Latest / Living Loud and Proud: Disability Conversations / Cast Ballots, Not Shade: Disability Voting Rights Week & The Power of the Disability Vote

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Cast Ballots, Not Shade: Disability Voting Rights Week & The Power of the Disability Vote · Living Loud and Proud: Disability Conversations

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Hey folks, to check your voter registration status in Pennsylvania, please visit vote.pa.gov.
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There you will be able to update your voter registration or register to vote for the first time.
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Additionally, you can request an absentee or mail-in ballot on that webpage. Election day in 2026 is on November
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3rd. The final day to register to vote in the general election here in Pennsylvania is on October
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19th. The final day to apply for a mail-in or civilian absentee ballot is on October 27th this year.
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All ballots must be received by November 3rd at 8 p.m.
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Make a plan to fill out your ballot and mail it back, deliver it in person, or drop it in a drop box if they are available in your location in time.
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You can find out more information on your local county election office's website for full details about what's available in your location to return your mail-in or absentee ballot.
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If you are waiting in line to vote in person on election day by 8 p.m., which is when the polls close,
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you should stay in line. You will be able to vote no matter how long it takes to get into the voting booth
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as long as you were in line before they close and you stay in line.
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If you have any difficulties with voting in any way,
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you can call the election protection hotline at 866-OUR-VOTE. Again, that's 866-OUR-VOTE or numerically,
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866-687-8683. Again, 866-687-8683. If you live in Philly and would like information on how to vote
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or need to report access issues or missing polling materials, whatever, call the Philadelphia
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City Commissioner's voting hotline at 215-686-Vote. Again, that's 215-686-Vote.
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Numerically, that is 215-686-8683.
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Again, 215-686-8683.
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Make sure you use your voice to be heard this year.
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Additionally, if you are in Philly and would like to test drive an accessible voting machine, There is a Bites, Ballots, and Belonging Social happening next Wednesday, September 16th at Intercultural Family Services, Inc. at 4240 Chestnut Street.
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There will be light refreshments and a chance to share your voting story with others.
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Now on to our show.
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Welcome to the Living Loud and Proud Podcast brought to you by
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Disability Pride Pennsylvania. If you need a link to the transcript for this episode,
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please visit our accessible website at www.disabilitypridepa.org slash podcast. And now, here is your host.
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Hi, folks. Welcome to the Living Loud and Proud podcast from Disability Pride, Pennsylvania.
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This week's episode is about disability and voting rights. I'm your host and producer,
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Phil Rosen. My guest today is board president, Nico Meiring. How are you doing today, Nico? go? I'm doing host and producer, Phil Rosen. My guest today is board president,
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Nico Meiring. How are you doing today, Nico? I'm doing well, Phil. Thank you so much for having me.
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Yeah, of course. Thanks for being here. So Nico Meiring's board president of Disability Pride,
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Pennsylvania, and chair of the Philadelphia Mayor's Commission on People with Disabilities.
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Born disabled, he organizes at the
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intersection of disability, democracy, sustainability, and transit equity. He serves as a
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poll worker in Philadelphia and works to make civic engagement accessible for every Pennsylvanian.
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So, Nico, let's get into the discussion here today. So the first thing I want to ask is,
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why is it important for people with disabilities
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to vote in America? And why should they care about their right to vote?
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Sure. Phil, thank you so much for having me and for making this podcast in a really pivotal time
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in the calendar year and in the history of the U.S. We're about 250 years into this big, beautiful
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experiment called democracy in America. And I'm thrilled, nervous, and invested and engaged in
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whatever comes next. But more to your question, there are more eligible disabled voters in this
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country than there are people living in California, one of our most populous states.
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So we're this gigantic voting bloc that I think no politician, no party has really figured out how to court yet successfully.
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More recently, the Rutgers Program for Disability Research numbered our roster, I guess,
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just before the 2024 presidential election at about
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40.2 million eligible voters. So that's about one in six people, right? And then if you think about
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who lives with us, who has a disabled person in their daily life, our spouses, our parents,
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our kids, our roommates,
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heck, our doctors, right? You're at another 72.7 million, so maybe one in three of that entire
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electorate. It is a really empowering perspective that I try to keep in mind when I see policy
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discussions, maybe not looking at the disabled angle or whenever I feel discouraged, shall we say.
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I think one thing that one reason why disabled people should vote is that many, many disabled elders, more than I could name here,
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worked and fought really hard for that right to vote.
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One thing that I'm learning in real time, and Phil, perhaps you are too,
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is that positive outcomes are worth celebrating,
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and positive outcomes are also worth the work to maintain. Because when we don't do the work to maintain these positive
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outcomes, we risk backsliding. One of the reasons that I personally work to involve more disabled
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voices in every conversation here in Philadelphia or across this great commonwealth is that disabled
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people deserve to have a voice at every single table. And the big reason for that is that we know exactly what happens
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when disabled people like you and me are not at the table.
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In 2022, disabled people turned out at the polls at about 50.8%.
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And that's fantastic.
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If you were an elected politician or an elected representative,
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you had a 50.8% approval rating,
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you and your team would be over the moon.
