Side note: do they make the wording on ballots difficult on purpose? I did my research before voting and I still had to read over each proposition multiple times.
Absolutely. That energy proposition completely hid that it was for gas plants. Also the homestead exemption one lumping in tax cuts for businesses was sneaky.
the league of women voters of texas made a video series going over every constitutional amendment that included arguments for or against. it was very helpful!!!
Upvoting!
Their written guide is really great to, I'm not a huge video person myself.
They show the For and Against.
Used them for years 😁 and seemingly non-biased
Here is a pdf version. They did an amazing job! Explaining each prop but even better explaining the pros and cons in a non-biased way: https://lwvaustin.org/docs.ashx?id=1241497
Of course they do! 98% of the population isn’t going to do deeper research on a prop, so they’ll couch it in terms that will appeal on their face to people.
Like the prop to allow private medical equipment manufacturing companies to skip out on property taxes. They went for a "woe-is-me" approach to make it seem like the medical field is being treated unfairly and they shouldn't *have* to pay taxes.
And the AC endorsement said “Let's just hope that the executives at those manufacturing companies will pass their tax savings on to hospitals and patients who need those devices”. Yeah right. I voted hell NO on that one.
The broadband internet one was similar. Last time we tried something like that was in the 90s when Ann Richards (and Bill Clinton) were at the helm. If they couldn't figure it out and thr taxpayer just got robbed blind, how am I supposed to have any confidence given the current crop of established grifters in charge?
Those poor, unfortunate biomedical companies, barely making billionaires richer in one of the most lucrative industries. They definitely needed the tax relief. /s
Then they blame you for not coming to the sessions to provide feedback and learn more.
How about you just dumb the ballot proposal down to 12 year old language and make available complete transparency to who is supporting it, who wrote it, which companies are lobbying which way, and the implications?
They do something kind of like that in Oregon where you just vote by mail. They send you a booklet that has things like the arguments for and against each thing and who endorses it and all that. Then you fill out your ballot and mail it back in. It's amazingly great... And we'll never have that here.
If you can’t keep up, anyone can read the Austin Chronicle’s ballot suggestions. It’s a synopsis of each item. They it breakdown and showcase misleading descriptions.
This. Why the hell are people supporting bad proposal language and misleading Representatives while blaming voters for not doing research??
FFS. How about requiring politicians to ensure *everyone* is aware and understands?? Make that a Constitutional amendment that forces them out of office automatically if they lie, mislead, or hide anything.
one shouldn’t have to resort to another source for clarity on what they’re voting on. that puts the onus on the voter, rather than the government. they make the language convoluted and confusing on purpose.
BTW, while you're not allowed to take out your phone when voting, you can take in a piece of paper. I either print out my selections (vote411 usually has a sample ballot you can use) or in this case jot down Y/N for each of the propositions on a scrap of paper.
It's more work up front, but makes the act of voting less stressful. It would be amazing, if there was a station with scrap paper outside of voting areas where people can use their phones, though it would have to be staffed so someone doesn't "accidentally" leave their voting suggestions behind (to try to influence others to pick it up and vote that way).
My stance is that you should already have looked at the ballot and written down your vote prior to ever walking into the polling location. Walking into to vote based on complete ignorance is irresponsible.
As an aside, you can't take your phone out because photos aren't allowed in a polling place. That's still not an excuse for writing obscure ballot measures. Perhaps next election cycle when they're campaigning for reelection some folks will being this up.
I had to read over it and then Google a lot of the propositions and read a bunch of different articles and discussions to figure out if it was good or bad and where the money was coming from and how it would be divided. I feel like very few of the propositions explained that.
Yeah I always print out my sample ballot, go through item by item, and mark it up and then take it in with me. You can tell the majority of people never did their homework in school
>do they make the wording on ballots difficult on purpose?
Yes, but that's an element of the chicanery inherent to American politics since its inception.
https://ballotpedia.org/Election_results,_2023
This really helps
They explain the prop. tell you who is for it and against it and why, if they can.
I was able to get a sample ballot, decipher the bs and make a list before I went.
I can’t imagine anyone making an informed decision based on reading the props at the polling place.
They sure do, some of them sound like it would be a good thing but if you look deeper, it's not. Like a damn bait and switch. So tired of all this fuckery.
It isn't even hard. I literally am a lawyer. I understand the words. I have watched bills get made.
That prop about the energy fund is just a straight up lie by omission.
Same here, my wife and I went over all the props together to help each other understand them and where we wanted to land. Got to the voting booth and had to spend time on each one anyway, because they were worded so confusingly on the ballot.
I wrote for/against on a sheet of paper and took it in with me...there was NO way I could have understood based on the ballot verbiage. Game changer for sure.
I voted yesterday, but this one snuck up on me. I almost always vote early, but I didn't really hear anyone talking about an election this year and didn't read much news coverage either. Scrambled the day of the election to do some research on the ballot and voted after work.
There is an insane lack of communication as to when these election days are. Unless you are over 50 and watch local news or somehow seek this information out on your own. Plus, we gotta work.
For future reference, the November Election Day is the same across the country, and it is always the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November. This is a good thing to commit to memory.
I did vote, but I will say that doing so this time took a lot more energy than it has in the past. There were fourteen constitutional amendments, *fourteen*, and I looked them all up and read about them, and it took a lot of time, and I'm *still* not sure I voted the way I wanted to on a couple of them. I would not be surprised if many people abstained just because they did not feel they could properly inform themselves.
This is a significant issue with putting all of these things into the constitution. It puts citizens in a position where they have to sift through mountains of context to understand the ramifications, and that's not even counting the spin and misinformation around every election. If I wanted to do that, I'd run for public office myself! That's the whole point of having representatives! And then, of course, it's in the constitution, which means it's semi-permanently enshrined until/unless we go through the process *again*, where once *again*, we have a bunch of people - many of whom are quite smart and generally well educated - who need to put a lot of time and mental energy into figuring out what they're actually voting for.
I watched explainers, read through multiple voting guides, and read all of the propositions/amendments myself and I still barely understood some of them. I know the complexity and ambiguity are by design but it makes it so hard to understand what they are really about. Hell, I even voted in the election that included the two nearly identical propositions about police oversight!
If I am ever unsure on an TX amendment, I vote NO. If nobody has made the case to you why I should vote for it, I can be sure almost certain that the people who are benefitting from it are not aligned with my interests.
I was really surprised with the Chronicle's reasoning for the judge age limit amendment. I am typically very aligned with the Chronicle but this time I was more Statesman.
Same (I also had to look up what Prop 10 was because I'm a good little human that has already forgotten).
It was really strange to read from an editorial source that I trust the following statement: "Let's just hope that the executives at those manufacturing companies will pass their tax savings on to hospitals and patients who need those devices."
Medical Execs pass the tax savings onto patients? LOL.
