Here's Where It Gets Interesting - Thank you for Voting with Erin Geiger Smith

Episode Date: August 16, 2021

In this episode, Sharon interviews Erin Geiger Smith who is a lawyer-turned-journalist and the author of Thank You for Voting. If you’ve been paying attention to headlines in the past few months, you know the conversation around voting laws is now more heated than ever. But why? To give us a better look into why we are here now, Erin walks us through the history of voting in the U.S., covering everything from voter suppression tactics to why some women refused to eat until they were given the right to vote. As well, Erin debunks commonly believed myths about voting and provides us with practical and fun tips on how we can increase voter turnout in our communities. Lastly, Sharon and Erin discuss the ways the media reports on voting issues and why voting laws should not be partisanized. For more information on this episode including all resources and links discussed go to https://www.sharonmcmahon.com/podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Interior Chinatown is an all-new series based on the best-selling novel by Charles Yu about a struggling Asian actor who gets a bigger part than he expected when he witnesses a crime in Chinatown. Streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. Friends, thank you so much for joining me this week. I have a fantastic guest. I know you're going to love this conversation. This is with author Erin Geiger-Smith, who is an attorney. She is a journalist, and she's written a fascinating book called Thank You for Voting. And she really knows her stuff when it comes to what it took for everyone in the United States to be able to vote. And she also has some really interesting,

innovative ideas for how we could improve voting in the future. So let's dive into this fascinating conversation with author Erin Geiger-Smith. I'm Sharon McMahon. And welcome to the Sharon Says So podcast. Oh my goodness, Erin, thank you so much for joining me today. This is a topic that Americans feel very passionately about in multiple directions. A lot of Americans feel like we are doing a lot to suppress voting in the United States. And a lot of Americans feel like we're not doing enough to ensure that voting is fair, that nothing untoward is going on. You've seen this just heat up dramatically over the last six months or so. And I want to get back into that. But before we dive deeply into what is going on with voting in America today, tell everybody

a little bit more about your career path. How did you get to study this issue, write about this issue? Tell us more about how you landed here. Sure. And thank you for having me. I'm excited to talk to you. Sometimes when I say my career path out loud, it sounds like a straight line. And then sometimes I think, how did I get here?

So here it is. I started my career as a lawyer. I worked at large law firms in Houston and New York doing giant company versus giant company fighting over some giant contract. I had been a journalism major in undergrad, but had always planned to go to law school. And at that time I was a stick to the plan type of girl. So I actually enjoyed being a lawyer. I loved the writing and research aspect of it, but I just couldn't get being a journalist out of my head. I'm a news junkie. I have been my whole life. I just couldn't stop thinking about it. And so I went to Columbia's

journalism graduate program because I knew no one in media. And I thought that would be the best way to sort of make that transition. And it really was. And then after that, I started my journalism career as a legal reporter because that's where I was comfortable. And it was a good way to get my feet wet. And I worked at Reuters, which is a wonderful giant news organization. And so not only did I have to write a couple of stories a day on giant lawsuits, but I also got to watch that newsroom operate, which is very exciting. So you have the photographers who just literally came back from war and then the people covering arts and then someone yelling about some giant stock tanking. So it was very fun and exciting. And then the 2016 election season happened. And I think for

so many people that felt like a ground shaking event. And in the media, it really did too. Number one, when you're a reporter, you're nosy and you want to be in the middle of the biggest story. It felt like all politics all the time. And then on a personal level, I realized that even though I'd gone to law school, even though I had covered Supreme court cases, even though I knew enough, I thought, about voting rights history, I all of a sudden felt like I didn't know enough. I wanted to look at how the media had covered it more closely. I wanted to understand what happened with polling. I didn't know more about the electoral college and just what made people show up at the ballot box

because our voter turnout is so low. And the more I researched, the more I just was stunned by voter turnout in general, and then especially voter turnout among young people below 50% in many presidential elections for the 18 to 29 year olds. And I just thought we have to do better. So that's a long way of saying I was trying to figure out what my part in covering politics and voting and elections could be. And I was scrolling Instagram one day, as we all spend too much time doing, and Reese Witherspoon was interviewing the author Ann Patchett. And Ann, who wrote Balcanto and Commonwealth and is one of my favorite authors, said she was going to write a book, nonfiction, on women and voting. I said to