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When Rutgers research is controlled for demographics like age, race, education, gender, and state,
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we saw a gap between disabled voters and non-disabled voters at about 6.4 points. So non-disabled voters are still
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voting in numbers a little higher than us. One other reason that we should care, and I'll stop
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giving you numbers and start giving you stories, is that every single thing that shapes my life
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right is decided by somebody
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who was elected at some point in time. And millions of other disabled people say that exact same
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thing. Whether Medicaid pays for home and community-based services, or whether they warehouse
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us in a nursing facility, whether SEPTA funds an elevator
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or an accessibility improvement,
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like I had the great joy of going to a press conference for earlier today,
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or whether that gets deferred for another budget cycle,
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another, heck, I don't know, Spider-Man film,
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that gets decided by somebody who is elected.
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Whether a playing place has a ramp
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on that pivotal first
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Tuesday in November or not, that is also determined by some people, even minor officials, who are at
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some point elected. This is why elections matter for disabled people and why we need to vote.
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And I guess we could also say that non-disabled people who are clued into this issue probably
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should care about the disability vote too, because almost all of them are going to be
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disabled at some point in their life.
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Maybe not now, but the continuation of this right to vote, you don't want to suddenly become
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disabled and then lose your voice.
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That's absolutely true.
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So that's a really good point that you raise.
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Another wonderful facet of it is that when we improve things for disabled people, when we
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improve accessibility, whatever that looks like, things tend to also improve for non-disabled
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people, for older folks, for people
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whose mobility is temporarily limited due to some injury, due to some surgery, new families
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who use strollers.
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Everyone benefits from accessibility.
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Everyone will benefit from more widely distributed information.
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So really, disabled rights, disabled voting rights are rights for everyone.
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Yeah, that's such a great point.
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So the week after this podcast is due to be released is Disability Voting Rights Week.
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And that means that this year the dates are September 14th to 18th.
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What is the purpose of this week? And who started it?
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Sure. I love to think of Disability Voting Rights Week as a holiday. I think people deserve every
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chance to celebrate and every chance to spread joy that they can reasonably get. But it's also
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a deadline, a deadline for me to get serious about spreading voting information
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and a deadline for the rest of the disability community to do the same, to really lock in,
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educate themselves about the ballot measures, candidates, and policy positions being debated,
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and further locking in on those important day of logistics.
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Where is my polling place?
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What do I have to do to request a mail-in ballot?
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If I'm not registered, what are my deadlines and what do I have to do?
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And importantly, where can I get that info?
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Every Philadelphian
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Every Pennsylvanian, every American deserves that
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free, nonpartisan, and widely available information that helps them cast a secure vote.
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You also asked me who started Disability Voting Rights Week and a little bit about the history.
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So DVRW is hosted by the American Association of People with Disabilities
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and their offshoot, the RevUp campaign.
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Okay.
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I'm not fully informed on the structural particulars of how that works,
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but RevUp stands for Register, Educate, Vote, Use Your Power. I guess the Y is a little
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bit silent in that acronym. But there's also RevUp chapters throughout different cities and
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regions in the US. Really honored and lucky to be working with RevUp Philadelphia, which
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gets overseen by Vicki Landers, who is a Disability Pride Pennsylvania
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founder and executive director, and Lauren Alden from Liberty Resources.
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But there's a lot of organizations that help steer that rev up ship, too.
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So shout out to Easter Seals, the ARC of Philadelphia, and other groups that do really
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pivotal work to make sure that this incredible city stays accessible and improves accessibility for all of us.
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But back to Disability Voting Rights Week.
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This mid-September week is, in my mind, a really great chance to think about where we are as a city, how we can each commit to keeping voting free, fair, and accessible.
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And those efforts, you know, it's nonpartisan, just like RevUp is.
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It's cross-disability, just like RevUp is.
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And it's also cross-movement, which for RevUp, in my experience, means engaging blind voters, engaging deaf voters or low vision, hard of hearing, wheelchair users, people with visible disabilities like myself most of the time, folks who have intellectual and developmental disabilities.
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Because regardless of how we come to the disabled experience, we have a right to vote.
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And thank God here in the U.S. and in Pennsylvania, we have some rules and laws that help us cast that vote securely.
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I should give a shout out and a mention here to September 16th Bites, Ballots, and Belonging event held by Wrap Up Philadelphia in support from the Committee of Seventy.
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It's going to be a really fun event from 3 to 6 that day at Intercultural Family Services.
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And I'll get the address to fill before this airs.
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I hope to see folks there.
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It'll be a great chance to
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socialize, share some bites with community, and very importantly, share your voting story.
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Share why voting is important to you and come to learn where your polling place is,
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what your voting options are, and what we'll be voting on in November.
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okay that's excellent.
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So, you know, you kind of told me a little bit about RevUp.
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So, are there any elections that you consider to be especially important for disabled individuals
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to vote in or to pay attention to?
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Are local or state elections more or less important than federal elections, for instance?
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Sure.
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I would hazard a guess to say that your local elections are incredibly important.
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Okay.
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I would be a bad poll worker and a bad champion of democracy if I said that one
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election was any more important than any other. But I will say that the people we elect at the
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local level, the policies and ballot questions that we decide upon, have daily touch points
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in your life in a way that people that live in a way
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that people that make decisions in Harrisburg and make decisions in Washington, D.C. may not.
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Not to say that those elections are not important. They are crucial and they are important,
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but their impacts may be more indirect or not immediately felt
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in the way that local elections and local officials, their impact can be felt and their decisions can
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have direct input. The people who really decide whether your ramp gets built and where it gets
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built and on whose timetable do not have a national debate stage,
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right? So again, we have to be careful because federal elections obviously matter quite a bit.
