Volume 138, Issue 23 Wednesday, February 19, 2020
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2020 Voting and Census Guide
Letter from the Editor: Why voting and the census are important
Letter from the Editor
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Volunteer Voters
pg 2 Census Absentee voting State Data Center What does it mean to
GABRIELA SZYMANOWSKA Editor-in-Chief
pg 3 count? pg 4
Democratic Primary List
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Absentee Primary Voting
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Fairground Stadiums
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Understanding the Census
I have a distinct memory of when I was younger — no older than 10 or 11 years old at the time — of my grandparents taking my younger brother and I with them to go vote. I can still see my grandma stepping behind a blue curtain to fill out a ballot and then handing it to me, so I could toss it into the voting box. However, the circumstance was completely different at the time because my grandparents weren’t voting in America. They were voting in an election in Warsaw, Poland. Nonetheless, the impression of my grandparents voting and the importance that they instilled in me about voting would stick with me, even when I stood in line to vote for the first time in 2016. And it is important to vote, because it gives everyone a chance to share their voice on concerns and issues that matter to them. For decades, many groups of people have fought for the right to vote in the U.S., many finally gaining that right after overcoming one obstacle after another. This year marks the 100th year of the Women’s Suffrage movement achieving their goal of being able to vote with the 19th Amendment. That’s pretty impressive. But, America has been an independent county since 1776 and held its first Presidential election was from 1788 and 1789,
where only white, middle-class men voted. Today, there are a ton of voices who can be heard through voting. Yet, there are still voices around the globe who don’t have the same rights afforded to citizens like most citizens here in the U.S., and there are still plenty of issues that need to be addressed. And while one vote may not seem like a lot, every vote adds up to express the rights of citizens to be heard. This year is also a big year for the U.S. because not only will thousands of new voters be taking to the polls to vote in the 2020 Presidential Election, but the U.S. Census Bureau will also begin collecting data for the next national census. The updated information of the census will allow the U.S. to see a snapshot into who U.S. citizens are, help inform federal decisions and laws, provide more funding for cities that need it and show the growth of the country over the last 10 years. The staff here at the Daily Beacon thought that it would be helpful to create a special issue guide for both of these events to explain the importance of the census, explain how absentee ballots work for those college students living away from home who want to participate in voting, present a breakdown of the list of candidates currently running for the presidential seat and why it’s important to vote. Along with this special issue, the Daily Beacon has partnered with the UTK Commission for Women and Lumos in filming over 100 students, faculty, staff and members of the UT community about why they think it’s important to vote. The videos will be released over the course of the next year on the Beacon’s social media platforms leading up to the elections. Stay tuned to find out why voting is important to the Volunteer community and connect with us if you’d like to share why voting is important to you.