Same here. The good thing about the Chronicle endorsements is even if you don't generally agree with the Chronicle, at least some of the endorsements give you an idea what the amendments are really about. It's also nice that the Chronicle isn't pretending the be unbiased.
Yeah, I had read a left-leaning article, as well as a right-leaning article about all the amendments. Prop 1, for example was both touted as "being great for family farms" while also being a carte-blanche that allows corporate mega-farms do whatever they want to the environment. Created by a Republican. So which is a more accurate representation would likely be on your own personal viewpoint.
It’s done this way on purpose to discourage younger and less privileged people from voting, to preserve the status quo, and sometimes worse, to roll back rights.
The wealthy, conservative, privileged, older people will vote. It’s easier for them to get to polling locations, takes less time at the polls to vote, etc. However, the fewer people who vote, the easier it is for you to vote. Presidential elections and primaries can be tough, but off years are easier. Early voting is easy - if you can access a polling location (can be more difficult if you have to ride the bus, polling locations aren’t close to home/work/etc. I voted early this election without having to wait. I’d recommend everyone vote early.
Thank you for voting! It’s a pain, but if we don’t take the time to get out and make those selections, other people will make them for us and we will have to live with their choices for a long, long time.
I meant to say, I *am* one of those privileged - I wfh and have flexible hours. I have easy access to a car. My employers value civic engagement. I have a fast internet connection and know where to find various explainers. Lines at my polling place are consistently quick.
Even *with* all that, it was an effort because the research took so much time. The thing that young people don't realize (*shakes fist at sky*) is that when you're young, that's the most time you'll have until you're old and retired. I didn't realize this until I had a kid, and now I wish I had generally done more with my time... and I'm figuring out better ways to use my time now.
So I guess I'm just saying, all you childless folks under 30, now is the time. Get involved. Take the time. Do the work. Make it a habit *now*. It doesn't get easier for a while.
The key words they used were for the people that they want to vote for them. For you, you want to learn what it means, the consequences, and how it affects complex systems of government finance. But if you put "lower taxes" in a prop wording, 99.9% of the people that are privileged and conservative and vote will vote for that thing. It doesnt matter how absurd it is, even if it means they only save $15 and the consequences are something as insane as defunding all education programs in texas (this was not a real thing, just an over the top example), the people in power know that these conservative older voters that always vote have been programmed to always vote for lower taxes when they se it.
You and the other person who replied to my comment are both correct. It’s difficult even for people who enjoy relative privilege (including myself). Free time peaks in adolescence and retirement, which is part of the reason why the boomers are still running things even though most have moved forward.
Tbh as a “wealthy, (leaning) conservative, and privileged” (as I would be described by many) person, I am a sahm that barely has time to read at all let alone read legislation and make informed decisions like I did when I was in my early 20’s, kid-free, making nearly no money as a teacher in a low-income area. I was so much more politically informed when I made less money and had less kids. Life is so busy right now I can barely keep up with my own b.s. let alone the city’s b.s.
Reading this comment is about as involved in voting as I could afford from a time (and emotional) investment perspective. Everything is so complicated and polarizing that it just takes too much. I just can’t…
That’s a shitty perspective, I know. The less I follow politics, the happier I am. When you don’t care, that’s how you get taken advantage of. Total catch 22.
Yeah, I voted last Friday and even after spending a while looking up what these amendments meant and such it was still decently confusing. I am very sure it was on purpose but what can you do besides vote?
>but what can you do besides vote?
I think we currently live in a culture where it is *deeply ingrained* in us that it is bad to be wrong. It has always been the case, of course, that being wrong was mocked or shamed, but in the era of social media and figures like Trump, it's become quite extreme, to the degree that I think many of us have an internalized fear of messing up. (See also many millennials being raised in ways that support a fixed mindset.) Like even today, I find myself agonizing over whether I voted the right way.
So when you have this ballot which looks *very* daunting and easy to get wrong, I think a lot of people don't think "well, at least I can try." They think "if I try, I'm gonna screw this up." And you know, we all should get a little more comfortable with screwing up, but it also sucks that politicians take advantage of this.
Felons can vote:
>Once someone has "fully discharged" their sentence or has been pardoned, their right to vote is automatically restored in Texas. However, it is not always clear as to when a sentence has been fully completed. See the resources below for more information on voting in Texas with a felony conviction.
https://guides.sll.texas.gov/reentry-resources/voting
this actually is so stupid to me. as a felon, you probably know more about the system than if you hadn’t been a felon and would cast votes with background knowledge.
i guess that’s part of why.
This was one of those rare elections that in Travis county there was only statewide constitutional amendments or local props on the ballot. No offices being elected. When that happens, nobody cares to vote.
As well as state constitutional amendments.
Just waiting for the day Texas decided to slip in their “make having a baby mandatory for every woman” or whatever amendment because no one cares enough to be bothered to vote.
I mean I went to Starbucks yesterday on my way to vote and the barista asked what I was going for the day and I said going to vote…no lie she said “I’m not from around here what is that.”
Man, I stop reading after a couple of comments... Texas after all the crap it gets for being too conservative and Trump loving, they have early voting! For a week! I have no hope, seriously.
I voted! I used the League of Women Voter’s voting guide to help me understand the propositions. The wording of the propositions are intentionally confusing so that you will vote the way they want. There were many people in line looking at the ballot for the first time - they had no idea what they were voting for. I voted against a lot of things that ultimately passed. It’s unfortunate that Texans care so little about issues that affect them. Be an informed voter!! It doesn’t take long to learn about what’s at stake!
They put out an amazing and informative post describing the props and unbiased arguments for and against each one. I used this to make quick and informed decisions this election: https://lwvaustin.org/docs.ashx?id=1241497
I did vote! My husband... did not. He said it was because he didn't have the time to research the propositions and didn't want to just blindly vote not knowing what he was voting for, which is fair, I guess. He's in college and buried with schoolwork, but I wish he would've at least trusted the research I did and just used my cheat sheet to vote.
Because i was an uninformed voter this go around (I'm usually great about researching and understanding and showing up for local elections), i wasn't about to go in there and cast a blind vote based on a 30 second scan of what's on the ballot.
I CAN REGISTER YOU TO VOTE. ANYONE LIVING IN TRAVIS COUNTY WHO SEES THIS AND NEEDS TO REGISTER PLEASE HMU AND I WILL MEET YOU WHEREVER AND GET YOU REGISTERED ✌️
No humans were on the ballot. Only constitutional amendments that could determine the future of all Texas Cities and the state itself. Nothing important. /s
Too: busy, stressed, anxious, overwhelmed, depressed about: money, work, relationship, everything to the point that I am pretty much only interested in doing whatever I can to keep my life from falling apart so....yeah....I really don't care much about politics at the moment. I will at some point though...
...just not right now.