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But if you're asking me where the disability vote has the most raw leverage per, I don't know,
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ballot cast, it's not really close. It's state and both. I think that this is pretty consistently true.
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Medicaid is the single largest funder of long-term services and supports in this country.
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And it's administered, of course, by the state, or at least in Pennsylvania, by the Commonwealth.
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So whether Pennsylvania funds home and community-based services robustly enough that disabled folks can live in our own homes instead of institutions, that's Harrisburg.
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Whether that direct care workforce is paid enough that anybody actually takes the job, that's Harrisburg.
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whether it simply gets operating money
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to keep elevators in service,
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to keep paratransit running
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on time, that debate,
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those arguments,
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they happen in the General Assembly.
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And
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I'm honored to be involved with
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climate transit
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activism and Transit Forward
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Philadelphia, whose
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coalition really advocates for transit justice and as part of that accessibility for folks in Philadelphia and our five counties.
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Okay.
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You asked me, Phil, what the consequential elections are. Am I right?
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Yes.
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Sure.
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So on the ballot in front of
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Pennsylvanians on November 3rd, we have
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governor, we have
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lieutenant governor, and governor Shapiro
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is running for re-election.
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All 17 of our
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congressional seats, and
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also, if I'm
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not mistaken, every single one of the
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203 seats in the Pennsylvania House.
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And then I would be remiss if I didn't also mention the Pennsylvania Senate, which could see half of their 50 seats, so 25, flip.
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Republicans have controlled that chamber since 1994, when I was six years old. So it could be that Democrats
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flipped that, or perhaps not. I think three seats decided. If we go further down, in an
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odd year, you're voting for city council, city commissioners, or the people who run our
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elections, school board, judges, sheriff, and all of those elections have disability perspectives as
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well. Well, I don't want to get too far ahead of myself. Right, of course, of course. So we kind of,
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you know, hinted at the midterm elections coming up, you know, at the time of release, it's going to be less than two months.
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Are there any barriers being put in place to take away anyone's ability to vote during using the preferred method?
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Excuse me.
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uh you know every time uh that i hear that somebody wants to secure the vote, I feel like a disabled person loses the security of their own vote.
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I know that sounds cynical, but I think it's also a pattern.
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I do want to be careful But but this is what I fear. I have been watching with a lot of trepidation that the Supreme Court lifted an injunction that had been blocking parts of a March executive order on federal elections.
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and that was this past Monday, so August 24th.
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Also, of course, this is Thursday the 27th.
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It's very possible that things change.
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So some big disclaimers.
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Going back to the story, Pennsylvania was one of about two dozen states that sued to stop that executive
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order in March. The Supreme Court didn't really rule if the policies were legal. It said that states
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sued too early. So those agencies at the federal level get to proceed while the case continues,
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and now Pennsylvania has already filed a follow-up suit in that.
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In it, the Postal Service, which is an agency that I'm actually a huge fan of, finalized a rule that says county officials must submit their mail ballot envelope designs for federal review.
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put unique barcodes on outbound and return envelopes,
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and also upload every voter's name, mailing address, and barcode into a federal portal.
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This adds a lot of time, right, because counties maybe have already purchased their envelopes.
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They've already contracted the printing.
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Ballots go out in a matter of weeks.
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I believe it was Montgomery County's election board chair called it chaos for the voters that they serve and that they're going to serve.
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and um and the u.s supreme Supreme Court, Justice Jackson, I believe,
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dissented and said that the ruling contributes to some pre-election chaos
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rather than ending it.
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Earlier in our conversation, Phil, I said that disabled voters like you and me
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deserve clarity around their voter access and their voting information.
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And this is the opposite of clarity.
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When there's any confusion around rules, when there's this chaos, like the election board chair calls it,
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disabled voters, older voters, rural voters, their voting plans really risk falling apart.
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They really kind of confront that chaos first, unfortunately.
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And one of the reasons that I'm not going to lose myself to fear or to panic is that one of our Philadelphia
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city commissioners, Seth Blustein, actually said publicly that Philadelphia already confirms
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a voter's identity on the mail ballot application before a ballot is ever counted.
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And I'm someone who has voted by mail in recent past elections because on the day of voting, I'm a poll worker.
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So I can attest that, you know, absentee voting, mail-in voting is secure.
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And here in Philadelphia, we have dedicated employees that take voting security very seriously and take voter identification, verification very seriously.
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I feel confident in my ability to vote fairly and to have that vote counted.
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So we already know only eligible voters are voting by mail.
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Thanks to Commissioner Blustein and his colleagues, Commission Chair Omar Sabirink,
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Commissioner Lisa Dilley, who do this crucial work day in and day out.
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When an election official from the party pushing the policy
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tells you that the policy is solving a problem that doesn't exist,
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believe him.
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Yeah, of course. And I love myself some unfiltered KBJ when she's pulling no punches.
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So, you know, you said something really interesting there about like, you know, the mail-in voting and how it's like trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist there.
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Do you think that perhaps part of the reason why there is this attack on mail-in voting comes from, like that people are going to be, I don't know, Googling on their phones while they're filling out their ballot?
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Like people are going to be more informed?
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You know, one thing about democracy, and I think it's a beautiful thing, is that democracy gets stronger the more voices we have
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the more hands that get raised up
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or the more voices that are heard
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and counted
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and following along those lines
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what
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danger does an informed
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voter pose
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if you are elected official
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and you are serving
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capably, fairly and transparently to the best of your ability, would you not welcome an informed voter?
