I went to vote today in Georgia USA. People showed up wearing bed sheets over them. What is this supposed to communicate exactly??
Just guessing here, but either:
a) Cosplaying as KKK to intimidate black people
b) Cosplaying as ghosts to intimidateblackpeople
c) Dressing in white to not heat up as much in direct sunlightSeems like run of the mill super illegal voter intimidation - maybe aimed at discouraging black voters by invoking images of the klan?
Weird part is they weren’t arrested… Like tf? There are police
Report that shit to the Georgia Attorney General. That’s voter intimidation. https://law.georgia.gov/resources/election-fraud-complaint-hotline
This is a bit of hyperbole. If there where trying to intimidate voters they wouldn’t dress up like ghosts. Stay vigilant but didn’t label everything as a conspiracy, some people are just stupid.
“The law against voter intimidation doesn’t specify specific conduct that is illegal. It specifies that intimidating voters is illegal,” Morales-Doyle [director the Voting Rights Program at the Brennan Center for Justice] said. “And so really, whatever form it might take, if the result is that a person feels uncomfortable exercising their right to vote, then it violates the law against voter intimidation.”
Even if this wasn’t obviously reminiscent of the KKK, just seeing someone hiding their identity while pretending to be a government official is unquestionably enough to make someone feel intimidated and that it’s an unsafe place to vote.
Ghosts in the south look an awful lot like KKK outside of a voting place. Do not mistake this due to the time of year and give this the benefit of the doubt.
By that logic the Pope and the Michelin man look like a members of the KKK
… and if they were hanging around a polling place that might be a problem.
Are the Pope and the Michelin man going into a voting center and filming people with their faces covered?
Be that as it may, people wearing masks or costumes have no place in a polling station.
I’m not arguing they should be wearing masks in a polling station
I know. I did not downvote and I really don’t get why people feel the need to. Your comment is completely accurate - it makes no sense to impute any intentions to these people in disguise. My only point was that the people in the photo should not appear like that for the election in any case.
If you dont live in America, stfu. We don’t care about your opinion on how Americans are acting towards other Americans. Your small exposure to the population means nothing.
I disagree, masked people at a voting place carries an implicit threat of violence… this may be some dumb teenagers or it may be crazy sov cit folks… either way their presence absolutely could scare off people intending to vote.
People who are obscuring their identity are usually doing so to avoid notice or repercussions for their actions… I think it’s reasonable to expect people in a voting location to be clearly visible and recognizable.
I think it’s reasonable to expect people in a voting location to be clearly visible and recognizable
I agree (in most cases). I’m arguing that these folks are more likely stupid than malicious.
“I have the privilege to be completely oblivious to glaringly obvious racism”
I’m uncertain, but it’s certainly quite possible these folks were trolling. My main point was that it’s not as much about what the folks in sheets intended as much as it’s about how they’re perceived. Elections are pretty important and people are pretty sensitive right now so even if these folks did it for the lulz they may have actually intimidated and suppressed some votes.
Intimidation comes in all forms. Let’s just say that this is not normal behavior around a polling site, and given it’s inside it’s definitely past barriers for anything beyond casting your own vote. Toss them out, even if they are just lost early Halloweeners.
If there where trying to intimidate voters they wouldn’t dress up like ghosts.
Maybe they watched too much South Park. Dressing as ghosts and burning lowercase Ts on lawns is how they tried to scare the
blackrich family away in an episode.
So, unfortunately, the police are often not politically neutral and usually skew towards a conservative bent - this is also likely explicitly outside their jurisdiction since it involves a federal election (and America has a really dark history of law enforcement interfering with elections) so, charitably, they may have been unable to act even if they wanted to.
The correct authority in this case would be one of these folks I believe (I’m not a Georgia native):
https://sos.ga.gov/form/stop-voter-fraud
https://law.georgia.gov/resources/election-fraud-complaint-hotline
https://www.eac.gov/voters/register-and-vote-in-your-state?field_state_target_id=18206
In actuality, it might be best to start by just calling these folks (phone number from the page above).
404-656-2871
Now I’m curious on what the laws are. Everyone’s familiar with the signage of no campaigning past a certain distance from the polling area, but wouldn’t any activity that isn’t actual voting related be considered trespassing right now? If an official there told them to leave and they refused, wouldn’t that mean the police or sheriff gets involved?
Yea - to clarify I’m not a lawyer and, while I’m legally curious, this isn’t something I’ve read a lot of. I know that during the Civil Rights era Johnson sent the national guard into some voting locations to specifically keep police and sheriffs out… in theory that was resolved with the voting rights act but the Supreme Court decided to effectively repeal most of that so… I dunno. I’d like to clarify that my statement regarding police officers was entirely speculation.
The information about fraud reporting is as accurate as I can manage though - the federal government has a page to look up that information on a state by state basis.
It’s a good thing to alert people on, as I’m sure this won’t be the lone example of odd activity, in Georgia or other states. The best place to affect votes is at the voting places, and lots of ways to do it, subtle or otherwise.
this is also likely explicitly outside their jurisdiction since it involves a federal election
states run federal elections though, plus there are probably local issues on the ballot too. why are police even there if it’s outside their jurisdiction? and how do you expect federal entities to enforce laws at every single poll in the country? it makes no sense.