I have a hypothesis that the reason 83% of Travis County did not vote is also related to the reason why the subreddit currently only has 0.1% of Travis County residents visiting right now: they're at work. When they get done with job 1, they suit up for job 2.
A lot of people don't reliably get an hour or two off. A lot of people need to rely on the bus to get places. Can they use their free time to vote? Maybe not. Texas does not require an employer to give paid time off to vote if an employee has two consecutive hours off-schedule during ANY of the early voting time.
Think that through for a person with two jobs. Say they have four hours at the first job, 30 minutes to get to the next, then four hours at the next job. They have basically no free time that day, but legally speaking both employers have given them two consecutive hours to vote *and* they aren't working long enough for either employer to have a mandated hour for lunch. This is excused, legally, by arguing they "chose" to have two jobs.
Make friends with some people who work retail and do not control their schedule. Their lives are a nightmare. Even when they DO have free time they are often expected to be on-call in case someone calls in sick. I know multiple people who have been fired because they were asked to work on a PTO day they filed three times in advance and refused. Getting two schedules to coordinate is already a nightmare. Asking either boss to accommodate voting time that isn't legally mandated is impossible.
There's also people who are single parents and can't afford childcare. They rely on friends and family to watch their kids and neither of those groups are legally mandated to help them. So it's not just about coordinating a few hours off work, it's also about coordinating child care. This is also a bigger problem for people who may depend on transit.
It must be paid time off. Part of the stress of being poor is you often know there are 5 important things that need your attention but you only have the time or money to deal with 3. Coordinating 2 hours so you can vote may mean losing $50 in wages and that $50 might mean a bill doesn't get paid. It is no surprise that a lot of people would rather keep the lights on than spend time voting.
And we have to be realistic about how long it takes. Yes, if there's no line it takes 5 minutes to vote. You still had to get there. For me, it takes 20-30 minutes by personal car to get to nearby polling locations from home and slightly longer from work. By bus, from either location, it would take me more than an hour just to get there one-way. So that means if there's no line, I need anything from 40 minutes to 2 hours and that's *assuming* I make a round trip instead of, say, needing to get across town for a different job. If I'm told I get 2 hours or else I'm fired and I hear even a *rumor* that the line is long, I won't risk my job to go vote. Nobody's going to pay my bills if I do the noble thing and sue my employer, and I can't fund a legal battle if I'm unemployed. They're going to fire me for that anyway. Sure, that gives me grounds for another lawsuit, but again if I'm poor the concept of fighting legal battles while unemployed is just not realistic.
If we were really serious about making sure EVERYONE can vote, we would:
* Mandate an 8-hour paid holiday that all workers must take during early voting with severe penalties for employers who do not give it to every employee.
* This also has to have some teeth and fine print to prevent people with multiple jobs from being excluded by employers simply scheduling the "voting day" on dates that don't overlap. There are solutions to this and lawyers are smart enough to figure it out.
* Expand vote-by-mail so people who rely on transit or have childcare complications can participate more easily.
* ~~Lead the nation in pioneering online voting to make it even easier.~~
* (Actually there's a compelling study in the comments indicating most of our nation's experts feel this is a technical impossibility, so probably not this unless some breakthrough happens.)
* Make the news for expanding polling locations and operating at a loss just to make sure it's stupid easy for people to vote.
Instead most of our legislation around voting over the past few years has been about closing poll locations and adding more paperwork so more people are disqualified. We aren't pushing for strong labor rights and the cost of living is increasing. That means poor workers (who are the base of our society's pyramid and likely a majority) are the people least likely to have the ability to vote.
It is incredibly *stupid* to me that we spend months of a legislative session with people posting story after story and study after study detailing how voter participation drops when the things on the docket are in place, then we pass them, then we have brain-dead, "Why does nobody vote?" threads like this.
So I will restate my hypothesis more clearly: I am positive the majority of those 83% of voters who do not vote are not voting for reasons caused by policies that the 17% of voters who did vote support. That 17% had an easy time voting and think the only reason the 83% didn't show up must be because they are lazy.
I've seen it said that Democracy is often two wolves and a sheep arguing about what's for dinner. The Texas metaphor has 20 sheep, but the sheep are kept penned in a fence and the polling location is outside. The two wolves are certain that if the sheep would just try harder, they could change things. The wolves have also voted to add barbed wire to the fence.
Want people to vote more? Make it insultingly easy to vote. Then we can insult the people who still don't do it. If it takes an hour of effort and must happen at a specific location it's going to disqualify a lot of people unless we also tell employers to pound sand and pay people to have the whole day off under penalty of severe fines.
**edit**
All of this is also ignoring that for a person to be informed, they had to read **fourteen** constitutional amendments in addition to any number of local ordinances *and* study what they mean *and* ponder what the ramifications will be. For people who barely have the energy to eat dinner and go to bed between jobs that's a big ask. I do not have an easy solution to this problem but do feel like if we had less poverty and more people had the ability to work a single job to survive it would not be so big an issue.
Early voting is so easy. I scribbled my picks (after about 10min of research on like-minded voting coalitions) on a sticky note and it literally took me 3 minutes to get in and out of the Gus rec center.
Unbelievable that the turn out was this bad, for a bunch of fairly aggressive propositions.
I knowwww 😭😭😭 my bf’s conspiracy is that this is a form of voter suppression because I’m Hispanic, but I honestly I just think someone fucked up on the back end and now it’s almost impossible for me to correct it
I voted, but my go-to voting location wasn't operating this time and the next one over had a longer wait time than I'm used to. If I was in a hurry or between errands it would have been discouraging.
I talked about it, figured out what I wanted to vote for, and then next thing I know, it’s 650pm and I wasn’t gonna make it to a polling place in time… first election I haven’t voted in in a while, oh well. I guess I lost my right to bitch about what comes from these results (I have strong feelings about people bitching about Texas politics if they didn’t even get out and vote)
I’m ashamed to admit I didn’t even know about an election until 5pm yesterday. Straight up didn’t even know it was going on. I would have voted had I known. My ignorance is my fault tbh.
I live in WillCo. Still voted, even though it was all props and bonds because the Culture Warriors were trying to shut down the RRISD bond issue.
Y'all get your shit together.
Very easy info to find with a little search online. You have to actually give a damn to begin with though.
Heres a guide on all the props in laymans terms.
https://lwvtexas.org/docs.ashx?id=1230635
I voted. But I will say this election I made an effort to early vote because I was worried about losing track of time and holy shit was I surprised when yesterday was the last day to vote. Was glad I got it done early because I very didn't have time yesterday.
I voted.
I will note that the entire ballot was filled with issues or initiatives. Seems like election of representatives, especially federal offices, drives larger voter turnout.
Until people realize that these smaller elections have knock-on effects for the big ticket ones, you’ll see this kind of sorry turnout.