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Yeah, I guess it depends on your motivations, right? I mean, if your motivation is power, right? You maybe don't want people pushing back against that as much.
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I would agree and I think you've said The quiet part out loud Right. You maybe don't want people pushing back against that as much.
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I would agree. And I think you've said the quiet part out loud. But, you know, one genuinely good piece of news and one thing that I like to hold on to when I hold on to hope is that in June, the Supreme
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Court did uphold state's authority to count mail ballots that arrive in the days after
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election day.
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So that responsibility, that authority sits with the state.
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The Pennsylvania Secretary of State is somebody that I had the great fortune of hearing
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from regularly when I was a board president of Young and Vol Philadelphia.
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Aleph Schmidt is somebody who takes his role very seriously.
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So when AAPD called that news a win that states have the authority to count mail ballots that arrive after Election Day,
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I genuinely do believe that Grace periods disproportionately protect disabled voters.
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So, you know, disabled voters' strategy is to have a plan, and we can't have that plan soon enough.
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Make that plan in August, make that plan in August. Make that plan in September.
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Make that plan in October.
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But as soon as possible.
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Okay.
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Yeah, of course.
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So for anyone who maybe is planning on voting in person this election cycle,
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are there any rules that are specific to voting in person that maybe they should know about,
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especially here in Pennsylvania, but, you know, just in general?
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Sure. Yeah.
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Whenever I've been a poll worker, I've had the great joy of serving as the majority inspector. So I'm one of the people behind the table who have you, like, sign on the e-poll book to affirm that you are voting.
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so I can tell you that in Pennsylvania,
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unless it's your first time voting at that specific polling place,
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you don't need a photo ID to vote.
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If you've just moved and me and my poll worker friends are meeting you for the
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first time, then yeah, you do need to show photo ID,
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but all other times that's not the case.
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Polls are going to open at 7 a.m.,
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and they're going to close at 8 p.m.
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A poll worker like me
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has the responsibility
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of staying there the full time,
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but if you are in line at 8 p.m.,
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if you are in line at 8 p.m.,
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and God forbid you're still there at 8.01, stay in line. If you are in line at 8 p.m. and, you know, God forbid you're still there at 8.01,
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stay in
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line. If you're in line
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by or at 8 p.m., you vote
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full stop.
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Nobody can move you out of that
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line, and if somebody tries, there's
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the election protection hotline, which
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is 866-687-8683,
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which stylistically and logically is 866, our vote.
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I just went to a League of Women Voters event on the 8th, where I heard from lots of wonderful
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champions of democracy, a professor who talked about the Voting Rights Act.
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So I got a reminder, lucky me, about the Help America Vote Act, or the HAVA.
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As of 2002, thanks to the Help America Vote Act, every polling place is required to have
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at least one voting system that lets a disabled voter cast about privately
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and independently. You don't have to be visibly disabled. And again, I'm not most of the time.
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You don't have to offer any justification. You just really make the request. If it's not
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set up, if it's shoved in a corner, if it's obstructed by, I don't know, someone's
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backpack and a bunch of coats,
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that's a reportable failure
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and you should report it.
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So call 215-686-VOTE.
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Right? That's 215-686-VOTE.
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Because disabled people like you and me
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deserve to vote.
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What else do I want to cover?
30:47
Oh, yeah.
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You have the right to bring someone to help you vote if you feel like you need it, if you feel like you want it.
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By and large, you get to choose yourself who that person is.
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Now, those exceptions are that it can't be your employer or somebody that your employer designates, so not your boss, not your boss's best friend.
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It can't be an officer or agent of your union, if you're a union member.
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And then it can't be the director of elections for your division.
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Anybody else.
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It could be your kid, your neighbor, um your care aide your care attendant um a random
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stranger that you trust if you're feeling particularly extroverted is all those people
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are fair game and what that manifested for me when i saw that in inaction it was the adult adult adult
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child of a parent or the adult parent of a disabled adult.
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And I guess I'll tell you something else that I didn't realize until I was just
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sitting down today to prepare for this talk with you, Phil.
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Every time I've been a poll worker, I've had the luck and the fortune and the blessing of seeing more and more disabled people come in to vote.
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And that's wonderful to see because it shows that we're taking each election seriously.
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But it's also beautiful because it shows Philadelphia that we really do need to make
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accessible for every polling station
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across this incredible city.
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I've
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mostly been a poll worker up at
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the Fillmore in North Philadelphia
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which when it's not a
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polling place is a concert venue.
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But this most recent time
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I was at a church more in
32:44
center city. So there's all kinds of places in Philly that can be polling places, regardless of structure, regardless of what that place is the other 364 days a year, it needs to be accessible for disabled voters.
32:57
Oh, yeah, perfect. So, you know, you kind of touched a little bit on this before in another answer, but there's been some discussion in independent media spaces about needing to vote in the midterms in large numbers and to be prepared to protect the results.
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What are your thoughts regarding this?
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And should we worry that results might not be honored or may otherwise be mucked with or rigged?
33:29
I think if there's any threat to this election, it wouldn't be a rigged count.
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It would be a thinned out count.
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Right.
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And why I say that is, for one reason, I do have to respect both of my roles as board president of a 501c3 and as chairman of a mayor's commission.
