Link: https://www.vote.org/am-i-registered-to-vote/
Warning: you will get texted so use your disposal number.
With all the news about citizens discovering their voter status has been lapsed, and new rules for being a voter, everyone should check.
But also, sometimes you forget. I have new neighbors who finished moving a month ago, and when I asked if they changed their mailing address and checked their voting status, we discovered they weren’t.
It is wild to me that in the US you’re not automatically registered to vote. The idea that you have to go through a manual process to exert one of your most basic constitutional rights is unfathomable to me.
Here when you turn 18 you can just vote. It’s that simple. No registration, no ticking a checkbox somewhere, you can simply go out there and vote the moment you’re 18.
In the USA many states work very hard to remove voters’ registration and voting locations so the folks they don’t want voting can’t place their votes.
You just have to stop thinking the US is an actual democracy and everything will make sense (or rather you will understand why nothing makes sense)
It’s to prevent double voting. Because even federal elections are conducted by the individual states, there is no central register for who has already voted. There’s also early voting. So in theory one could vote on multiple states on the same election.
That’s the official reason, anyway.
Nothing about the US system is particularly geared to prevent double voting.
I get that you don’t have a federal register (something you should really fix tbh) but requiring manual registration when you could, oh idk, simply register people when they are born and then later automatically provide them a unique ID they can vote with? (I’m not even talking a government ID for the purposes of identifying yourself to law enforcement and stuff, I’m talking even just a voter ID for the sake of voting only)
Then have part of the number in that ID identify the state you’re from if you want to prevent crossing borders to double vote (kinda like how credit card numbers have that info on them).
It’s what they do here anyway, I’ve had an ID since I was like 4, and it’s with that document that I and everyone else votes.
Though I know the US is probably too anti-democratic for this and none of the parties in power want to change jack.
We’re the oldest democracy in the world and as such are likely the most poorly designed.
It’s been a proto-democracy for so long, that it has become a pseudo-democracy.
Is Greece that bad politically?
Their comment is based on this criteria:
Countries are classified as democracies if they meet the following conditions:
Executive: The executive is directly or indirectly elected in popular elections and is responsible either directly to voters or to a legislature.
Legislature: The legislature (or the executive if elected directly) is chosen in free and fair elections.
Voting: A majority of adult men has the right to vote.
Source https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/08/countries-are-the-worlds-oldest-democracies/
For anyone interested: the prehistoric origin of democracy, ie before the Greeks, is also interesting
I have a brother in Oregon, they auto register there.
How does one get a disposal number?
“Warning: you will get texted so use your disposal number.”
Umm… What?
You get an SMS so use a spam phone number
Looks like you can leave that field blank, and it’ll still work.
The phone number isn’t a required field and you can just use
user@example.comfor the email. The site tells you whether you’re registered right away, without the need to check any emails they send.My thoughts exactly.
This is the kind of election post that’s necessary.
I hate seeing “Remeber to go vote!” posts the week before an election as if that’s all you need to do. In most places, you need some kind of enrollment activity before they let you vote on the day, bring ID, etc etc.
Haha, get fucked. I already get flooded with emails and text messages because I made some donations in 2020. I’ll never participate by giving up contact info again. Good job poisoning the well, Dems (I donated to Bernie and other progressives, now I’m hounded by first Biden and then Harris campaigns).
Do they not let you unsubscribe?
I’ve treated them like spammers. I figure it’s best not to acknowledge that the account is actively read. But lately I’ve been toying with the idea of trying to unsubscribe from all of them en masse.
Why are you complaining about something you’ve never tried to stop? Either do something about it or STFU
I conflate a thing that sucks when you try to stop it with a thing that’s happening now. You can stfu too.
Its… just one click to stop the emails and texts…
Apparently vote.gov is a thing.
when I asked if they changed their mailing address and checked their voting status, we discovered they weren’t.
They weren’t what?
Registered to vote, pedant.
Oh okay.
Imagine not just getting a letter explaining where to go vote on which day or if you prefer how to vote by post.