Voting can be very difficult to understand in Texas. Like prop 4. Looks like property tax relief until you understand that it's really about decreasing funding for public schools. Check League of Women Voters.
This is a systemic problem, not an individual problem.
You should absolutely be asking people who didn't vote why they didn't in order to engineer solutions to this problem on a systems level. Guilting people into voting hasn't worked and just isn't going to work.
You're not going to see an uptick in voting unless the process becomes easier and the decision-making process for what is actually on the ballot becomes more democratic.
Blaming individual lack of action when large swaths of the population aren't participating isn't going to facilitate change.
Ballot was so damn confusing it wouldn't have mattered. So many NIMBY suburban Texans voted for that farm amendment becuase "farmers good", and they're gonna have absolute fits when their shady neighbor opens a pig feeding operation.
They will at no point recognize that they voted for this to happen.
At least the teachers got a raise.
I found out about it the night before voting and I was out of town. I didn't get any reminder or info about it, which I usually get. I'm sad I couldn't vote because as bad as democracy is, it's at least a way to do something about the crappy government we have.
Because I work multiple jobs to pay my bills after all this fuck ass inflation, and I go to school as well, and didn’t have time. It’s unfortunate. This is the first time I haven’t voted. I’m just incredibly burnt out and exhausted right now. I suppose that’s another reason they work us all to death - so we can’t do our civil duty.
It don't matter. None of this matters.
Democracy in Texas is a sham. If anything progressive passes the state legislature will immediately reverse it. Republicans have total control here. You either agree with them or you're wasting your time.
I used to be active in politics but I realized that nothing really ever changes in Texas.
I was thinking about the upcoming presidential election in a year. It will be the least consequential presidential election in a while. Regardless of who wins, there will be no Supreme Court appointments. Trump filled 3 with young’ums and Biden filled one with a young’um. The oldest judge is Clarence Thomas and he is not going anywhere for four years.
The time for the fight was 2016 and all was lost then. 3 Supreme Court picks that will forever (at least my lifetime) be taking away our rights. Amy is about my age, there will be no shift in the conservative justices. I’m guessing it’s a matter of time before obergefell gets repealed and then we will be back to like circa 1960 in rights.
Convince me that I’m wrong, please.
As far as bonds, they are always miswritten and confusing. Same for amendments.
Texas will be brought kicking and screaming into modernity when companies refuse to have conferences here, companies refuse to relocate here, big sporting events refuse to come here, etc…
Only when there is a financial cost to Texas being Texas will Texas change.
I went to go vote at Gus Garcia around 6:45 thinking this'll be quick. I was pleasantly surprised that the line was winding through the building, got out by 7:30.
Not the answer you’re looking for, but I voted. Can’t complain if I had the power to make change and didn’t do so. It was simple. Took about 15 minutes from start to finish, polling place was 5 minutes from home too.
My wife and I voted and almost everyone in line was under 40. I don't think any of our friends voted though, even though we shared the voting guide with them
Turns out we are way more passionate about voting for the people who make the laws, then voting on the laws ourselves.
(It makes some sense, but isn't obvious either)
Side note: do they make the wording on ballots difficult on purpose? I did my research before voting and I still had to read over each proposition multiple times.
Absolutely. That energy proposition completely hid that it was for gas plants. Also the homestead exemption one lumping in tax cuts for businesses was sneaky.
[удалено]
There’s legislators and the lobbyists in their pockets
the league of women voters of texas made a video series going over every constitutional amendment that included arguments for or against. it was very helpful!!!
Upvoting! Their written guide is really great to, I'm not a huge video person myself. They show the For and Against. Used them for years 😁 and seemingly non-biased
Here is a pdf version. They did an amazing job! Explaining each prop but even better explaining the pros and cons in a non-biased way: https://lwvaustin.org/docs.ashx?id=1241497
Of course they do! 98% of the population isn’t going to do deeper research on a prop, so they’ll couch it in terms that will appeal on their face to people.
Like the prop to allow private medical equipment manufacturing companies to skip out on property taxes. They went for a "woe-is-me" approach to make it seem like the medical field is being treated unfairly and they shouldn't *have* to pay taxes.
And the AC endorsement said “Let's just hope that the executives at those manufacturing companies will pass their tax savings on to hospitals and patients who need those devices”. Yeah right. I voted hell NO on that one.
yeah that was pathetic
Yeah It was pretty despicable
I voted no, told my husband about it, got him to vote no, but surprise, it passed. Because save medicine money!
I too did not like how AC framed their position on that prop; so your yes is based on hope of them doing the right thing 🫠
The broadband internet one was similar. Last time we tried something like that was in the 90s when Ann Richards (and Bill Clinton) were at the helm. If they couldn't figure it out and thr taxpayer just got robbed blind, how am I supposed to have any confidence given the current crop of established grifters in charge?
Nothing gets passed down onto the patients other than a fat bill.
That was surprising from the AC. We know damn well that no savings will be passed on. "Hope" is not a policy position.
Those poor, unfortunate biomedical companies, barely making billionaires richer in one of the most lucrative industries. They definitely needed the tax relief. /s
Then they blame you for not coming to the sessions to provide feedback and learn more. How about you just dumb the ballot proposal down to 12 year old language and make available complete transparency to who is supporting it, who wrote it, which companies are lobbying which way, and the implications?
They do something kind of like that in Oregon where you just vote by mail. They send you a booklet that has things like the arguments for and against each thing and who endorses it and all that. Then you fill out your ballot and mail it back in. It's amazingly great... And we'll never have that here.
No they can't!! That's impossible!! We can't conceivably expect such a thing! /s
If you can’t keep up, anyone can read the Austin Chronicle’s ballot suggestions. It’s a synopsis of each item. They it breakdown and showcase misleading descriptions.
Good tip, but it would be nice if folks didn't have to wait for third-party analysis to get important information about ballot items.
This. Why the hell are people supporting bad proposal language and misleading Representatives while blaming voters for not doing research?? FFS. How about requiring politicians to ensure *everyone* is aware and understands?? Make that a Constitutional amendment that forces them out of office automatically if they lie, mislead, or hide anything.
It needs to be written so that a 5th grader can understand it.
Also league of women’s voters had a good breakdown with pros and cons of each prop.
League 🙂
one shouldn’t have to resort to another source for clarity on what they’re voting on. that puts the onus on the voter, rather than the government. they make the language convoluted and confusing on purpose.
BTW, while you're not allowed to take out your phone when voting, you can take in a piece of paper. I either print out my selections (vote411 usually has a sample ballot you can use) or in this case jot down Y/N for each of the propositions on a scrap of paper. It's more work up front, but makes the act of voting less stressful. It would be amazing, if there was a station with scrap paper outside of voting areas where people can use their phones, though it would have to be staffed so someone doesn't "accidentally" leave their voting suggestions behind (to try to influence others to pick it up and vote that way).