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And I am not going to stand up claims that I can't stand behind in good faith.
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Philadelphia verifies an identity on the mail ballot application before a ballot is ever counted, as we've covered.
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When Pennsylvania results have been challenged in court, and this has happened repeatedly, those counts have held.
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right um the method that would lead to thinned out voting numbers for disabled voters and for voters from other historically marginalized communities would be friction-like making the registration paperwork more complicated or to make that effort heavier.
34:44
it would be to let those accessible voting machines
34:48
sit broken in the corner you know the sad fact is that nobody has to alter a single vote if enough people give up
35:00
before they cast theirs that's cold comfort and I'm sorry to say that.
35:06
But I don't mean it to be comforting.
35:09
I mean it to be actionable.
35:12
You can't really do anything about a hypothetically rigged machine.
35:18
We could shadowbox hypotheticals all day.
35:21
But you can do a whole bunch about proposed rule changes and making your voice
35:28
heard, right? Part of one way that you can protect the results, one way that we can interpret protecting
35:39
results to be actionable, is to become a poll worker here in philadelphia and wherever you value listener
35:48
are hearing in from um needs poll workers every cycle it is a paid position so although you do have
35:56
to be in one location for uh 11 12 13 hours in in one, you do get paid for it.
36:10
And, you know, speaking for myself, speaking for the people that I've worked the polls alongside, disabled or not, we really care and take the time and energy and effort to
36:17
make sure the machine gets set up right, because we know what those machines are for.
36:22
The voter, you know, who needs assistance
36:25
gets their rights communicated and respected
36:28
because we do know them.
36:30
We are required to get training
36:34
and we're in fact compensated more if we are trained.
36:41
If you want to protect an election,
36:43
you don't really do that from sitting on your couch or sitting behind a computer screen.
36:48
You can guard it from behind a poll book.
36:53
I should also mention that we can vote early enough that any problems, if they do pop up, are fixable.
37:01
You can track your mail-in ballot, and Pennsylvania can't even start opening those mail
37:07
ballots until election day. So in full apologies to receding hairlines, chattering teeth, and worn
37:17
down hangnails, but a slow and long count is pretty normal here. It's sort of the law, and we need to be very careful to not equate
37:28
a slow count with a stolen count. Right. Of course. Of course. So we've seen some rolling back
37:39
of the Voting Rights Act in the last year. Notably, many states in the South are disenfranchising
37:45
black and brown voters. And there have been some fears that student voters might also be
37:52
disenfranchised as a result of some of these changes. Should we be concerned that they may come
37:57
for the disability vote next or as part of all of this?
38:01
you know the voting rates Rights Act was the ramp.
38:08
And in April, the U.S. Supreme Court took kind of a sledgehammer to that ramp.
38:16
in late April
38:21
I think April 29th in Louisiana
38:22
versus Calais
38:24
Supreme Court ruled 6-3 and rewrote Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which barred voting rules and district maps that discriminate on the basis of race.
38:38
Justice Kagan wrote in dissent.
38:43
How do I remember this?
38:45
Section two is all but a dead letter.
38:50
And she was backed up by legal scholars at the Brennan Center and at Harvard, which are far smarter legal scholars than than me and perhaps like like you yourself.
39:04
So, yeah, directly, yes.
39:07
And there's three ways that this reaches us, right?
39:12
Disability is not a separate population
39:16
from Black and Brown populations.
39:19
Disability is a very wide voting block,
39:22
but also remarkably intersectional.
39:26
Disabled Black Philadelphians exist, and they vote.
39:29
The first place I ever lived in Philadelphia was a majority older,
39:35
majority Black apartment complex, and we all voted at the synagogue next door.
39:41
That was our polling place.
39:42
for the 2020 election, man, Phil,
39:45
I have never seen such a long line
39:49
out the polling place, out the door,
39:51
around the corner, through a parking lot.
39:54
And this was 2022,
39:55
when we still had COVID protections in place.
39:58
But, you know, even as old as many of those voters were,
40:02
they were out voting in droves.
40:04
So I really want to honor that. But, you know, going forward and, you know. as old as many of those voters were, they were out voting in droves.
40:06
So I really want to honor that.
40:15
But going forward and back on topic, disabled Latino voters in North Philly, they vote.
40:23
Disability rates are higher in Black and Brown communities because of things like healthcare access, redlining, pollution, environmental
40:27
racism, and maybe that's a different podcast conversation.
40:31
But these are all things that Philly really knows intimately.
40:37
And what I need to make explicit when I'm in conversation, because I'm aware that I might
40:44
not look like, you know,
40:46
I get impacted by the same things that hit disabled Black and brown communities.
40:51
But I do because disability touches so many of us.
40:55
When you dilute the political power of a Black neighborhood or an older neighborhood or a rural neighborhood,
41:04
so too do you dilute the power of
41:07
the disabled people and voters who live there, right? Disabled people who are over age 18 and who can
41:14
vote, but then disabled kids as well who, you know, deserve to have a healthy future that values them
41:23
as well.
41:30
But, you know, back on topic, there's shared legal architecture, too.
41:36
So I'm referring to the Voting Accessibility for the Alderling Handicapped Act of 84,
41:40
the Help America Vote Act, ADA Title II.
41:45
All of these were built on this foundation that the Voting Rights Act laid.
41:55
So what impacts the VRA today, we need to make sure it does not adversely impact the Voting Accessibility for the Aldering and Handicapped Act tomorrow.
