Daily Report -- August 24, 2020
State Support to Vote Safely and Adding Juneteenth as a
State Holiday
Today the General Assembly money committees took up bills to
specify how Virginia will handle absentee ballots this Election Day. As you may
know, during the regular session the General Assembly passed no-excuse absentee
voting. That law became effective July 1 and, because of the health and safety
concerns related to COVID-19, Virginia is preparing for a very large increase
in the numbers of people that request an absentee ballot for the General
Election on November 3. This issue is making national news, and there has been
much dialog about the safety of mail-in ballots.
Today the money committees took steps to protect both voters
and our democratic process. SB5120 from Senator Howell and the identical HB5103
from Delegate Sickles passed on party-line votes—all Democrats voted yes; all Republicans
voted no. These bills lay out commonsense steps that the VEA supported to make
absentee voting as easy and safe as possible.
The bills clarify how ballots will be certified by each
general registrar, including how a voter will be notified if there are any
issues with their ballot. The bills also allow voters to make corrections to
errors on their ballot and to omit the witness signature on their ballot
without penalty of the ballot being invalidated. The bills also require the
placement of ballot drop-off locations at the general registrar office and each
voter satellite office. On the day of the election, there shall also be an
accessible drop-off location at each polling place in operation for the
election. All drop-off locations shall include necessary security requirements.
Additionally, the bills set aside $2 million for pre-paid return envelopes for
all absentee ballots. This is another important measure that the VEA supports.
We believe that all citizens should be able to vote easily, even when there is
a public health crisis. We supported efforts to expand access to absentee
ballots during the regular session and we are happy to see these bills move
forward.
In another important move, HB5052 from Delegate Lamont
Bagby, Chair of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus, unanimously reported
from the Committee on General Laws. This bill codifies the Executive Order
signed by Governor Northam to make Juneteenth a State Holiday. During testimony
on the bill, Delegate Marcia Price urged anyone who cannot knowledgeably
explain why Juneteenth should be a state holiday, to learn about it. As someone who went to Virginia public
schools for all but 1 year of my K-12 education, I was never taught about
Juneteenth. There is no better example of the whitewashing of our history then
that. When you know better, you do better. I encourage all of you to listen to
Delegate Price and do better. If you don’t know about Juneteenth, please learn about it here.