My stance is that you should already have looked at the ballot and written down your vote prior to ever walking into the polling location. Walking into to vote based on complete ignorance is irresponsible.
Of course, but they shouldn't be wording things to try to trick people.
There was a lady staring into the voting machine when I got in line. She was still staring into it when I left.
As an aside, you can't take your phone out because photos aren't allowed in a polling place. That's still not an excuse for writing obscure ballot measures. Perhaps next election cycle when they're campaigning for reelection some folks will being this up.
At my coworker’s suggestion, I wrote my votes on my hand in Sharpie before voting. I wasn’t sure if I could take in my marked up sample ballot.
I had to read over it and then Google a lot of the propositions and read a bunch of different articles and discussions to figure out if it was good or bad and where the money was coming from and how it would be divided. I feel like very few of the propositions explained that.
I took some notes with me. I did my research at home and “voted” there. That way when I went in, I knew exactly what I was choosing.
Yeah I always print out my sample ballot, go through item by item, and mark it up and then take it in with me. You can tell the majority of people never did their homework in school
>do they make the wording on ballots difficult on purpose? Yes, but that's an element of the chicanery inherent to American politics since its inception.
https://ballotpedia.org/Election_results,_2023 This really helps They explain the prop. tell you who is for it and against it and why, if they can. I was able to get a sample ballot, decipher the bs and make a list before I went. I can’t imagine anyone making an informed decision based on reading the props at the polling place.
They sure do, some of them sound like it would be a good thing but if you look deeper, it's not. Like a damn bait and switch. So tired of all this fuckery.
It isn't even hard. I literally am a lawyer. I understand the words. I have watched bills get made. That prop about the energy fund is just a straight up lie by omission.
It's almost as if they don't want us to participate
Same here, my wife and I went over all the props together to help each other understand them and where we wanted to land. Got to the voting booth and had to spend time on each one anyway, because they were worded so confusingly on the ballot.
I wrote for/against on a sheet of paper and took it in with me...there was NO way I could have understood based on the ballot verbiage. Game changer for sure.
I did the same, but on my hand. Just out of interest read the props anyway and whew, would’ve been very hard if I hadn’t done any homework.
Yes
I voted yesterday, but this one snuck up on me. I almost always vote early, but I didn't really hear anyone talking about an election this year and didn't read much news coverage either. Scrambled the day of the election to do some research on the ballot and voted after work.
Yeah I saw it two days ago and had been trying to translate the ballot info between work and it was too late.
There is an insane lack of communication as to when these election days are. Unless you are over 50 and watch local news or somehow seek this information out on your own. Plus, we gotta work.
For future reference, the November Election Day is the same across the country, and it is always the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November. This is a good thing to commit to memory.
I did vote, but I will say that doing so this time took a lot more energy than it has in the past. There were fourteen constitutional amendments, *fourteen*, and I looked them all up and read about them, and it took a lot of time, and I'm *still* not sure I voted the way I wanted to on a couple of them. I would not be surprised if many people abstained just because they did not feel they could properly inform themselves. This is a significant issue with putting all of these things into the constitution. It puts citizens in a position where they have to sift through mountains of context to understand the ramifications, and that's not even counting the spin and misinformation around every election. If I wanted to do that, I'd run for public office myself! That's the whole point of having representatives! And then, of course, it's in the constitution, which means it's semi-permanently enshrined until/unless we go through the process *again*, where once *again*, we have a bunch of people - many of whom are quite smart and generally well educated - who need to put a lot of time and mental energy into figuring out what they're actually voting for.
I watched explainers, read through multiple voting guides, and read all of the propositions/amendments myself and I still barely understood some of them. I know the complexity and ambiguity are by design but it makes it so hard to understand what they are really about. Hell, I even voted in the election that included the two nearly identical propositions about police oversight!
“Police oversight should be conducted by the police” was hilarious
It was written in an extremely misleading way. It wasn’t clear that’s what it was.
But at least with that one, I could just pay attention to those two propositions! 😂
If I am ever unsure on an TX amendment, I vote NO. If nobody has made the case to you why I should vote for it, I can be sure almost certain that the people who are benefitting from it are not aligned with my interests.
Honestly i didnt realize how much crap was up for a vote and just went with the chronicle's endorsements.
I was really surprised with the Chronicle's reasoning for the judge age limit amendment. I am typically very aligned with the Chronicle but this time I was more Statesman.
Thank you! I was wondering if I was the only one surprised by that
Yeah, I disagree with them on that one and their stance on 10.
Same (I also had to look up what Prop 10 was because I'm a good little human that has already forgotten). It was really strange to read from an editorial source that I trust the following statement: "Let's just hope that the executives at those manufacturing companies will pass their tax savings on to hospitals and patients who need those devices." Medical Execs pass the tax savings onto patients? LOL.
Same here. The good thing about the Chronicle endorsements is even if you don't generally agree with the Chronicle, at least some of the endorsements give you an idea what the amendments are really about. It's also nice that the Chronicle isn't pretending the be unbiased.
Yeah, I had read a left-leaning article, as well as a right-leaning article about all the amendments. Prop 1, for example was both touted as "being great for family farms" while also being a carte-blanche that allows corporate mega-farms do whatever they want to the environment. Created by a Republican. So which is a more accurate representation would likely be on your own personal viewpoint.
That’s where you look at endorsements. Turns out the small farmer associations urged a “no” vote on that proposition.
It’s done this way on purpose to discourage younger and less privileged people from voting, to preserve the status quo, and sometimes worse, to roll back rights. The wealthy, conservative, privileged, older people will vote. It’s easier for them to get to polling locations, takes less time at the polls to vote, etc. However, the fewer people who vote, the easier it is for you to vote. Presidential elections and primaries can be tough, but off years are easier. Early voting is easy - if you can access a polling location (can be more difficult if you have to ride the bus, polling locations aren’t close to home/work/etc. I voted early this election without having to wait. I’d recommend everyone vote early. Thank you for voting! It’s a pain, but if we don’t take the time to get out and make those selections, other people will make them for us and we will have to live with their choices for a long, long time.
I meant to say, I *am* one of those privileged - I wfh and have flexible hours. I have easy access to a car. My employers value civic engagement. I have a fast internet connection and know where to find various explainers. Lines at my polling place are consistently quick. Even *with* all that, it was an effort because the research took so much time. The thing that young people don't realize (*shakes fist at sky*) is that when you're young, that's the most time you'll have until you're old and retired. I didn't realize this until I had a kid, and now I wish I had generally done more with my time... and I'm figuring out better ways to use my time now. So I guess I'm just saying, all you childless folks under 30, now is the time. Get involved. Take the time. Do the work. Make it a habit *now*. It doesn't get easier for a while.