myself, I want to be a part of that. That sounds like a project that would be right up my alley. And so because I had covered so many books, topics, and stories for the Wall Street Journal, it wasn't totally out of left field for me to email Ann's publicist. And so I said, look, if Ann needs help researching or conducting background interviews, I would love to do it. It just sounds like a great project. Honestly, never thought that would go anywhere. It was just this email I sent, but Anne got back to me really quickly and we hit it off and our idea for the book was the same. And so it was just going to be my side project to help me learn more and be a part of this process and a book I was really excited about. But instead of it being a side project, I became obsessed, which was supposed to be 10 hours a week. And me doing my J job

became 40 hours and way more. And Anne saying, I think you need to tone it down. Like we're not doing the book tomorrow. You're obsessed. And about 10 months into the research, she came to me and said she needed more time working on her novel. And she was like, this is your book. You're obsessed. You've done all the work. You got to do this. And will you do this?

And so I immediately was like, sure, I'll do it. And within a week, I had to come up with a full proposal. And at that point, it was into 2018. So it was just a sprint to then start reporting. I'd been doing so much historical research and then it was time to go to voting conferences and meet young voters and go to the Supreme Court and all of the things. And so I was always circling around the topic. And then that somehow led to the path of writing this book and spending two plus years immersed in the world of voting. Wow. I always

love meeting people who've developed incredible passions for a topic because I know what that's like. And I always find other people's passions so fascinating. And anytime I meet someone like you, especially because we have a lot of overlapping interests, I'm always like, oh my gosh, I have so much to learn. Like how much time do we have? You have to lot of overlapping interests. Yeah, absolutely. I'm always like, oh my gosh, I have so much to learn. Like how much time do we have? You have to learn forever. Absolutely. Well, hats off to you for finding a passion

and really running with it. And then you're able to offer this as a service, as knowledge for the rest of us to become more informed, better educated humans. I love it. Thank you. I mean, that's the goal of journalism and its best form is to inform others. And I love the title of the book, Thank You for Voting. Tell me where your title

came from. It came from research I found very early in the process that talked about mailers, which actually do work to get people out to vote, like actual pieces of mail. And some of them basically were pretty rude saying, hey, I noticed you didn't vote in the last election. It'd be really nice if you showed up for the one upcoming. And that motivated people to vote, but it also made them very angry. The groups and politicians that did it got a lot of letters saying, hey, jerks, stop snooping and get out of my mailbox. But they discovered that if they sent these sort of preemptive thank you notes that say, hey, there's an election coming up. I know you're a good citizen. Thank you so much for voting in the upcoming election. It was nearly

very close to as effective as the ones that made people angry. So we just loved this idea of thank you so much for voting. Let me remind you and tell you when it is and please show up. And so it was the sort of polite and subversive joy of thank you for voting that got us the title. And I just loved that study that people will do something if you thank them kindly. It almost sounds like you're asking them for a favor and then you're saying thank you. It works. It's one of the things that helps move the marker a little bit to get people to the polls. I love it. All right. So if you have not read Aaron's book yet, it is really divided into three sections. And the first section talks a lot about the history of voting in the United States. And I always think history is incredibly important to learn because we do

not understand truly where we are without knowing where we've come from. Talk to me more. Let's start with the idea that not everybody, when this country was founded, was allowed to vote. And over time that has changed, but how did we get to the point of everyone being allowed to vote? The fact that nearly everyone over 18 in our country can vote is something that we're super proud of. But I think it's so important for us to really recognize and understand how very long it took us to get to that point. There are people's parents and grandparents who are alive right now who were not able to vote when their time came of age. So it's really recent history, number one. But number two, we have to sort of wrap our minds

around the idea that it was so often one step forward, two steps back when it came to voting rights for the different groups. We have these huge voting landmark dates that we look to proudly, like the 15th Amendment in 1870, giving Black men the right to vote. Though that was followed by the Reconstruction period, where we had huge numbers of Black men voting and being elected to state and federal office. I mean, it was really a wonderful time in our history, but immediately Jim Crow law started chipping away with that. So you get the right, and then people in back rooms and sometimes at that period front rooms are starting to say, we can have literacy tests still. We can have poll taxes. We can have

