The primary election chaos in Georgia on Tuesday prompted Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon to put out a call for volunteers to become poll workers for the 2020 elections.
In the aftermath of Georgia fiasco, Minnesota needs poll workers
June 13, 2020 at 7:15PM
The Peach State's primary on Tuesday was anything but peachy with hourslong waits, problems with voting machines and shortages of ballots and poll workers, particularly in heavily minority counties. Georgia election officials called it "unacceptable" and vowed to investigate.
Simon, who has been pushing for expanded mail-in voting in Minnesota, sees Georgia and Wisconsin (which had similar problems in April) as harbingers of what could happen here, especially if the COVID-19 pandemic does not significantly subside by November.
"What happened in Georgia this week was a warning to Minnesota," he said in a statement Thursday. "Voters in many areas of the state found themselves waiting in line for multiple hours and faced with voting equipment difficulties, caused mostly by a shortage of poll workers. We saw similar problems in April, as the voters in Wisconsin's primary were faced with no choice but to wait in long lines because there simply weren't enough people to staff polling places."
One roadblock is that poll workers tend to skew older — the demographic most affected by the coronavirus. Said Simon: "We need others to take their place."
Kevin Diaz
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