NC NEWSLINE - Sunday voting is declining in North Carolina, with counties that had some Sunday hours during early voting for the 2022 midterm elections deciding to eliminate them this year.
The state Board of Elections approved early voting plans for 80 counties where local boards voted unanimously on days and hours. Of those, about a dozen had early voting hours on Sunday in the 2022 general election but dropped them this year.
Not all county early voting plans are set, and there may yet be more Sundays eliminated in more counties.
The state Board of Elections will meet to decide early voting plans in 20 counties where local boards were divided over voting days or polling locations. In most of those counties, Sunday voting is at issue.
Republicans hold majorities on county boards of election and all have Republican chairs. Republicans are less inclined to support Sunday voting hours. They’ve objected to Sunday voting for various reasons: that people should be in church; that Sunday voting stretches election staff, and that it’s not cost effective.
Dallas Woodhouse, the former elections liaison in state Auditor Dave Boliek’s office, encouraged county election boards to drop Sunday early voting hours.
Sunday voting is important to Black voters because Black churches hold Souls to the Polls events on Sundays.
By eliminating Sunday voting hours and making voting inconvenient for college students, the state Board of Elections is sending the message that they don’t want Black, brown, or young people to vote, said Brian Kennedy II, policy director at Democracy NC. He said it’s part of a pattern.
The Wake County Board of Elections voted to move an early voting site out of the student union at N.C. State University and to the edge of campus. The vote was unanimous after Republicans shot down Democrats’ move to keep the student union site.
In Guilford, the county elections board split on whether to have polling sites on the campuses of NC A&T State University and UNC-Greensboro. Guilford is one of the counties where the state board will set the early voting plan.
“The effort is to suppress the vote,” Kennedy said. “Advocates are pushing people to vote early, cast ballots, whether or not Sunday is an option.”
In at least one of the counties that unanimously approved a plan that dropped Sunday voting, Democrats put up a fight. At the Brunswick elections board meeting last month, the board’s Democrats voted to approve two plans that included Sunday hours. But those plans were voted down by the Republican majority.
When the board’s Democrats were reminded that the Republican-led state Board of Elections decides early voting plans when local votes are not unanimous, the Democrats agreed to a plan without Sundays.
Brunswick had polls open on both Sundays during the 2022 early voting period. Brunswick elections staff provided data for 2022 that showed turnout was lowest on Sundays.
Still, speakers urged the Brunswick board to keep Sunday hours. Gary Kozlusky of Sunset Beach asked the board to consider what would be best for voters and recommended the board open voting on both available Sundays.
“Not everyone has the flexibility to vote during the week,” he said. ”Some people have longer, irregular hours, others work Saturdays caring for family members. No single schedule works for everybody.”
Brunswick elections board Chair Randy Pelton said weekend voting has been an issue every year going back to when he first started serving on the board in 2013.
“Every year, it’s the same thing,” he said. “I don’t think money is the issue at this point.”
Republican member Joe Myers said the 17-day early voting period is too long.
In an interview Tuesday, Kozlusky, who is a poll worker, said that Brunswick does a good job with election planning. But Republicans have always opposed Sunday voting, he said.
“There are just so many little things going on everywhere in North Carolina,” he said. “It’s almost like you can see that there’s a strategic movement against Sunday voting.”
Deborah Maxwell, president of the NC NAACP, predicted voters will still find a way to cast ballots despite Sundays disappearing from early voting schedules.
“They can try all the suppression tactics they want, but we’re still going to vote,” she said. “Our lives depend on it.”