41:58
it's all of these
42:03
really important civics lessons that aren't taught to you in history class,
42:11
maybe get glossed over in high school civics class, but which really matter for disabled people.
42:19
And then the other way that this scale back of the VRA hits disabled folks is that section two that we talk about was one of the only tools that allowed us to win on effect, effect, EFFECT, rather than intent.
42:40
right you didn't have to prove somebody sat in a room and said that part out loud. Hey, we actually choose to discriminate. You just had to show the outcome.
42:52
Right. And this is important because disability discrimination can take the form of ignorance, malice, or apathy. And how we engage to correct it depends heavily upon that origin.
43:11
But at any rate, it's almost never announced, is it?
43:17
Disability discrimination in voting is almost never announced.
43:21
Nobody says outright, what a great day to exclude wheelchair users.
43:26
They say that, I don't know, the church basement is the only available place to vote the polling station, and there's no way down there for wheelchair users.
43:36
It's when we say, oh, the city budget, it is what it is, and there's no chance for disabled people who use screen readers to have tech in place before we vote on the budget and it goes into effect.
43:50
So sorry, so sad.
43:52
But effects-based analysis is really how we win.
43:59
Historically, Philadelphia has been that proof, but in the future, Philadelphia will be that proving ground for how we activate, empower, and enfranchise disabled voters or not.
44:15
Okay, yeah. You know, it is interesting, too. Like, I've lived a few different places in Philly, and it's always interesting to me, like, how the polling place is accessible. Because, like, every polling place is different, right?
44:26
Like, you know, I remember living down on Callow Hill or near Callow Hill Street, right?
44:33
And I think it was, like, this, like, little, like, municipal building or whatever.
44:40
I can't remember what it was exactly.
44:42
But there was, like, a lift up, you know,
44:45
instead of like a ramp or, um, you know, some of the other places have been like churches where it's
44:49
like literally just a direct, like walk in from the sidewalk and you're in. Um, and, uh, now if I
44:57
went to vote in person, I think it's literally just up the street from here. It's like, um,
45:01
Penn Asian senior services or something like that so it's like um you know of
45:06
course that's going to be a more accessible place anyways because of the community that they uh serve
45:12
but it's just always fascinating to me how it all works um and and sometimes it can be a little
45:18
inconvenient um you know with the the place that had the lift you know you had to wait for the
45:23
security guard to come and security guards like their time to to get there sometimes.
45:29
Or maybe they were busy. I don't know. I'm not going to make too many judgments there.
45:32
But it's always interesting to see how, you know, accessibility is thought of in all these different spaces.
45:40
Yeah, absolutely. It's why paying attention to the details is so important. You know, another aspect of accessibility that I like to pay attention to when I look at local news or local commentary is how that information is presented.
45:58
A zoning board meeting sounds pretty boring, but it could have a really big impact on how a disabled person lives in their home.
46:08
And that decision is hyper-local.
46:10
It makes a decision at the block or neighborhood level.
46:14
And whether that's reported on page 12 of your local newspaper, which maybe you don't get every morning, or whether that's in a mail envelope direct to your house, that
46:26
changes how you receive information and whether you're likely to notice and engage with it or not.
46:34
And, you know, actually, this is a question that just came up in my head as we've been talking
46:39
about all this stuff. And I don't necessarily want to put you on the spot as like, you know,
46:43
a poll worker or a representative of the mayor's commission or anything like that. But there's been a lot of
46:49
hay made recently, especially in maybe more progressive circles about like, you know, whether
46:55
first past the post voting, you know, the scheme that we generally use in this country
47:00
is truly democratic or has truly democratic outcomes.
47:13
You know, are there some alternatives that maybe would increase that, you know, democratization of like the results?
47:20
Or is that just a lot of, you know, fluff that people are just putting out there?
47:24
Thank you for this question. It's something that I've really thought a lot about.
47:49
I think about how both sides of my family came over to the U.S. from the Netherlands, where they have a very different system of government, and how the rules that they have shape how their politics functions day in and day out.
47:56
Here in the U.S., we have a first-past-the-post system for determining who wins our federal elections.
48:00
And through the direct vote, who wins our local elections as well.
48:07
And so when we say first past the post, what it looks like nationally is whoever gets 270 electoral college votes first wins the federal election.
48:21
And the candidate who receives the least amount is elected.
48:26
They lose.
48:27
And all of those electoral college points, those are for naught.
48:34
What that shapes in our political dialogue and how we talk about the decisions in front of us every November is that it shapes us
48:50
into all or nothing voters and this I worry and this I have seen to lend itself to not discussions, but arguments.
49:07
Not to compromises and collaboration, but confrontation.
49:14
It's easy to think that I don't have anything in common with my neighbor
49:22
or with someone who might vote differently than me.
49:28
If I have elected officials in my era saying,
49:34
this side believes in everything that you stand against,
49:37
and this side believes in everything that you stand for,
49:40
there's no, or at least very little, incentive to reach across the aisle to expand your worldview
49:47
and to think about how the actions that you take as an elected official really impact people who,
49:55
you know, both supported your campaign and who didn't. Comparatively, ranked choice voting,
50:04
where a voter might say, this candidate is my first choice
50:09
because their perspectives and and viewpoints align most closely with my own political perspectives
50:15
this person is my second choice third fourth and so on because they do the next next next and next
50:22
next next best job uh that's ranked choice voting.