grandfather clauses. It was all of those things that made the arc of history so long between 1870 and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. And then, of course, to bring it to the present day, the Voting Rights Act is still used in lawsuits filed to enforce the right. The other thing about our voting history is really just grasping how long these battles were. At the beginning of the country, there were states where women had voting rights and where free Black men had voting rights. But we took those away in the 1830s in some cases. I'm circling around. My point is that people had to fight so long and have really specific campaigns, had protests, had parades. I mean, in the women's right movement is one that I think people don't really

realize. The first huge women's rights convention was 1848. They talked about voting in Seneca Falls. And then it wasn't until 1920 that the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote. So that's generations of women who really built on the work of those before them. You know, it wasn't always pretty within the women's rights movement, there was racism. There was concern about, was it fair that Black men could vote before women could vote? Fair, obviously not being the right word, but that was, you know, arguments of the time. We have in our history these very ugly times, and then these Americans who were just dogged in trying to get access for themselves and others. With Native Americans and other

immigrant groups, citizenship was withheld for a long time, keeping those groups from voting. It's such an up and down period. And when we look at current voter suppression, I think it helps to understand that not everybody is coming to it with the idea of wanting everyone to vote. And we have to look closely at the barriers, especially thinking at the time, like literacy tests didn't sound like on its face, a racially charged law, but the fact that black Americans weren't giving access to education makes it very hard to learn to read and pass the nearly impossible literacy test. Mm-hmm. Talk a little bit more about the journey to women's suffrage.

I think it's so important to reiterate that we always want societal governmental change immediately. Like, one more day that this injustice continues is one day too long. And I completely understand that viewpoint. And yet that's not how most change occurs. Most change occurs very slowly. I mean, the arc of history is long as a very, the most accurate of quotes for the women's rights movement. You know, they started, it was a few women having tea at a friend's house seeing someone's new baby. And they talked about the idea for a convention and very soon pulled one together. Suffrage was about two-thirds down the list of their women's rights proposals, but it was on there.

And so that was 1848. And those conventions started happening. They started gathering local people, Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass, a longtime women's suffrage champion. He really is one of the heroes of women's suffrage, along with all of the women. You know, they had these conventions to talk about it and bring the ideas about. And then that transferred into a legal argument, telling lawmakers and Congress, hey, you know, the Constitution says citizens have the right to vote. That's me. I'm a citizen. So the legal argument started taking play. And then into the early

1900s and to when it was passed in 1920, there was a decision to become extremely visible, to have these, we call them women's suffrage parades, but what do you call it when a ton of people march down the street with signs demanding change? They're protests. We call them parades so often, but it was mass protests, directly calling out soon-to-be President Woodrow Wilson, saying, you're wrong. These have to change. There were hunger strikes. There were White House picketing every day. There was the lobbying of Congress to actually pass this amendment. I mean, it was decades between when the Women's Suffrage Amendment was introduced to pass. And it required

women learning from what the generation before them did, and then adapting and being willing to change. You know, I talk about in the book how these women would have been champions of social media for their pithy phrases, their desire to make a spectacle when necessary. I mean, they dressed all in white or sometimes in black, so they would look like a giant mass of people demanding change. And it just, it really took a long time and a lot of different tactics and a lot of lobbying and legal action. There were some who thought you shouldn't upset Southern white women who didn't want Black women to have the right to vote. So there were a lot of mistakes made. But even at that time, there were women within the movement

pushing back and saying, no way. It needs to be all of us if it's one of us. And I truly think we picture that signing of the amendment with women in long skirts clinking champagne glasses. And instead, it involved being in prison and refusing to eat and massive amounts of telegrams to the White House demanding change. You know, it was really purposeful. When we look at current day protests and the organization of them, it's important to realize really that that's what it takes. It takes organized, not willing to give up effort to see societal change. That change isn't always welcomed by everyone at the time. That's another thing I think about our voting rights is we picture these big wins and they were wins, but even at the time, there was a lot of

people who weren't happy about it. A lot of people not happy. Yes. Because if everybody was happy, then the change would have occurred instantly. Exactly. If we would have been like, let's have steak for dinner. Sure. That sounds fantastic. Great. Let's do it. Visa and open table are dishing up something new. Get access to primetime dining reservations by adding your Visa infinite privilege card to your open table account. From there, you'll unlock first-come, first-served spots at select top restaurants when booking through OpenTable. Learn more at OpenTable.ca forward slash Visa Dining. A&W is now serving Pret Organic Coffee, and you can get a $1 small coffee, a $2 small latte, or like me, a $1 small coffee and a two dollar small latte available now until