Some of those who work forces are the same that burn crosses
People keep forgetting rage against the machine lyrics. They never stopped being relevant.
Some of those that work forces, are the same that burn crosses
They are police
FTFY
There is nothing weirs about it - those that work forces are the same that burn crosses
Who do you think is under the sheets
Why would they arrest their fellow officers?
Some of those that work forces are the same that burn crosses.
Those who work forces are those who burn crosses.
Crosses?! No, those are lowercase it’s, for “Time to leave.”
I’m thinking they might be ghosts! It’s close to Halloween and they sometimes creep out of the graveyards to illegally vote and steal our democracy!!!
Lol seriously though, if I had to guess it’s just people wearing ghost costumes for Halloween even though it’s slightly early.
On a darker note, they might be really afraid of people seeing who they are and coming after them for “voting the wrong way” but I really doubt that.
They were filming and had fake county employee badges, immediately trespassed and removed
Ohhhh that’s even darker than I dared to guess… Voter intimidation? They’re probably looking for “illegal voting” and know their actions are frowned upon by most so they dont want people to recognize them in town.
Kinda really stupid because you immediately draw attention to yourself dressed like that… But then again the type of person who falls for the Trump election lie doesn’t exactly have logic listed among their strengths…
If this is true and you can have a decent account and some evidence of what happened it might be worth dropping a “tip” about it to your local news station
immediately trespassed and removed
So I take it to mean the poll workers or someone else actually asked them to leave? If so, that’s something. This is absolutely shitty, politicking at the polling place at best, and I agree with the others: you show up to a political event in the south wearing a white sheet, then pointy hood or not, we all know what you’re evoking.
That’s almost certainly super illegal. Unless there’s a weird local exemption It’s illegal to misrepresent yourself as a government official (this usually comes up with law enforcement but it covers all “regular” public employees - i.e. not private contractors hired by the government).
Please report this and include as many photos or other physical proof you may have as I really suspect it’s an attempt at voter intimidation.
Isn’t the vote secret, so nobody can come after them for voting the wrong way?
Sure but what happened in the civil rights era was that anyone who was black was assumed to be voting against the racist as fuck candidate… so if you showed up and were black you’d be run off, beaten, or lynched.
Let’s say you’re me - I’m a man with a beard who wears skirts - I show up to vote and take a wild guess who I’m voting for… it’s not the chucklefuck that wants to persecute all my trans friends. Based on appearance alone (including swag you might have pinned to your bag) you could try and make a guess about how someone may vote.
Agreed on most points but any political “swag pinned to your bag” would be illegal within 100 feet of a polling place
A pride flag pin is not political swag but also correlates very strongly to voting blue, and far-right nutjobs could run with that
Yeah, or something like “My body my choice” there are lots of pins or patches you could draw inference (sometimes incorrectly, of course) from.
That is true, I was just trying to think of some possible reason to want to be hidden. I didn’t even realize they were filming people until the OP replied to me. That made it way worse :/
That first paragraph might be you using absurdist humor. Or it might be a legitimate quote from trump during a televised debate I missed.
I CAN’T TELL ANYMORE!!! EITHER ONE IS JUST AS LIKELY!!!
“The democrats are using the dead to illegally vote in our elections, it’s true. It’s halloween season, the ghosts like to come into the city, and vote. They’re not sending their best. Their sheets are stained, folks. Dirty laundry. They even sent the ghost of an Ohio pet cat that they ate. I saw it, very sad. Said meow. We tried to get the Scooby gang to help, but the Scooby gang has gone woke. Everybody is gone woke. They’re stealing the country…”
What even IS this decade??? Back in 2016 I used to joke that maybe the world really did officially end in 2012 and this was all just reality starting to distort and fall apart.
Now I’m not even joking. What evidence do we have that this is real life???
This seems like a violation of Georgia’s laws against wearing masks in public. If they were trying to speak with or otherwise interfere with voters I encourage you to report it: https://law.georgia.gov/resources/election-fraud-complaint-hotline
Cosplaying as discount klansmen by the looks of it.
I’m guessing their excuse would be some BS statement about voter fraud and “dead people voting”. Obviously they don’t want to be identified.
The general election is two weeks away. What are people voting for in Georgia today?
Some states have early in person voting instead of limiting it to a single day.
Early voting and mail-in absentee votes are a thing where Republicans haven’t restricted them. It makes sense to spread it out if you look at how wait times for even early voting can get into several hours. Why in the world would anyone want to try and do it in one day? How could all the votes be possibly done…oh, that’s why.
Klan.
I don’t care the intent or the season or the laws or the lulz. You wear a white fucking sheet to a polling place in a southern state, it looks like the fucking Klan. Fuck them.
People are voting in the US? I thought that was in November?
Each state has different rules. Some allow “early voting” on selected days prior to the main election day. This allows people who can’t get time off from work on the main day to work it into their schedule.
Absentee or mail-in votes are also done early. Where allowed.
Votes aren’t counted until the main day.
Some states allow counting for early/mail in/ absentee voting before election day but they all prohibit release of counting information early.
Early in person voting has started in several states.