50:28
And in that system, whoever gets the most first choices becomes the nominee or the elected
50:43
official uh and and so on down from there.
50:47
And in those cycles, in those races, we see,
50:53
I don't want to say more collaboration because ultimately you do have
50:57
winners and losers,
50:58
but you do see a wider acceptance of different ideas,
51:04
being willing to like fine tune and adjust an idea
51:08
before it becomes a policy,
51:10
before it becomes like a tentpole of someone's campaign.
51:15
And it helps our elected officials
51:21
develop into people who give good governance and who can engage in good
51:29
governance. And one hallmark of good governance is the ability to say, you know, this thing that I
51:36
thought originally no longer holds because of new information that I have. Because I have new
51:43
information, now this is what I believe.
51:47
And here's how it is better
51:48
or more comprehensive
51:49
or more well-informed
51:51
than my last position.
51:55
It's not a bad thing
51:57
to change your mind.
51:59
It's not a bad thing
52:00
to have well-informed stances
52:03
for your decisions. And I would love to see more
52:11
municipalities try out choice voting and really, really see how we can make voting that fits our
52:22
voters. Yeah, of course. And something that I have kind of been
52:28
watching a little bit is in some of these primaries that have had ranked choice voting,
52:33
New York City comes to mind, for instance, to me. That's probably the most high profile one
52:38
recently that we can talk about. I remember that there was some sort sort of maybe not collaboration but i remember that there
52:47
were a couple candidates that were like oh if you don't vote for me first vote for me second and
52:51
and so on and so forth and uh it it kind of really changed the tone of like you know rather than
52:58
just like going all in and like attacking someone it kind of makes it a little bit more feel a little
53:04
more collaborative and maybe a little bit more, feel a little more collaborative and
53:05
maybe a little bit, I don't know, God forbid I say this, nicer than our elections tend to be.
53:13
You know, I think part of what makes so many people check out, and I don't know if you feel
53:20
this way or not, maybe this is poor analysis on my part but I feel like there's a an air of cynicism
53:27
a lot of people feel about like especially first past the post where um oh you know
53:35
like whatever attack happens like oh no like is this really real is this not you know
53:44
and some people just don't have the time to really evaluate those either.
53:48
I mean, we're all busy. Right.
53:53
So it's just one of those things where I always kind of look at it and,
53:56
and, you know, you see like the, the attacks,
53:59
like are they coming from somewhere real sometimes? And, and, you know,
54:04
it doesn't always feel that way,
54:05
at least to someone who might pay more attention.
54:10
You're right.
54:11
I think that we can always do more
54:14
to educate our voters about how to navigate
54:18
online resources and verify their accuracy
54:21
and transparency in a methodical way.
54:25
And here in Philadelphia,
54:27
I want to give some shout-outs
54:29
to Philly Tech Week,
54:32
to Black Tech in Philly,
54:35
to the Free Library,
54:36
and to everybody
54:40
who helped bring
54:43
some democracy conversations to the Free library for the month of May.
54:49
One session was indeed about accuracy of online information and how we defend democracy in this age of AI and tech that is advancing at a very rapid stage.
55:08
Yeah. And, you know, I guess one other quick question that I just wanted to ask is,
55:15
how do we fight against apathy? Like just general apathy? Like my vote doesn't matter
55:21
because I'm just but one voice in a sea of millions.
55:26
Sure. So I think one way that we can punch back against apathy is that we can really get involved.
55:37
Um, civic engagement is, um, one of my favorite hobbies.
55:42
And I'm so lucky to live in Philadelphia,
55:45
where civic engagement can look very different from day to day,
55:49
usually at multiple different points during the day.
55:53
If you're showing up at the polling place only every May and every November,
56:02
you're only, well, you're kind of leaving the party early.
56:07
You're leaving the party at like 7 p.m.
56:10
Why not go to a town hall meeting and make your voice heard?
56:14
Why not go to a SEPTA board meeting where they have public comment sessions at least monthly
56:22
and more frequently if they're debating something that's particularly hot button,
56:26
like a transit route change.
56:29
Or if you're listening to this from outside the SEPTA service territory, your own public transit agency.
56:37
Going back to the point I made about information in the newspaper versus on the front page, go to a public meeting, find out when a hearing is going to be held, show up at your council members' office hours and really make your voice heard.
56:59
People will be answerable to you, especially at the local level.
57:07
I, here in Philadelphia, have a really active city council member that I just saw today at the Scepter Press conference I was at.
57:19
This is what I would say to somebody who is facing a rising tide of voter apathy.
57:27
Right.
57:28
Even if you think that all candidates are not in it for the right reasons, there are still ballot measures most of the time that deserve your input.
57:41
If they don't impact you, I guarantee you that they impact somebody that you
57:45
care about, somebody that you interact with in your daily life, perhaps. And this is why
57:52
we can take a firm stance against voter apathy. Okay. And, you know, I think I'm going to close
58:00
out the conversation here with this question coming up. So we've covered some heavy topics today, you know, things like voter apathy or like potential questions about election results, that kind of stuff.
58:16
Do you have any positive like takeaways or thoughts about what's happening in the future regarding voting rights, especially with regards to disability?
58:26
Yeah, absolutely.
58:28
I mean, if I didn't have some positivity, enthusiasm,
58:34
and energy for the future,
58:36
I wouldn't be as involved in the fight for disability rights as I am.