november 24th in ontario only the other thing i loved learning about in our history was there was always some people at the start who when it came to voting knew what was right and fair as recognized by the fact that some women and some black men did have the right to vote from the start. It wasn't that we didn't have the idea. It was that people in power are always a little worried about what happens if those who elect them change, you know, they just are, that's the nature of humans. If I'm in power and I want to keep it, you think, well, if we allow a lot of women to vote, then what if that doesn't work out for me? Or, you know, Native Americans in Western states had such large numbers that that was a worry. Like if they all can vote and they don't vote for me, what's going to happen? Like many other things, it was a power struggle rather than certain people aren't qualified or shouldn't be able to vote. I mean,

those words were certainly used, but there was never any good reason to keep people from voting. In all that I read, no one ever had an actual good reason. Tell me more about voter suppression tactics used in the past. And do you see any remnants in the past. And do you see any remnants of voter suppression today? Is this something that we have solidly moved past? Is it something that we should still keep an eye on? Tell me more about voter suppression. When I was researching the book, the best thing that I heard to describe voter suppression was from a civil rights attorney in Texas. And she said, the way to think about voter suppression about voter suppression is voter suppression in the past was like a locked door.

You either didn't have the right to vote or it was just impossible to answer all 30 questions on the literacy test that made no sense. Today's voter suppression is more, the door's locked and I'm gonna give you 20 keys and you just gotta try and try and hope one works. So in the past while we did have a literacy test or poll taxes, what we have now is nothing that fully prevents someone from voting, but there are hurdles. And if you're

someone who is younger, or maybe you're a first generation American whose parents didn't teach you to vote, those hurdles can be pretty effective in keeping you from voting. So when we think of voter suppression now, it can be something as not enough polling places in a county. So lines are really long. There aren't many Americans who love waiting in six hour lines. Right. There aren't many Americans who love waiting in six hour lines. Right. But when you look at the data and the I haven't seen full 2020 data yet, but for 2018, Black Americans and Latino Americans waited much longer than white Americans to vote.

They just face longer lines because there weren't enough polling places or the machinery was out of date, those sorts of things. You know, shortly before the 2020 election, I was doing a radio appearance. We were talking about voting specifically in the state of Minnesota, which has same day voter registration. Yeah. You guys are stars a lot of the time, Minnesota. Somebody messaged me to say, I am from Minnesota and I just got a job transfer to another state. Can I vote online in Minnesota? And I was like, no, you can't vote online, but you can vote where you live now. If you demonstrate that you live there, you have a lease or, you know, whatever. And so they went to investigate and realized that they couldn't register to vote in their new state because of those 30 day requirements. And so they were

actually kind of distraught that they were literally being denied the right to vote because they couldn't vote in the state they came from. They didn't live here anymore and would have had to travel here. And they couldn't vote in their new state because of that residency requirement. That was very, very upsetting to them. It is. A lot of people would say, well, they should have planned ahead. They should have registered 30 days in advance. But you don't get a copy of your lease until you show up to actually move in there. Right.

You know what I mean? Like, you don't always have what you need and then be able to be there in person 30 days prior to the election. Yeah. So that is just one example that I'm personally familiar with, with somebody who was quite upset that they were not able to vote because of the differences in. Yeah, it's tough. So my because I was working on this book and we were let's just say I was talking about voting a lot at my house in the last couple of years. And my husband signed up to be a poll worker for the 2020 election. And we don't have same day registration in New York. And he had multiple people. I mean, this is anecdotal.

He's one man at one polling station. But multiple people, mostly young, who showed up thinking they could vote. And he was like, it's heartbreaking turning away an 18 year old who's there excited to vote. And they can't only because we don't have that in New York state. Whereas if they were in Colorado or your state, it wouldn't be a problem. And so it was important to me to write the book and to talk about these things, to try to encourage people to know the different options in different states. So if your state doesn't have something that would make it easier to vote or make it easier for young people to vote or different racial groups to vote,

start putting that on your list of things to talk to your local politicians about. Do you have automatic voter registration? Do you have same-day registration? Is voting by mail no excuse in your state? What are your drop boxes going to look like? You know, there are all these things that can really make a difference in turnout if we pay attention to them and if we know what goes on place to place. Let's talk for a second about voter turnout because it is a uniquely American thing that we don't vote that particularly well. We don't. We don't. We don't vote.

