Dozens of residents and members of voting rights groups packed into a small room to voice their frustrations during a public comment period before the board.
Many spoke about the need for transparency in determining how multiple precincts across the county ran out of ballots -- some on multiple occasions throughout election day – as well as why poll workers repeatedly provided incorrect information to voters waiting outside of precincts.
“Ballot shortages, machines going out; these issues happen every election cycle. It’s the same issues, and the same precincts, and it has to stop,” said Danyelle Holmes, an organizer with the Poor People’s Campaign. “2024 is coming up – a very critical election for the state and for this country. Yet, we don’t know if we’ll be able to have a fair election process.”
The PPC is one of 12 voting rights and community organizations that have called on the Elections Commission to meet with community members and stakeholders since election day, in large part to provide answers to residents about how the Commission plans on resolving seemingly systemic issues in future elections.
Those who participated in the public comment period, many of them voters or former candidates, expressed both frustration and pain. They shared stories of exceedingly long lines outside of precincts and incorrect information provided by poll workers, sending many voters home before they cast their vote.
Amir Badat, special counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, says many of those concerns will inform questions asked of the Board in official meetings.
“I think that we heard emotion that’s been festering for a month, since election night” he said. “When someone shows up to a polling location and they’re told they don’t have ballots and they can leave or stay if they want to, that will elicit a really strong reaction.”
Election commissioners are set to meet again Monday, December 18th, with a number of the organizations forming that coalition, including Badat.
But Holmes says she’s worried about the implications of such long-running issues in Hinds County’s administration of elections – particularly in Mississippi, where the struggle for Black suffrage, while historic, remains a touchstone for many residents today.
“This isn’t something where we said, ‘oh, this was racism or something Trump supporters did.’ These are all Black elected officials who mishandled a predominantly-Black county’s election, and it’s totally unacceptable,” Holmes said, “Because the very behavior that the oppressors put on is what we have seen them perpetuate.”
