mitch Kokai to discuss our May poll! This poll breakfast will be at City Club in downtown Raleigh.