Except it's the first step. Yes, we don't vote particularly well, especially in local elections. We're real bad at that. And I was teaching a government class once, and we were talking about voter turnout and what factors go into voter turnout. I was teaching in Maryland at the time, which statistically should have fantastic voter turnout because it's a very well-educated, wealthy state statistically, people who tend to vote more often. And yet Minnesota runs circles around Maryland all day long in terms of voter turnout. And I was asking my class, like, why do you think that is? It's a complicated issue. I don't really expect 16 year olds to be able to.

Although listen, from the mouth of babes, honestly. Well, here was their answer. They thought about it for a while. And one boy raised his hand and said, because there's nothing else to do there. As well, you know, as someone from a small town in Texas, I can feel that answer, but we don't show up to vote there. But talk a little bit more about what affects voter turnout. Why do some states have fantastic voter turnout and some states really struggle in that area? Yeah, it is an area where there is no absolute bullet answer because there are so many factors. no absolute bullet answer because there are so many factors. But some of the things that we were alluding to, like how easy is it to vote? How much does the state encourage it? I mean, in a way, Minnesota is so proud of your voter turnout. And before the election comes around, there's all of

these news articles and stories talking about what great voters you are and sort of the thank you for voting. It encourages you to show up. But Texas and Tennessee, for instance, very much struggle with low voter turnout. And they have very long registration periods. Texas has a longer early voting period now, but some states that have short early voting periods, New York just got early voting, like literally in the last couple of years, we just got early voting. It's those sorts of access issues, no excuse voting, things like that. In local elections, which are truly a problem everywhere. I mean, just not enough people vote in local elections.

You hear people say that their vote won't count or it isn't important. And any expert that you talk to, any voting expert, whether it's an academic or people who are in the field, they stress over and over that the biggest influence on voter turnout is you, you on your friends, families, and colleagues. And so if those who really care about voting and want to encourage it, just take the time to inform friends, family, and colleagues of when voter registration deadlines are, how to find your early voting

period, to sign up for TurboVote. Anyone who's listening to this who hasn't signed up for TurboVote, go do it because they text you every election, local, national, and tell you when to show up and where your polling place is. And it's little things like that that can make a big difference. But if you're talking to someone who says their vote doesn't matter, it's important to ask them what is it that they care about. And often it's going to be their own education or their child's education or student debt or healthcare. And all of those things are really affected by your local officials. I think coronavirus really taught us all that our mayor and our governor can have a massive effect on our lives. So in convincing someone to vote, find out what their issues are and then

help them understand who makes those decisions. You know, people who care about police reform, well, district attorneys are elected in many, many, many places. And so you want to make sure that you show up for those elections. I mean, it's just the local elections. We really struggle in that area. The other way to think about it, there's two. One, your local elections are like the farm team for who is eventually going to be your senator. You really need to show up for those who are at the quote unquote bottom, even though it's such important work. I don't like describing it that way. But the other thing is, say you are a blue person who lives in a red state or the opposite. in a red state or the opposite. If you're in the minority party, it is so important to show up for local elections because that's how the national party and the state party decide where to send

money. You know, if you are in a minority party and don't show up and vote, that's just signaling, yeah, we're not going to have any serious races here. We're not going to be competitive here. You have to show up and show people that your group can be competitive. And the other thing is politicians like to keep their jobs. So the closer a race is, the more likely that a winning politician is to listen to the concerns of the minority party. You know, you really want to show up and vote your values because the more people that share your values that vote, the more likely your concerns are going to be listened to. I mean, that's a huge thing with younger people. One of my favorite quotes in the book is there's a college professor who tells his students, you know why people care about my social security, but they

don't care about your student debt? Because I show up and vote because I'm an old white man who shows up to vote every time. And if you young people in my very diverse college class want people to care about what you need, you got to show up. And if you're already a person who cares and does show up, you have to help your friends because with young people barely voting over 50% in this election, and that was a big leap, that means you may think all your friends are voting, but they're not. They're not. I mean, half of you nearly are staying home. So, you know, make sure and confirm.