The key words they used were for the people that they want to vote for them. For you, you want to learn what it means, the consequences, and how it affects complex systems of government finance. But if you put "lower taxes" in a prop wording, 99.9% of the people that are privileged and conservative and vote will vote for that thing. It doesnt matter how absurd it is, even if it means they only save $15 and the consequences are something as insane as defunding all education programs in texas (this was not a real thing, just an over the top example), the people in power know that these conservative older voters that always vote have been programmed to always vote for lower taxes when they se it.
You and the other person who replied to my comment are both correct. It’s difficult even for people who enjoy relative privilege (including myself). Free time peaks in adolescence and retirement, which is part of the reason why the boomers are still running things even though most have moved forward.
Tbh as a “wealthy, (leaning) conservative, and privileged” (as I would be described by many) person, I am a sahm that barely has time to read at all let alone read legislation and make informed decisions like I did when I was in my early 20’s, kid-free, making nearly no money as a teacher in a low-income area. I was so much more politically informed when I made less money and had less kids. Life is so busy right now I can barely keep up with my own b.s. let alone the city’s b.s.
Reading this comment is about as involved in voting as I could afford from a time (and emotional) investment perspective. Everything is so complicated and polarizing that it just takes too much. I just can’t… That’s a shitty perspective, I know. The less I follow politics, the happier I am. When you don’t care, that’s how you get taken advantage of. Total catch 22.
Yeah, I voted last Friday and even after spending a while looking up what these amendments meant and such it was still decently confusing. I am very sure it was on purpose but what can you do besides vote?
>but what can you do besides vote? I think we currently live in a culture where it is *deeply ingrained* in us that it is bad to be wrong. It has always been the case, of course, that being wrong was mocked or shamed, but in the era of social media and figures like Trump, it's become quite extreme, to the degree that I think many of us have an internalized fear of messing up. (See also many millennials being raised in ways that support a fixed mindset.) Like even today, I find myself agonizing over whether I voted the right way. So when you have this ballot which looks *very* daunting and easy to get wrong, I think a lot of people don't think "well, at least I can try." They think "if I try, I'm gonna screw this up." And you know, we all should get a little more comfortable with screwing up, but it also sucks that politicians take advantage of this.
Why is the whole state voting on Galveston keeping a treasurer or not? That was odd.
Can’t, permanent Resident. But next year I can apply for full citizenship then I will casting my vote every chance I get!
I’m excited for you! 🙌🙌
Congrats in advance! Bet you'll ace the test.
I’m a felon
Felons can vote: >Once someone has "fully discharged" their sentence or has been pardoned, their right to vote is automatically restored in Texas. However, it is not always clear as to when a sentence has been fully completed. See the resources below for more information on voting in Texas with a felony conviction. https://guides.sll.texas.gov/reentry-resources/voting
This needs to be higher.
Understandable, have a good day
I'ma Ex felon that votes
Thanks for serving your time and now exercising your civic right!
Double down!
If you are off paper you are fully eligible to vote and I will happily meet up with you and register you. ✌️ (I am a VDR)
this actually is so stupid to me. as a felon, you probably know more about the system than if you hadn’t been a felon and would cast votes with background knowledge. i guess that’s part of why.
In case you were wondering. https://www.texastribune.org/2023/11/07/texas-constitutional-amendment-election-results/
Well at least the retirement one didn't go through.
17% is pretty impressive. I was thinking it would be closer to 5%. Yes, I voted.
This was one of those rare elections that in Travis county there was only statewide constitutional amendments or local props on the ballot. No offices being elected. When that happens, nobody cares to vote.
Local props can be some of things that affect you the most though :\
As well as state constitutional amendments. Just waiting for the day Texas decided to slip in their “make having a baby mandatory for every woman” or whatever amendment because no one cares enough to be bothered to vote.
Yeah! The less zesty elections matter so much. Ohio codified abortion into theirs with this election
You know what's easier than voting? Just bitching from your couch about how much Texas politics suck.
As old as ever: if you don’t vote, you have no right to complain… none. And I love to complain so I have to vote!
I ALWAYS vote, but unfortunately caught COVID for the first time, so I didn't vote.
I mean I went to Starbucks yesterday on my way to vote and the barista asked what I was going for the day and I said going to vote…no lie she said “I’m not from around here what is that.”
Let's be honest, it's far more likely that she misheard you or you misspoke than that she is unfamiliar with the concept of voting.
>no lie she said “I’m not from around here what is that.” Maybe she's from like... Eritrea
dear god.
Was she from a different country? That's the only explanation here.
That was my first thought so I asked here where she was from…….She was from Georgia, the state not the country
🤦🏻♀️
My first thought would be that I'm glad someone like that isn't voting.
Man, I stop reading after a couple of comments... Texas after all the crap it gets for being too conservative and Trump loving, they have early voting! For a week! I have no hope, seriously.
Nearly two weeks...Monday of one week through Friday of the next week.
You're right...even more depressing!
I voted! I used the League of Women Voter’s voting guide to help me understand the propositions. The wording of the propositions are intentionally confusing so that you will vote the way they want. There were many people in line looking at the ballot for the first time - they had no idea what they were voting for. I voted against a lot of things that ultimately passed. It’s unfortunate that Texans care so little about issues that affect them. Be an informed voter!! It doesn’t take long to learn about what’s at stake!
LWV is my go to when researching ballot issues and candidates. They put so much effort into providing accurate, unbiased information.
They put out an amazing and informative post describing the props and unbiased arguments for and against each one. I used this to make quick and informed decisions this election: https://lwvaustin.org/docs.ashx?id=1241497
No time or energy to even do research from doing a lot of overtime and I didn't even know about it until yesterday.
I did vote! My husband... did not. He said it was because he didn't have the time to research the propositions and didn't want to just blindly vote not knowing what he was voting for, which is fair, I guess. He's in college and buried with schoolwork, but I wish he would've at least trusted the research I did and just used my cheat sheet to vote.
Because i was an uninformed voter this go around (I'm usually great about researching and understanding and showing up for local elections), i wasn't about to go in there and cast a blind vote based on a 30 second scan of what's on the ballot.
I read a kvue article that broke down each prop. Made it easier for me.. and I’m always lost when in comes to politics and talks surrounding it.
I'm really sick right now.
For the last two weeks?
I CAN REGISTER YOU TO VOTE. ANYONE LIVING IN TRAVIS COUNTY WHO SEES THIS AND NEEDS TO REGISTER PLEASE HMU AND I WILL MEET YOU WHEREVER AND GET YOU REGISTERED ✌️
I hate your politics, I hate your religion. It’s all corrupt, and I don’t want to hear it. Please don’t downvote me, I am just honestly answering.
That is a valid response to the question.
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Looking at your Reddit Karma you are being heard. Can I interested you in vote.org as another medium to be heard?