Don’t tell me whom I should or should not know.
Only accepts US phone numbers, so probably not for US citizens living abroad.
Phone number is not required. I left it blank and it worked.
Can you lose your voting rights in the USA?
Whaaaaat?
Yep and the person with the most votes isn’t the winner either! It’s super fun and cool living in a non-democracy.
Yes. If you are a convicted felony, you lose your right to vote until you get out and request to get the right back from the state. Each state has their own rules. Some are automatic and some are a pain in the ass.
Some states also have been known to purge voters from their database sometime before an election. They claim it’s either an error or just getting rid of old records of deceased voters. No one believes them though.
Which is how Kemp managed to get “elected” in GA years back
technically yes with a felony conviction, but this is referring to losing your voter registration not your rights
Warning: you will get texted so use your disposal number.
That field was optional. Just don’t put your phone number in at all.
Also it would have been weird if it came back and said I wasn’t registered when I’ve been getting my mail-in test ballots on time and everything.
Doesn’t matter where you are in the world, vote if you can. I’m lucky enough to be in an area of the US where we get mail ballots, so the worst I have to deal with are right wingers complaining mail in ballots lead to fraud and then doing it themselves by dumping mail.
Just as a PSA, if anyone is concerned about malfeasance in the voter registration process, go to your state of residence’s Secretary of State website or the main State Website. I will not post any links becuase if you can’t navigate the web to find an official website I really don’t think you should be voting—sorry kids, mids and olds.
Your state’s Secretary of State website will have instructions on how to both register to vote and to actually vote. Your state’s official website will also have the same information if your state doesn’t have that office and registration is controlled by some other entity.
We (united states citizens) live in a federation and the reality of that is most elections are handled by local powers so there are some ocassional differences in how voting is administrated, key point—go to your locality’s OFFICIAL websites to find how to register to vote.
It really does matter. There are elections beyond the presidency. Hate your senator? vote, hate your Representative? VOTE. HATE YOUR STATE REPS? FUCKING VOTE? Live in a state where ballot initiatives are a thing??? FUCKING VOTE!!!
it doesnt cost money. just register and educate yourself on what’s on the ballot and go to the goddamn polls. there are a lot of issues causing problems right now in the US but at least one thing we can do is go to the ballots on election days and vote based on our convictions.
This. No way in hell I’m entering all that personal info on a non-official website. That’s how you get on voter spam lists…
who’s downvoting and can you explain why?
because the very first thing you say in this post basically amounts to “I think I have the authority to decide the basis on which we determine who deserves to vote”
like, yeah, most people can navigate to their secretary of state websites. And it’s not really your responsibility to have to link the pages anyway.
But doing it for that reason aligns you philosophically with people who think that the illiterate, the elderly, the poor, the disabled, the critically ill, etc. somehow don’t deserve to vote. It aligns you ideologically with other people who think they can decide who deserves to vote, with people who want to disenfranchise others-- in essence, it aligns you ideologically with many Republicans
If someone is so inept that they are incapable of utilizing the internet or otherwise seeking help from a person who they trust, or (shock) reach out to their local authorities to navigate the very simple task of registering to vote then yes, I believe said individual is probably not in a position to cast a meaningful and informed vote. Does that disenfranchise people? Yes. There is a point in which we must draw a line in saying certain individuals are not eligible to participate in this system (which we do all the time; see: minors, felons, etc.)
That being said, my comment is not physically stopping a moron-incapable-of-using-google from registering to vote—further I provided general information on how to do it. I want everyone who can do so to vote.
Your opinion is very weird, friend.
How is wanting people to vote a weird opinion?
Says a group of people don’t deserve to vote.
Claims he wants people to vote.
Your logic is even weirder.
Ah, yes of course, because there can’t be any subtlety to how we feel societal systems be implemented—it must all be all or nothing. Regardless, nothing I posted is blocking people from voting or advocating for actual impediments. I just shared an aside that my personal opinion is that if someone is too stupid to figure out how to vote they probably shouldn’t be voting in the first place.
