Check In 6 October

[tanaqui]

Election day is almost upon us! I'd like to flag up another reminder for everyone to check their voter registration, as some states are being very aggressive about removing people from the rolls for spurious reasons and don't allow various forms of same-day registration or other options to ensure people who are entitled to vote can do so. (And you can bet that certain states will be aggressive post-election about trying to throw out votes to the benefit of Republican candidates.)

Another reminder: minoanmiss left a comment on an old post about voter intimidation near polling and registration places which gives information about the law in all 50 states — a good resource to check if that's the kind of thing that may go on where you live.

minoanmiss also suggested we should have a fresh roundup of the latest election resources. We do have an old one from the last (presidential) election, but I'm afraid I don't have time to update it myself this time (life is very busy for me right now). If anyone else is willing to take on checking the entries on that post and going back through the posts in the comm to add to it, I'm sure our comm members will be very grateful.

Meanwhile, thanks to everyone who's posted resources and suggestions over the past month. Here are the posts that have been made

OSHA proposed regulations for worker heat protections: comment period until Dec 30, 2024
[Post on a step you can take as an ally]
National (US) Voter Registration Day!
Musicians for Kamala!
Community for Climate Action
This might be relevant to our interests....
More postcard signups available

Finally, here's the poll (behind the cut) for you to tell us what you've been doing in the last few weeks.Do tell us more in comments about what you've done or let us know what you plan to do next.

Poll #31996 Check In

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 9

View Respondents

Since the last check in, I...

View Answers

called my one senator
1 (11.1%)

called my other senator
1 (11.1%)

called my representative
1 (11.1%)

called my governor
0 (0.0%)

called my state reps
1 (11.1%)

sent a postcard/email/letter/fax
4 (44.4%)

attended a town hall
0 (0.0%)

donated money to a cause
5 (55.6%)

attended an in-person activist group
1 (11.1%)

participated in phone/online training
1 (11.1%)

went to a protest
0 (0.0%)

signed up for alerts
1 (11.1%)

worked for a campaign
1 (11.1%)

did textbanking/phonebanking
0 (0.0%)

took care of myself
3 (33.3%)

not a US citizen but worked in solidarity in my own community
0 (0.0%)

did something else (tell us about it in comments)
4 (44.4%)

committed to action in the coming month
3 (33.3%)

As always, everyone is free to make posts about any issues and actions they think the comm should know about. You can also drop some information into a comment to our sticky post if you'd like the mods to do it.

If you're looking for information on anything else, you can use our tags to check for any ongoing actions or resources relevant to the issues you care about. (And a quick shout out to redbird for all the tagging work that keeps the comm running smoothly.)

Comments

[philomytha]

For Americans overseas, Vote From Abroad is very good at walking you through the whole process of requesting and returning your ballot from anywhere else in the world:

https://www.votefromabroad.org/

[gingicat]

I'm clerking once again, with the same group I worked with once in 2023 (citywide elections, not contested enough to need a primary, surprisingly well-attended due to school committee drama) and twice this year (Super Tuesday and statewide primaries). There was low turnout for both of those, but I'm sure that won't be the case in November. (Maybe a lot of people will vote early.)

"something else"

[redbird]

Despite that nice long list of actions, I did two this month that don't fit anywhere: I sent a few postcards for senate and congressional candiddate3s via Postcards to Voters, and I called a city councilmember's office, which I am counting here as "called my state rep."

That was about a very local issue, calling to thank her for getting the traffic department to program some pedestrian crossing signals to come on automatically during the Sabbath. My partner noticed that she had done so, and said something about calling to thank the councilmember for doing something for her Jewish constitents that isn't pushing for more arms sales to Israel. This also led to me saying that I had gotten used to the city trying to have a foreign policy when I lived in New York City, home to the United Nations headquarters.

[minoanmiss]

I am really sorry to not put my money where my mouth is and I too would be so grateful to whomever can round up electionr esources.

[beatrice_otter]

My "something else" was writing letters and postcards encouraging people to vote.

[jazzyjj]

Sorry for being somewhat late to the party. I've actually been doing a bit of stuff, but not *really* election-related. My parents are once again going to help me vote, or perhaps my personal assistant can help out. He has offered to do so, and I remember several years ago he and I waited out in the cold for like 2 hours in order to vote. He is not a Trump supporter either, so that's good. Speaking of Trump though, I'm going to read the 2 books written by his niece Mary. I've heard great things about her, so I looked her up at the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled. Sure enough, she came up right away and the books are narrated by her.





Unfortunately the mother of a neighbor of mine passed away over the weekend. Both parents are now gone and she's devastated.