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Hi, and welcome to the your good news podcast with me your host Katherine Getty. Each Thursday, I'll give you the scoop on the good news coming out of Washington and how you can get involved with this thing called democracy.
Welcome back to another episode of The your good news podcast with members of Congress back in their districts campaigning to be honest, not much is happening in Washington. So today we will fully be diving into the idea of getting ready to vote. How do you prepare to exercise your right to vote. And really, it's all about making a plan. Step one we covered mainly in Episode 59. But for a refresher, registering to vote and checking your registration status. Checking your registration status super easy, check out usa.gov/confirmed voter registration, don't worry, I'll put that link in the show notes. And you can see if you are good to go step one check. If you haven't registered to vote 21 states and the District of Columbia have same day voter registration, I will include that link that lays out the states and you can find out more information on if you haven't registered in your in one of those states how to register. So step one, registering to vote confirming registration. Step two, find a sample ballot and research it. Finding a sample ballot gives you the opportunity to know when you walk in that ballot box or you mail in that that ballot, you know exactly what you're going to be voting on and feel really confident in that ballotpedia.org/sample ballot lookup offers you a really quick and easy tool. If you can't find it through there. Sometimes they don't have all of the ballots, you can check, check out your local board of election and state board of elections. And being able to kind of see a sample ballot gives you some more confidence on what you're going to be voting on the researching piece. It's not only researching the candidates by visiting their websites, watching debates, and listening to speeches or even campaign stops. It is also looking at the ballot measures or propositions and initiatives. And at a basic level, those, you know ballot measures propositions and initiatives are typically items at the end of the ballot, that maybe look really wonky, their lawyer written oftentimes, and they could reference a penny sales tax increase, or the penny sales tax increase, or legalizing marijuana or adding or removing something from your state's constitution. So those ballot measures are super important. And so being able to take the time to research a couple of different ways like checking out okay, I want to learn more about Proposition insert number or this ballot measure says it's going to give a half a cent help schools, where is the money going to be going, you can look at your local papers, you can look online, there's a myriad of ways to be able to research and kind of take all of those pieces and form your own opinion. And then kind of the last thing is voting. So maybe you're a military service member. sounds trite. But thank you so much for your service. You already know you're going to be absentee voting or maybe you're not able to vote in your your district that you know how to get there. A really good resource is Federal Voting Assistance. program.gov. That's through the Department of Defense. It lays out how do you understand where you're going to be able to vote if you're a military service member. You can also be getting a mail in ballot since 2020. You have seen more mail in ballots. It's a new kind of a taking absentee ballot and applying it to a wider population. But make sure you read the directions and know the deadlines to submit it. USPS we love them but sometimes it's slow so get those ballots in after you've done your research. and exercise your right to vote. And then lastly, going in person to vote. So similar to researching the issues that are on the ballot research, where your precinct as research the times that are available, knowing what you're going to need some states maybe have voter ID laws, some states, maybe you need to have your voter card, whatever it may be, do your research so that you feel prepared and also have a backup plan. lines can be long. So bring water, bring a snack, be prepared, maybe come back at a different time. Oftentimes, in the morning at lunches and at night, are the longest times does your employer allow you to leave for an hour to go vote in the middle of the day, maybe it'll be a shorter line. So do some research on actually going into vote, because it is really fun to get that sticker.
I know I'm maybe six years old saying that. But before I do a little bit of a recap, I do want to say, I know there are a lot of steps to voting. And I think of it in this way. Voting is something worth investing in voting is our voice and action of voting is something we don't get to do often. And while it is a lot of research, it is invaluable for our future. So to recap the steps step one, registering to vote, checking your registration status, making sure you know if you're good to go making sure if you haven't registered in your in a same day registration state you that you know how to register to vote, step to finding your sample ballot and researching all the different things that are on it. It will make you feel super prepared. It will make you feel like you know exactly what's going to be happening. And you will know when something is a person wins or loses or a ballot measure fails or succeeds. You know exactly what's happening. And lastly going to vote may that be in person or via mail. exercise that right? So that's it that's it for today. Thank you so much for joining another episode of The your good news podcast. If you haven't already, please subscribe so weekly an episode will be where you stream your podcasts, leave a review, share with someone you know. also reach out to me I'm on Instagram. My handle is at Katherine Getty. I would love to hear your feedback on this episode and what you'd like to hear in the future. And as always, tune in next Thursday for another episode of The Yorker news podcast.
