I voted on the first day of advanced voting today at the Boots Ward Recreation Center on Dallas Highway, Marietta, Georgia. The line was short, but one of the election staff members said my wife and I could go to the front if you are 75 or older. He assumed we were old. We are. We’re in our 80s. So we strolled down the lawn to the door and went right in. I asked another election staff if we could keep hold of our Starbucks coffees. He said, as long as the lid is on. I was amazed. Georgia has a rule that you can’t give out water to others, but you can carry a bottle of water.

So with coffee in our hands, lid on, we entered one of thousands of rooms around the United States to cast our ballots. There were actually two rooms. A line of eight staff members sat at numbered stations to ‘check us in.’ We gave our driver’s licenses to the election member, checked our contact information, and signed the voting agreement.

Once you have an election card, you are directed to a voting booth. You insert the card into the machine and begin to vote.

A Felon on the Ballot

The ballot wasn’t wrong, except for the first page. At the top of the vote for president was Donald Trump’s name. A convicted felon, rapist, and fraudster, his name is on the ballot, and millions of people will vote for the guy. In some states, you can’t vote if you are a felon. Yet, felon Trump is on the ballot.

So, an interesting question is whether Trump can vote in his home state of Florida. According to Flordia law:

If a felon’s conviction didn’t involve murder or sexual abuse (Trump is not a felon because of sexual abuse because it was a civil case brought on E. Jean Carroll), they lose the right to vote until they do the following:

• Pay all of their restitution, fines and other fees in full
• Complete their sentence, including probation and parole

Trump has not been sentenced because the judge pushed the sentencing until after the November election. But it turns out that since Trump is not in prison in New York State, he can vote in Florida. Nicholas Riccardi explains “that Florida defers to other states’ disenfranchisement rules for residents convicted of out-of-state felonies. In Trump’s case, New York law only removes the right to vote for people convicted of felonies when they’re incarcerated. Once they’re out of prison, their rights are automatically restored, even on parole, per a 2021 law passed by the state’s Democratic legislature.”

Time for You to Vote

As I mentioned above, this was the first voting day in Georgia. Some reports tally that more than 275,00 Georgians went to the polls today. The state’s race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump is very close. I debate who will win the contest in Georgia. The outcome will be decided by who gets out to vote. Georgia has a record of making it harder for some people to vote. When he was Secretary of State, Governor Kemp removed hundreds of thousands of voters from the rolls. In 2024, the state legislature passed a law allowing citizens to question and then ask that names they submit to the county election officials be removed. So far, most of these requests have been rebuffed. The Georgia State Elections Board has pulled some last minute rule changes that have angered folks on both sides of the isle. They recently passed a rule that says that all ballots must be hand counted and there should be a match between the paper ballots and the electronic vote tally. I voted today, and I printed out my ballot, and then had the ballot scanned. A record is therefore secured when the ballot is scanned meaning there should be a 1 to 1 correspondence.

The last time there was an election for president in Georgia, Donald Trump and his allies plotted to overthrow the vote in the state. According to the Fulton County Attorney, Trump led a Racketeering Conspiracy and was indicted by the county.

Trump and his allies are ready to launch an attack on the outcome of the election. They will file law suits against counties and states in the electoral college swing states.

Like 2020, the election will not be over until the next president takes the oath of office on January 20, 2025.

The only way to prevent another Trump term in office is to vote against him this month and on November 5th. Everyone’s vote is crucial, especially if you live in one of the swing states.