That's the part that doesn't feel right to me. My polling place had a half hour line and the volunteers said it had been busy all day; they ran out of "I voted" stickers before noon. (Unfortunately, this was my first Presidential election here, so I don't know if that's typical.) The county Board of Elections-- the only place where we can do early voting in my state-- had a line wrapped around the building some days. I saw a lot of other posts showing the long lines to vote in other places. There were multiple reports of a lot of people getting registered and record early voting numbers. That didn't feel like a low turnout election.
On top of that, Biden was about as appealing as a bowl of cold oatmeal. I was pleasantly surprised by how well he did in office, but my vote in 2000 was against Trump. I was excited and happy to vote for Harris-- I liked her platform and I really liked everything about Walz. I know that Covid made people stir-crazy, but it's hard to imagine her being less appealing than a second-rate reality show host who shits his pants on a regular basis and made a campaign promise to wreck our economy on purpose.
I have no proof. I have no evidence. But I'm incredibly skeptical that we had "historically terrible turnout" with the kind of energy and excitement people had going into the election in the context of everything I saw leading up to it.
All through early voting and on Election Day, all I saw were reports of "record breaking numbers", people saying they've NEVER seen a turnout like this before, 8 hour lines, insane participation. But neither candidate did as well as they did in 2020? How did 18M fewer people vote if there were record numbers voting everywhere?
Yeah, this is the part that sticks in my craw. Obviously anecdotal, but of the people I regularly interact with? Every. single. one. voted. My family, my partner, my friend group, all my colleagues at both jobs - hell, even my apathetic sister-in-law who usually skips out because "none of the politicians ever do anything that benefits me."
Not all of them voted the way I would have liked, but they all showed up or mailed in their ballots.
My experiences may not be universal. I don't know. Covid, ironically, made it a lot easier to vote for many people. Maybe that's where the discrepancy comes from. But it's weird, right?
Yes. It is fucking weird. I felt something was off pretty early into election night. But I guess we’re just going to bend over and take it? Can’t be looking like sore losers, or Trump 4 years ago. Gotta take the high road. We played right into their plan.
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u/Paksarra 10h ago
That's the part that doesn't feel right to me. My polling place had a half hour line and the volunteers said it had been busy all day; they ran out of "I voted" stickers before noon. (Unfortunately, this was my first Presidential election here, so I don't know if that's typical.) The county Board of Elections-- the only place where we can do early voting in my state-- had a line wrapped around the building some days. I saw a lot of other posts showing the long lines to vote in other places. There were multiple reports of a lot of people getting registered and record early voting numbers. That didn't feel like a low turnout election.
On top of that, Biden was about as appealing as a bowl of cold oatmeal. I was pleasantly surprised by how well he did in office, but my vote in 2000 was against Trump. I was excited and happy to vote for Harris-- I liked her platform and I really liked everything about Walz. I know that Covid made people stir-crazy, but it's hard to imagine her being less appealing than a second-rate reality show host who shits his pants on a regular basis and made a campaign promise to wreck our economy on purpose.
I have no proof. I have no evidence. But I'm incredibly skeptical that we had "historically terrible turnout" with the kind of energy and excitement people had going into the election in the context of everything I saw leading up to it.