The other thing about my one vote doesn't count is if you feel like your one vote is not enough, then make your vote 10 votes by getting your friends and family and colleagues to show up. I think what employers can do to help make sure their employees vote is huge. And if every company in America tried to have 100% voter registration, the impact that would have on turnout is massive. And there are companies that already do it. Patagonia makes a huge effort and has signed up thousands of companies to agree to give their employees time off to vote.

So wherever you work, if you're in an office of two people or 50,000, raise your hand to help organize voter registration at your company or be the point person who agrees to email and say voter registration deadline is in two weeks. Here's the link to register. Here's what you need to do. I mean, we can all make such a big impact in our direct community, whether it's your school or your church or your office.

I think corporations getting more involved in promoting voting, which can and should be done in a nonpartisan way, is a huge key to helping turnout. That's such a great point. That's such a great point that we're not asking corporations to contribute, you know, like, hey, give a million dollars to this cause. We're not asking people to dedicate a year of their life, that these are actually very simple things. Very simple, yeah. Somebody could do with very minimal cost to a company, very little amount of employee time spent on this. Yeah. It could really change things. Yes. It's very little time

and it's very little money. Where it has been a success is when the person at the top, a CEO or another officer does a short video and just says, we care about voting as Americans, as members of this capitalistic society, we need you to show up and vote, you know, not vote in a way that's helpful for our company, not even say that, but just think that it is important for us to participate in the democratic process. And you really just need, if you're a small company, you need one person. If you're have a lot of different geographic locations, you need a person in every place. But it's just about that one person calling the local League of Women Voters and asking them to set up a voting drive and making sure you send out the dates. And then what also really works, because we are who we are, is a little bit of voting swag.

X company votes, you know, a stop and repeat on election day where you can post that you voted. It's very little effort and very little money, and it can make a giant difference. I love that. And I love the idea that one individual, even if you don't work in a big office or work for a big company, that you could be like, you know what? I'm going to text my friends and be like, just remember the early voting period is going to close this day. It's going to open this day and this day, literally sending a quick text message, a quick email, just a couple little reminders. Just a reminders. Exactly. I did. I made like a checklist for the end of the book that even has little boxes. You can check if you're that

type of person, which I am absolutely that type of person that says choose five friends, 30 days out, 20 days friends, 30 days out, 20 days out, 10 days out, text them this, and then agree. Now that we're all coming out of our shells, it was harder in November, 2020, but then meet up and celebrate that you voted, have some pizza or a cocktail and wear that sticker. We need to make voting. Number one, we have to teach people to do it. All of these steps, registration, find your location. Do you want to vote by mail? All of those things. And then we just need to make it a little more fun. And those things work. Voting parties that cities have are another thing

that help really encourage people to come to the polls. I've heard that in Australia, they have like, they grill sausages. And you get, when you exit, there's somebody out there grilling sausages. It's like a voting and sausage day. Yeah. I mean, that's what they look forward to. Two things. It's, you know, we started at, in the earliest days of our country, sometimes voting was held in taverns.

And that did, of course, mean women weren't there. And I'm not saying there weren't all sorts of problems with it, but people showed up to vote when it was at a tavern and a long party. And so we can safely take some of those ideas of making it a true gathering and something to look forward to. You talk about in the book this idea that voting is a learned behavior. Nobody exits their mother's womb knowing how to vote. Right, exactly. And it's a skill that you can learn. And it's a skill that

is imparted to your children. It's a skill that can be taught to your coworkers. Absolutely. It becomes a cultural expectation like it is here in Minnesota, where it's just like, yeah, you better come back from lunch with an idea. Right, exactly. You know? Yeah. Talk more about the learned behavior of voting. Sure. I wanted to say that voting is hereditary because if parents do it and teach their kids, they are more likely to do it. But obviously, linguistically, that's not exactly correct. So I went with learned behavior. My idea of it to really make it simple from parent to child is make sure you take your child to vote. Yes. But also make it a learning experience of you telling them, if you're going in Texas, I had to register to do this 30 days ahead. Like I couldn't just show up.