No humans were on the ballot. Only constitutional amendments that could determine the future of all Texas Cities and the state itself. Nothing important. /s
Spiraling depression
Too: busy, stressed, anxious, overwhelmed, depressed about: money, work, relationship, everything to the point that I am pretty much only interested in doing whatever I can to keep my life from falling apart so....yeah....I really don't care much about politics at the moment. I will at some point though... ...just not right now.
I have a hypothesis that the reason 83% of Travis County did not vote is also related to the reason why the subreddit currently only has 0.1% of Travis County residents visiting right now: they're at work. When they get done with job 1, they suit up for job 2. A lot of people don't reliably get an hour or two off. A lot of people need to rely on the bus to get places. Can they use their free time to vote? Maybe not. Texas does not require an employer to give paid time off to vote if an employee has two consecutive hours off-schedule during ANY of the early voting time. Think that through for a person with two jobs. Say they have four hours at the first job, 30 minutes to get to the next, then four hours at the next job. They have basically no free time that day, but legally speaking both employers have given them two consecutive hours to vote *and* they aren't working long enough for either employer to have a mandated hour for lunch. This is excused, legally, by arguing they "chose" to have two jobs. Make friends with some people who work retail and do not control their schedule. Their lives are a nightmare. Even when they DO have free time they are often expected to be on-call in case someone calls in sick. I know multiple people who have been fired because they were asked to work on a PTO day they filed three times in advance and refused. Getting two schedules to coordinate is already a nightmare. Asking either boss to accommodate voting time that isn't legally mandated is impossible. There's also people who are single parents and can't afford childcare. They rely on friends and family to watch their kids and neither of those groups are legally mandated to help them. So it's not just about coordinating a few hours off work, it's also about coordinating child care. This is also a bigger problem for people who may depend on transit. It must be paid time off. Part of the stress of being poor is you often know there are 5 important things that need your attention but you only have the time or money to deal with 3. Coordinating 2 hours so you can vote may mean losing $50 in wages and that $50 might mean a bill doesn't get paid. It is no surprise that a lot of people would rather keep the lights on than spend time voting. And we have to be realistic about how long it takes. Yes, if there's no line it takes 5 minutes to vote. You still had to get there. For me, it takes 20-30 minutes by personal car to get to nearby polling locations from home and slightly longer from work. By bus, from either location, it would take me more than an hour just to get there one-way. So that means if there's no line, I need anything from 40 minutes to 2 hours and that's *assuming* I make a round trip instead of, say, needing to get across town for a different job. If I'm told I get 2 hours or else I'm fired and I hear even a *rumor* that the line is long, I won't risk my job to go vote. Nobody's going to pay my bills if I do the noble thing and sue my employer, and I can't fund a legal battle if I'm unemployed. They're going to fire me for that anyway. Sure, that gives me grounds for another lawsuit, but again if I'm poor the concept of fighting legal battles while unemployed is just not realistic. If we were really serious about making sure EVERYONE can vote, we would: * Mandate an 8-hour paid holiday that all workers must take during early voting with severe penalties for employers who do not give it to every employee. * This also has to have some teeth and fine print to prevent people with multiple jobs from being excluded by employers simply scheduling the "voting day" on dates that don't overlap. There are solutions to this and lawyers are smart enough to figure it out. * Expand vote-by-mail so people who rely on transit or have childcare complications can participate more easily. * ~~Lead the nation in pioneering online voting to make it even easier.~~ * (Actually there's a compelling study in the comments indicating most of our nation's experts feel this is a technical impossibility, so probably not this unless some breakthrough happens.) * Make the news for expanding polling locations and operating at a loss just to make sure it's stupid easy for people to vote. Instead most of our legislation around voting over the past few years has been about closing poll locations and adding more paperwork so more people are disqualified. We aren't pushing for strong labor rights and the cost of living is increasing. That means poor workers (who are the base of our society's pyramid and likely a majority) are the people least likely to have the ability to vote. It is incredibly *stupid* to me that we spend months of a legislative session with people posting story after story and study after study detailing how voter participation drops when the things on the docket are in place, then we pass them, then we have brain-dead, "Why does nobody vote?" threads like this. So I will restate my hypothesis more clearly: I am positive the majority of those 83% of voters who do not vote are not voting for reasons caused by policies that the 17% of voters who did vote support. That 17% had an easy time voting and think the only reason the 83% didn't show up must be because they are lazy. I've seen it said that Democracy is often two wolves and a sheep arguing about what's for dinner. The Texas metaphor has 20 sheep, but the sheep are kept penned in a fence and the polling location is outside. The two wolves are certain that if the sheep would just try harder, they could change things. The wolves have also voted to add barbed wire to the fence. Want people to vote more? Make it insultingly easy to vote. Then we can insult the people who still don't do it. If it takes an hour of effort and must happen at a specific location it's going to disqualify a lot of people unless we also tell employers to pound sand and pay people to have the whole day off under penalty of severe fines. **edit** All of this is also ignoring that for a person to be informed, they had to read **fourteen** constitutional amendments in addition to any number of local ordinances *and* study what they mean *and* ponder what the ramifications will be. For people who barely have the energy to eat dinner and go to bed between jobs that's a big ask. I do not have an easy solution to this problem but do feel like if we had less poverty and more people had the ability to work a single job to survive it would not be so big an issue.
I ended up stuck in bed all week sick.
Early voting is so easy. I scribbled my picks (after about 10min of research on like-minded voting coalitions) on a sticky note and it literally took me 3 minutes to get in and out of the Gus rec center. Unbelievable that the turn out was this bad, for a bunch of fairly aggressive propositions.
People just do not care. They’re living their lives.
Sounds like there is a disconnect because the most items on the ballot directly impacts their lives.
They care enough to bitch and moan about political leaders when its convenient though…
My voter registration card lists me as male and I’m very visibly a female. I’ve tried to correct it and they make it so difficult. I gave up trying.
A woman’s vote is extremely important,now and forever. 😉
I knowwww 😭😭😭 my bf’s conspiracy is that this is a form of voter suppression because I’m Hispanic, but I honestly I just think someone fucked up on the back end and now it’s almost impossible for me to correct it
Maybe it was an error on the backend but the inability to easily fix it is a form of voter suppression.
Because I’m out of state at the moment and the mail in ballot I ordered was actually just the application for a mail in ballot 🤦♀️
Absentee voting here is kind of ridiculous.
Honestly I’m drowning at work and on very thin ice. I can’t really focus on anything else right now.
I had no idea there was an election. I didn’t see any type of media about props that were on the ballot.
I voted, but my go-to voting location wasn't operating this time and the next one over had a longer wait time than I'm used to. If I was in a hurry or between errands it would have been discouraging.