58:42
Disabled voters are one of the, if not the, fastest growing electorate populations in the
58:50
U.S. between 2020 and 2024. We grew 5%, which is pretty fast for one four-year time frame.
59:01
we're obviously
59:04
the only minority group
59:06
that anyone can join
59:08
at any time.
59:09
So in terms of voting rights,
59:11
we're the only voting bloc in America
59:13
that is mathematically guaranteed
59:16
to grow.
59:21
So an aging population,
59:24
better medicine, more people surviving things that they didn't used to, and I should say it, a whole generation of long COVID survivors who are really reshaping our understanding of chronic conditions all contribute to this voting bloc getting bigger.
59:44
Nobody can gerrymander Nobody should gerrymander all contribute to this voting block getting bigger.
59:46
Nobody can gerrymander.
59:49
Nobody should gerrymander.
59:53
A demographic that keeps recruiting from the general public.
59:59
Also, going back to something that I celebrated at the beginning of our conversation,
1:00:09
our turnout is going up, even as voter turnouts from other demographics, other groups, maybe flat, or maybe even is falling, unfortunately. Between 2018 and 2022, so two midterm years, disabled turnout rose 1.6 percentage points.
1:00:21
And conversely, non-disabled turnout fell 1.6 points.
1:00:30
Right. Even with every barrier we've talked about today to disabled voting,
1:00:37
I think it was Lisa Sher at Rutgers who described the disability community as a sleeping tiger.
1:00:46
Right. At least in terms of American politics.
1:00:48
So I'd say tiger's up, and it's stretching right now.
1:00:52
I, you know, am also so encouraged by the election events taking place here in Philadelphia,
1:01:02
here in Pennsylvania.
1:01:04
I mentioned Bites, Ballots, and Belonging
1:01:08
September 16th at Intercultural Family Services
1:01:11
from 3 to 6.
1:01:13
I should also mention an accessible voting workshop
1:01:16
October 6th that I'm hosting along with Art Reach
1:01:20
at the Tech Owl community space from 530 to 7pm.
1:01:27
I'm working on that under the auspices of the mayor's commission, along with Abby Judd from Art Reach.
1:01:34
Abby Judd is an incredible voting advocate who has done a lot of work here in Philadelphia to tie accessibility in voting rights and even in with art.
1:01:47
We'll hear from city commissioners, Omar Sabir, RCP, yes, Commissioner Blustein, Commissioner
1:01:54
Dealey.
1:01:55
We'll talk about the rights that we talked about today.
1:01:59
And fingers crossed, Phil, our special guest will be an accessible voting machine um if all goes well so really
1:02:07
looking forward to that event looking forward to bites ballots and belonging um and any other
1:02:16
events that come up between now and november whose purpose it is to spread information
1:02:22
share resources and make sure that voters are heard.
1:02:29
So real quick, I just actually wanted to ask you, you said that hopefully there's going to be an accessible voting machine as a special guest at that event.
1:02:37
Are people going to be able to test drive it, so to speak?
1:02:41
Yeah, absolutely.
1:02:42
Oh, awesome.
1:02:43
I need to email the election office again and
1:02:45
firm up some plans.
1:02:48
Before
1:02:49
we close, I can give folks some
1:02:51
action steps that I would be a
1:02:53
really bad voting advocate if I
1:02:55
didn't mention. Folks, do me
1:02:57
a huge favor. Go to vote.pa.gov
1:03:01
and just
1:03:03
check your voter registration.
1:03:06
It takes maybe 90 seconds.
1:03:08
And if you're not registered,
1:03:10
you have until October 19th
1:03:12
to do so. If you want
1:03:14
a mail-in ballot, don't apply
1:03:16
by October 27th. It's
1:03:18
August 27
1:03:20
right now, so you have
1:03:21
a long time.
1:03:26
Well, folks, I I think that's about all we have for today's episode.
1:03:31
Thanks, Nico, for your insightful comments on voting rights in the disability community and just general things Americans have to worry about regarding voting.
1:03:42
And, you know, is there any place that people can find you at um you know it just in general
1:03:49
sure um i am an old millennial so i kind of grew up online uh i i dearly miss the chat rooms
1:04:00
of the early 2000s but these days you you can find me on socials, on
1:04:05
at name starts with N
1:04:08
because it does
1:04:09
and mine does.
1:04:11
But on LinkedIn, I'm just
1:04:13
Nika Meiering. I dare say I'm probably one of
1:04:15
the few Nika Meierings people
1:04:17
know in life. I don't have
1:04:19
a name like Mike Smith. I don't have a name like
1:04:21
Joe Brown. If you Google me and see
1:04:23
Nika Meiering, odds are that you found me.
1:04:28
Okay, awesome. Well, thanks again for coming on. And, you know, always insightful when I get the chance to talk to you. And hopefully we will have many, many more conversations throughout the entirety of this podcast.
1:04:44
Thank you, Phil.
1:04:45
This was a real joy, and I can't wait to speak with you again.
1:04:48
You know, we've never had a bigger community.
1:04:50
We've never had better tools.
1:04:52
We've never had more reason to get out and vote.
1:04:54
Let's use our power.
1:04:56
Awesome. I want to
1:04:58
second that, and all right, folks.
1:05:00
We'll see you next time. Please visit our accessible website at www.disabilitypridepa.org.
1:05:10
You can find us on social media at disabilitypridepa on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.