I had to do it. I had to read about what was on my ballot so I can know who to vote for. And then also take that time to teach a little bit of the history. So, you know, as a white woman in 1920 was the first time I would have been able to vote nationwide. So when I told my son that he was five at the time, I was like, so your dad could have always voted, but I wouldn't have able to vote until 1920 to which he said, that is crazy. I was like, it is crazy. You're right. If you are a black woman in this country, especially in the South, tell your child, I wouldn't have been able to vote until 1965 and discuss the work that it took. And I think that both helps kids understand the importance of it and the importance of protecting it for yourself and for others. Also, it can be fun.

You know, look up when they will be able to register in your state. Some states have preregistration at 16 and 17 years old. So look up that date and tell your child this is the day that you will be able to register to vote. This is the first presidential election you'll be able to vote in. First time you'll be able to register to vote. This is the first presidential election you'll be able to vote in. First time you'll be able to vote for governor. I mean, if you have a kid who's into dates, you can go far down the rabbit hole, but there's just a way to make it fun and make it a habit, which is another important thing about showing up in local elections. Local elections give you lots of opportunity to bring your child and to explain what it is you're voting for and who these

politicians are and find a politician. If you can't find one in the present and find one in the past, like show your child what you think a public servant should be. You know, it just helps them get excited and make plans. And if you have a college student, kid going off to college, help them figure out how they're going to either vote where they're in college or vote absentee, because it's not so easy. I wish that it was, but like your friend who had every intention of voting and didn't know the specific rules. So it's stressing that voting takes planning, both in informing yourself and in the process is something that can go a really long way. And then once your kid knows how to do it, hopefully they'll help five friends and their

college dorm. We have to do so much better at making it more accessible and more convenient. But at the same time, if everyone does their part and helps others, these hurdles will seem less like hurdles. And yes, my oldest child went off to college this year and that was, this is going to be his first presidential election to vote in. And so we had at least five conversations about what is your voting plan? Are you, how are you going to achieve this? Do you want to vote early when you're in town visiting? Do you want to bring your student ID and where you live and vote locally to your college? Do you want to vote absentee? What's the plan? And he was initially like, I don't know what the plan is. I'm just going to vote. I'm like, okay, but saying

I'm just going to vote, does it actually work? Right. Yeah. We're at that easy, but it's not. Saying I'm just going to vote, even though Minnesota actually makes it pretty easy to register same day. His driver's license doesn't have his college address. So these are things you have to plan for. And so it really did take five conversations from a nagging mom and he actually cares about politics. He's interested in it. Um, it's not that he's like, I don't even care about that. But it really did take five reminders for me to be like, what is your voting plan?

Because not voting is not an option. Right, that's not. But it's so true. I kept just becoming more and more empathetic and then trying to help other people or convince other people to think that way too.

Not just complain that these 18 and 29 year olds aren't voting. We have to help them. They care a lot about the issues. They do understand that the issues affect them and their family, but you just have to help them take the next step. And I just want to stress all the time that that's on us. It is on us that are outside of that 18 to 29 year old age group to help those who are in it. You know, we cannot blame them. We need to blame ourselves because we haven't done the work of teaching. And if we start doing it, then we won't have to change. But you know, it is, I really feel like it's on us to help these younger voters get out there and they made great strides. And there are

certainly so many people in that age group doing just mind-boggling, fantastic, inspiring work, but we got to help them out. Yes. I also made a point this year of bringing my eight-year-old to vote with me. I let her help me fill out some of the bubbles and she fed it into the machine. And then when we got back to the car, I was like, well, is that what you were expecting it to be? She's like, no, what were you expecting? And she was like, I thought you were going to have to write everybody's names on a slip of paper and put it in a box. And I was going to have to remember how to spell everybody's names. Well, I'm glad it was a less stressful experience for her.

spell everybody's names. Well, I'm glad it was a less stressful experience for her. Yeah. To remember anyone's the spelling of anyone's names, but her concept of voting was like in a third grade class. Yeah. Like a test. Yeah. For, Oh yeah, exactly. Who do you want to vote for? Put their name in this box. Yeah. Just teaching her from the very beginning, this actually is really not hard. It takes five minutes. You know, for me, I'm lucky that I can just roll right up to my polling place and be like, hello, I'd like to vote. And not everybody has that experience, but I want to demystify the experience for my young child. So she doesn't grow up feeling like it's this big insurmountable, I don't know how to do that. It's so important because if a child hasn't been taught that, you know, there aren't a lot of 18 or 25 or frankly, 45 year olds who like to go into something that they're unsure how it works.