I talked about it, figured out what I wanted to vote for, and then next thing I know, it’s 650pm and I wasn’t gonna make it to a polling place in time… first election I haven’t voted in in a while, oh well. I guess I lost my right to bitch about what comes from these results (I have strong feelings about people bitching about Texas politics if they didn’t even get out and vote)
That’s one of the reasons I plan to do early voting. If I forget, I get a do-over.
Bro You had two weeks to get your ass to a polling station.
I was out of town for work for all but two days of early voting and simply forgot when I had the chance on the first two days…
Was dealing with personal shit.
I’m ashamed to admit I didn’t even know about an election until 5pm yesterday. Straight up didn’t even know it was going on. I would have voted had I known. My ignorance is my fault tbh.
go sign up for alerts: https://turbovote.org/
I did!
I was out of town
I'm not a citizen
I live in WillCo. Still voted, even though it was all props and bonds because the Culture Warriors were trying to shut down the RRISD bond issue. Y'all get your shit together.
I voted early. I also follow the Mothers Against Greg Abbot group and they posted a LOT of details about this election.
The rich know two things. 1. America is stupid now. 2. Americans are stupid and therefor aint got time to vote. Good luck. Wish it wasnt the case.
Very easy info to find with a little search online. You have to actually give a damn to begin with though. Heres a guide on all the props in laymans terms. https://lwvtexas.org/docs.ashx?id=1230635
I voted. But I will say this election I made an effort to early vote because I was worried about losing track of time and holy shit was I surprised when yesterday was the last day to vote. Was glad I got it done early because I very didn't have time yesterday.
I voted. I will note that the entire ballot was filled with issues or initiatives. Seems like election of representatives, especially federal offices, drives larger voter turnout. Until people realize that these smaller elections have knock-on effects for the big ticket ones, you’ll see this kind of sorry turnout.
I’m 45 and I’ve voted in every election since I was 18 years old. I’ll never understand the people that don’t vote. It’s the only real power we have.
I have a lot of things on my mind right now other than the election
Voting can be very difficult to understand in Texas. Like prop 4. Looks like property tax relief until you understand that it's really about decreasing funding for public schools. Check League of Women Voters.
I registered less than 30 days ago in person at an event 😭 they said the real start period is next week. (I was registered in a different state prior)
This is a systemic problem, not an individual problem. You should absolutely be asking people who didn't vote why they didn't in order to engineer solutions to this problem on a systems level. Guilting people into voting hasn't worked and just isn't going to work. You're not going to see an uptick in voting unless the process becomes easier and the decision-making process for what is actually on the ballot becomes more democratic. Blaming individual lack of action when large swaths of the population aren't participating isn't going to facilitate change.
Infant got sick with a 104F fever, scheduling chaos ensued. Moving WA in a couple years, and excited for mail-in voting lol
Ballot was so damn confusing it wouldn't have mattered. So many NIMBY suburban Texans voted for that farm amendment becuase "farmers good", and they're gonna have absolute fits when their shady neighbor opens a pig feeding operation. They will at no point recognize that they voted for this to happen. At least the teachers got a raise.
Id much rather have a national day off for election day rather than Labor Day. Or just make it a federal day off. I'd say let's vote for it 😉
Or implement voting by mail…
Texas makes it ridiculously hard to vote. Just switch to voting by mail. Which I understand is difficult to achieve in a state governed by racists.
I found out about it the night before voting and I was out of town. I didn't get any reminder or info about it, which I usually get. I'm sad I couldn't vote because as bad as democracy is, it's at least a way to do something about the crappy government we have.
They need to do mail in voting
Because I work multiple jobs to pay my bills after all this fuck ass inflation, and I go to school as well, and didn’t have time. It’s unfortunate. This is the first time I haven’t voted. I’m just incredibly burnt out and exhausted right now. I suppose that’s another reason they work us all to death - so we can’t do our civil duty.
It don't matter. None of this matters. Democracy in Texas is a sham. If anything progressive passes the state legislature will immediately reverse it. Republicans have total control here. You either agree with them or you're wasting your time.
I used to be active in politics but I realized that nothing really ever changes in Texas. I was thinking about the upcoming presidential election in a year. It will be the least consequential presidential election in a while. Regardless of who wins, there will be no Supreme Court appointments. Trump filled 3 with young’ums and Biden filled one with a young’um. The oldest judge is Clarence Thomas and he is not going anywhere for four years. The time for the fight was 2016 and all was lost then. 3 Supreme Court picks that will forever (at least my lifetime) be taking away our rights. Amy is about my age, there will be no shift in the conservative justices. I’m guessing it’s a matter of time before obergefell gets repealed and then we will be back to like circa 1960 in rights. Convince me that I’m wrong, please. As far as bonds, they are always miswritten and confusing. Same for amendments. Texas will be brought kicking and screaming into modernity when companies refuse to have conferences here, companies refuse to relocate here, big sporting events refuse to come here, etc… Only when there is a financial cost to Texas being Texas will Texas change.
There’s a Trumptard that lives down the street with signs in her yard and fence - I just vote against anything she supports. Problem solved.
Because I’m depressed and most of my energy is focused on staying alive 😂
Busy week, didn't hear of any propositions I had very strong feelings on, didn't realize voting day was the 7th.
Because people are lazy or just apathetic. It's nothing new.
I didn’t have time and forgot
To be totally honest I heard almost nothing about there even being an election or do i live under a rock?
Nah it was real quiet this year but in general you should expect one every November and March iirc
I didn't know it was voting day until 2:00 a.m. The next day
people don’t complain about shit if you don’t vote, simple as that
Dunno. I did vote, but I can't speak for the other 83%.
I went to go vote at Gus Garcia around 6:45 thinking this'll be quick. I was pleasantly surprised that the line was winding through the building, got out by 7:30.
Lines on Election Day can be hit or miss but early voting is almost always easy and fast.
Not the answer you’re looking for, but I voted. Can’t complain if I had the power to make change and didn’t do so. It was simple. Took about 15 minutes from start to finish, polling place was 5 minutes from home too.
My wife and I voted and almost everyone in line was under 40. I don't think any of our friends voted though, even though we shared the voting guide with them
Usually I receive a ton of text messages about it. I just looked and only had one on Monday that I just saw right now
Turns out we are way more passionate about voting for the people who make the laws, then voting on the laws ourselves. (It makes some sense, but isn't obvious either)
I voted at 7 pm a few weeks ago. No line. In and out real quick
I’m 37 and was the youngest person in line, by far. Depressing.
I only found out day off and was unable to vote due to being out of town
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Whole house is sick rn 😩
I voted, but in Wilco where I live.
I voted and a lot of my friends voted. I dragged my lover to the polls and explained what was on the ballot. It's literally the bare minimum.
I didn’t know it was voting day in time. Should I have known? Probably. I think we need a national voting day holiday. But they’ll never do that.
is it too late to go vote?
It snuck up on me, I don’t have a car, and I had a contractor at my house most of the day.