Yeah. They've never been in there. We made big strides this time actually, and having poll workers of all ages and races, but a lot of times, you know, you're 18 and the poll worker is the kind lady who's 75. You don't feel like you have a lot in common. You don't know that you can ask questions. I always tell my son you have a lot in common. You don't know that you can ask questions. I always tell my son to ask a question to the poll worker, whatever it is. A few years ago, he asked a question about Batman. So, you know, but just any question to know that they are, the poll workers are there to help you. And if you don't know something, that's what they're for. When we, my son went with me and when he fed it in, it said, thank you for voting.

And because he had been living with a book so long, he was like, thank you for voting. It was very cute. As if the entire New York state polling had been dedicated to the book. Yeah, it was very cute, but he was very excited. But yeah, plan ahead. If you are in a place with a long line, I say, you know, make sure you bring some entertainment and some snacks. Now you know how to do it. It demystifies the process so that it does not become intimidating as when they're adults. And if you vote once and you vote twice, you vote a third time,

you're very likely a lifetime voter. So self-identify as a voter. Yeah. I love that. The I am a voter campaign was one of my favorite things in 2018 and 2020. This idea of it's part of your identity, who you are. Yeah. I want to talk a little bit more about the role of the media in voting because you have that really unique perspective of being a journalist and talk to me more about where you see the strengths of the media in terms of voting in America and where you see maybe some of the weaknesses. Sure. I mean, it's a big topic that I think about constantly and that those in the media who are covering politics are also thinking about it constantly and wanting to do

better. I mean, the goal really is providing accurate information when it comes to election time or even now, honestly, all these stories that talk about new laws. I wish we did much better in teaching the mechanics as well. I wish every story that talked about an election coming up had a sidebar that said when the registration deadline is and those sorts of things. You know, my biggest concern about it is I think discussion of voting and voting laws has become extremely partisan. Yes. And that it shouldn't be a partisan issue. I don't think that journalists have to both sides democracy. You do have to report in an objective way. I think objective journalism is extremely important, but I think being really straightforward about this isn't true. This mention of voter fraud is trying to convince you of something that isn't real.

I think that journalists can be pro-voting without being partisan because it is what our democracy is based on. So I really think a lot about how we can do better on being clear to people that certain laws are chipping away at their right to vote and that that's sort of not OK. I mean, it's a tough discussion to have because it is always important to note what a politician is saying. But if they're saying something that isn't accurate, I think we need to be even better about making that clear. And it's sometimes hard. The other thing is I think we need to continue to do much better on showing our work and where stories come from. You know, like when people are trying to figure out what political news to read or any news really about political news, I always say it's like Hamilton. You want the person in the room where it happened. Try to get the story

from the reporter who was there or who talked to the people who were there and not how the story's been changed seven times till your aunt shares it on Facebook. You know, like trust your local news and big name media organizations have been around for sometimes more than a hundred years, generally because they have a history of accuracy. And so if people can trust that a little bit, I think that would make people more comfortable finding news sources you trust, read a wide variety of things, never just read one of anything, you know, and then if you see a story that sounds crazy, make sure you find it somewhere else too. You know, if it's so crazy, it's the news business is competitive and someone's going to want to match that as quickly

as possible and say, yeah, me too. If you see a story that's crazy and don't see three reputable news sources also reporting it, yes, then there's a good chance you have some bad information. But I mean, that was, that was a long answer of what we can do better and how I hope readers can come to trust us a little more. Yes. Well, Erin, thank you so much. Thanks for having us. It was very fun. Yes, we will. I hope that we can chat again soon.

Thank you so much for your time. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to the Sharon Says So podcast. I am truly grateful for you. And I'm wondering if you could do me a quick favor. Would you be willing to follow or subscribe to this podcast or maybe leave me a rating or a review? Or if you're feeling extra generous, would you share this episode on your Instagram stories or with a friend? All of those things help podcasters out so much. I cannot wait to have

another mind-blown moment with you next episode. Thanks again for listening to the Sharon Says So podcast.